Even at my age I love to learn. You never know everything and there is a wealth of information out there to be drawn on. When My Garden School School asked me if I would be interested in reviewing one of their many on line gardening courses, I said yes eagerly.
The next step was to decide which of the many and diverse courses on offer, most of which are 4 weeks, I was spoilt for choice, from garden design to garden history and everything I between. Being a very amateur photographer I was drawn to the course run by Clive Nichols called Flower Photography Master Class, which I dismissed as I needed a bit more paraphanalia that I have at the moment. Eventually I chose Container Gardening with Harriet Ryecroft as the tutor as I thought I would benefit from some advice and guidance on container planting. I always end up with an eclectic jumble which doesn’t always look as though much thought had been given to the placing and, more to the point, planting.
The on line course is a virtual classroom in which we can interact with fellow classmates and our tutor. There are weekly assignments to upload which are then assessed and critiqued by Harriet.
On Wednesday (2nd September) I received my first video tutorial with accompanying notes. Week 1 was Enhancing Your Garden with Containers. Harriet took us through various styles, suggestions and ideas with some great photos, which I found instructive as there were a lot of points I had never thought to consider. Our assignment was to select 4 containers, explain why we liked them, where we would place them in the garden and why. Harriet responded with some points which I will take on board, for example reproducing some of the border planting into the containers on the patio, thus bringing the two parts of the garden together.
Initially it looked as though I was going to be the only one on the course, but now there are three of us. It will be fun to draw on each other’s views on planting and containers. I have been somewhat challenged with the first assignment as the Garden School website was updated when the course started and, as with anything to do with computers and technology, there have been a few glitches. These are slowly being ironed out and it is an exciting and vibrant looking website. It is still a little cumbersome using my iPad, although I have found a way around this and, unfortunately, I still can’t log on to my laptop but as I said these are small glitches and easily sorted.
Completing the assignments don’t look as though they are going to be too onerous or time consuming. There are no limitations on the number of words we need to write which is great, and I found, on this assignment anyway, the only thing really required was the time and thought to look for the 4 containers but once on a roll it was fun.
Now I am looking forward to Week 2 – Principles of Success with container Gardening which starts on Wednesday.
