IGO December 25 News Extra
Festive greetings to everyone in Interest Groups Online, and warm wishes for the season ahead. As we celebrate the end of the year, we have new groups: Mindfulness, Nature, and Womankind 2, and hope many of you will enjoy connecting, learning, and sharing together in the months ahead. We always want to hear from IGO members and the activities in their groups – email
Helen Titherington, Trust Volunteer – IGO News Extra Editor
Edward Burne-Jones, The Adoration of the Magi
New Group - Womankind 2
Following a successful year with Womankind Group 1, a second Group is planned to start in January 2026. If you are interested in discussing issues relevant to women’s lives today, then this is your opportunity!
Among other things, this discussion group will be exploring the designed and built world from women’s perspective and needs and follow the journey of how the silenced voices of women in faith leadership and protest returned and became stronger.
Full list of topics, dates/times and how to join – is available at the IGO website Groups Page.
Hazel – group leader
Join via Beacon
New Group – Mindfulness and Nature
This group will bring together two powerful approaches to wellbeing and ageing well. The group is for those who have an interest in mindfulness or practice it, and who wish to explore deepening their enjoyment of nature.
Firstly, it will build on the popular u3a Mindfulness and Meditation Learning Events, which utilise the framework of the Five Ways to Wellbeing: Notice, Connect, Be Active, Give and Keep Learning. We will add Joy and Saving the Planet to create a seven-element framework.
Secondly, it will take the principle of connecting with nature to explore the many benefits of taking mindfulness not just into everyday life, but also into connecting with nature.
In each session, the group will explore mindfulness and nature through the lens of one of the seven elements. This will involve mindfulness practices and mindful movement with a nature theme, presentations on specific topics and reflection and discussion in groups to learn together. The group is open to all abilities, including those who will be new to mindfulness or have mobility issues. It will encourage access to nature, whether it be a window view from your home, a garden, a park or the countryside.
Sessions will include sources such as books, poetry, music and art and introduce the techniques of mindful photography. Participants will be encouraged to share their own knowledge and experiences. We will also explore how these topics relate to practices such as Forest Bathing, Sense Foraging and Green Wisdom.
For more information, please contact Mike through this group's entry in the Beacon Members' Portal. All enquiries are welcome.
New Group – Preparing a Talk
A hands on session in a small, informal group setting aiming to discover how a few simple ideas can make a talk more interesting. Learn new ones or brush up those skills!
Join via the Beacon Members' Portal.
New Potential Group – Shared Reading Group
Potential groups provide an opportunity for members to help set up a group which is not currently included in our active groups or where exsting groups are full. When there enough members in the Potential group, we organise a meeting so you can decide between you how the group will work and how it will be run.
A Shared Reading group brings people together to read aloud, reflect, and discuss literature in real time, creating a warm, inclusive space for connection and conversation. Inspired by initiatives like those run by the Derby Book Festival, this format welcomes participants of all backgrounds to engage with short stories, poems, or excerpts from longer works, guided by a facilitator who reads aloud and gently steers discussion.
The emphasis is not on literary analysis or prior reading, but on shared experience: how the words resonate, what memories or emotions they stir, and how they speak to our lives today. No preparation is needed just turn up, listen, and join in as they wish.
The group will be opento all members who enjoy storytelling, thoughtful dialogue, and the pleasure of words well spoken. Whether you’re a seasoned reader or simply curious, this is a chance to connect, reflect, and discover literature together; it is important to emphasise that members can also just sit and listen.
Join via the Beacon Members' Portal.
Groups with Spaces
-
Agatha Christie in the Evening – 2nd Wednesday at 7pm
-
Great albums of the 70s (2) – 3rd Monday at 10am
-
Italian Conversation for Beginners – 1st and 3rd Thursdays at 4pm
Join via Beacon
Spanish Buen provecho - new series in the new year.
The Spanish conversation group Buen Provecho begins a new series of 5 sessions in the new year - so if you want to practice phrases around food and drink in Spain why not sign up now - there will be 10 places - the times are 11.30 on Fridays - dates - January 9th, 23rd, February 6th, 20th, March 6th - try your best to commit to attending all 5 sessions.
Join now for one of the ten spaces via Beacon
Armchair Archaeology in the New Year
The group will meet 21st January at 10.30. The subject will be Cairnpapple - Neolithic to Bronze Age sacred and burial site
The sessions are every third Wednesday
Join via Beacon
Dr John Wells, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons
Forty Question Quiz - 13 January at 3pm
The world of ‘sub-cultures’ is this month's theme for the general knowledge quiz. The quiz is held every second Tuesday at 3pm.
Join via Beacon
-
What did Christopher Cockerell patent in December 1955
-
Which Belfast born Shakespearean actor and film director was born 10 December 1960
-
What did unruly American colonists empty into the sea in Boston, December 1773
-
Emily Brontë wrote which famous novel before she died of tuberculosis in December 1848 at the age of 30
-
Who was murdered in Canterbury Cathedral in December 1170
Answers at the end
