Learn to ring church bells
A friend has invited you to do this with them.
Tower bell ringing is a team activity in which each ringer controls one bell by rope and keeps it in time with the others. The Association of Ringing Teachers says it takes on average 10 to 15 hours of intensive instruction to ring a bell safely and competently.
ModerateFreeMonthsIndoorsWith othersUK and US
How to start
- Read the Association of Ringing Teachers page on what happens in a first lesson.
- Use the Association's find a teacher page in the UK, or the North American Guild's list of towers, to find ringers near you.
- Contact the tower or teacher and arrange a first handling lesson.
Where to go
- Association of Ringing Teachers (UK charity that trains bell ringing teachers) UK
- Association of Ringing Teachers, "Your first lesson" UK
- North American Guild of Change Ringers list of towers and handbell bands US
We opened these links on 8 October 2026 and found them to be what we say. Dates, places and prices are on the official page, where they stay up to date.
Plan this
Pick a day, or a month, and we will set out how to get ready, step by step, with a date and a reason for each. Courses and classes have start dates and can fill up, so the plan begins with finding and booking one. Kit comes after the first session, once you know what you need.
Read next
“Education has no expiration”: Virginia Ordaz and her mother finished their degrees in the same class
How a retired fire dispatcher from Stockton, California, finished the degree she started in 1989, and how her mother finished hers more than 40 years after her last class. How to find out what your own old credits are worth, in the US and the UK.
Sixty paper hats on a table in Bridlington: David Smith and the shape mathematicians had sought for decades
David Smith of Bridlington, a hobbyist with no training in mathematics, found 'the hat': the first single shape known to cover a flat surface only in patterns that never repeat. How he found it, why he could not prove it alone, and the free tools that let you put the same tiles on your own table.

