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Gardening through the Seasons

Course code: ZCAV009P

Subject area: Learning for Wellbeing

Study level: Part Time

Course level: U

Course details

Course time:

14:00 - 16:00

Days of week:

Thursday

Course date:

24th Apr 2025 - 3rd Jul 2025

Course location:

Abingdon Campus

Contact details

Phone:

01235 555 585

This is a 10-week course which focuses on the highlights of the garden in Summer. With a combination of theoretical and practical gardening the aim is to learn more about how to maximise the enjoyment of summer gardening while learning about seasonal changes, essential jobs, maximising sustainability and biodiversity.
As part of your Gardening Through the Seasons course, you’ll have the exciting opportunity to work on a brand-new allotment patch right here on campus. This hands-on experience will allow you to apply your skills, gain practical knowledge about maintaining an allotment, and contribute to its development. It’s a fantastic way to deepen your understanding of seasonal gardening while helping to create a thriving community space.

You will need: Gardening gloves (if you choose to wear them, not essential), clothes and footwear suitable for practical gardening.

Participants may like to start collecting useful resources such as: empty toilet roll tubes, clean empty milk cartons, packing paper as used by online retailers, clean, empty plastic food containers of various sizes. You will be advised in advance which weeks these resources will be used.

Please note due to half term there will be no teaching on 29th May 2025.

Abingdon and Witney College is subject to Ofsted regulation and is required to work with all its students to make sure they understand Government initiatives around Safeguarding, Prevent and Fundamental British Values. Information on these matters will be shared with you during your course.

You will also be asked to complete monitoring paperwork, which helps us to deliver course content to the highest quality.

Course units
The course will explore:

- Sustainable gardening practices including recycling household waste items. - Gardening to increase biodiversity and provide food and shelter for wildlife. - Budget friendly ways to increase plant stock including taking shoot and root cuttings, dividing plants, sowing seeds. - Reducing garden and household waste by composting. - Harvesting rainwater and efficient watering strategies. - Using free resources such as eggshells, cardboard to improve soil. - Designing Summer themed planted containers. - Pruning and dead heading techniques to maximise flowering potential of plants. - Maintaining the summer garden and preparing for the growing season. - Wildflower meadows and the creation of small-scale wildflower meadows. - The pros and cons of “No mow May.” - Different plant types and how they can be combined to best effect in the garden.

Entry criteria
Energy and enthusiasm and interest in learning how to develop a sustainable garden.

Courses can fill fast, so please enrol early to avoid disappointment. Decisions on whether a course is to run are made two weeks prior to the start date - an email will be sent to you should there be changes to your course or if it is cancelled. Please check your inbox leading up to your course, including the junk folders. For anyone without an email account, our Admissions team will phone you instead.

For the first week of the course you will need to bring a valid form of identification; this includes passport, driving licence, debit/credit card, Birth Certificate or National Insurance card.

Please note - you should be 19 years old or over at 31st August 2024 prior to starting the course.

Fee information
Courses offered by the college are fully or partly funded by the Government and the published fee takes account of this funding.

Before starting a course, the College is required to check you meet conditions relating to that funding, e.g. age, residency status within the UK/EEA, prior qualification level and employment status. In some circumstances (such as with online enrolments), these checks can only be completed after you have enrolled and paid.

If you are unable to pay in full for this course at the time of enrolment, and the course tuition fee is £300 or more, an instalment plan is available. If this is your preference, please do not enrol online but rather call the Admissions Team on 01235 216400 to enrol.

Once enrolled, Admissions will take the first instalment payment from you and pass on your details to the Finance team who will email you to set-up your payment plan. Please return a fully completed instalment plan to Finance as failure to do so could result in being withdrawn from your course.

The rules on fee reduction are complicated, we would encourage you to talk to our Admissions Team on 01235 216400 to discuss these options. You can find more information on our Fees and Bursaries page - search "Fees and Bursaries" at the top of the page.

19+ Fee:

£197.00

19+ Reduced Fee:

£101.00

Qualifications received
As this is a non-accredited course, there is no formal qualification. However, you will be asked to complete activities that demonstrate how you are progressing on your course.
Learning & method assessment
This is both a theory based and practical course. Learners will be able to participate in weekly, classroom activities to build and share knowledge alongside their peers as well as working in the garden to develop their practical gardening skills and learn new techniques. There is no exam attached to this course.

As this is a non-accredited course, there is no formal qualification. To track your progress and achievement you will be required to complete a short document.