WEA courses

Begin your journey into the care sector with our Step into Care course. Learn essential skills and knowledge required to provide high-quality care to clients. Ideal for individuals considering a career in care or looking to enhance their caregiving skills.

Do you want to start learning English? Do you lack confidence when speaking in everyday situations like at the doctor’s, at your child’s school, out shopping or on public transport? If English is not your first language and you want to learn at a beginner level and become more confident to speak to people, this course will get you started with some of the words and phrases needed to communicate in everyday situations. It will also give you confidence with some basic digital communication skills. In addition, we will help you to practise giving your own information and filling in forms accurately.

This course looks at the troubled years after 1140, when England was ravaged by civil war and had two rival monarchs: the Empress Matilda, the daughter of King Henry I and her cousin, King Stephen. The Empress spent 17 years trying to secure her birthright. These years were called ‘The Anarchy’ by historians because of the destruction wreaked by both sides on villages and towns across southern England and the breakdown of law and order. The course explores the reasons why William Adelin’s sister, the Empress Matilda never achieved the Crown.

How do the popular representations of smuggling in novels, songs, poems, paintings and film match up to the reality? We will look at some of the enduring romantic depictions alongside official records to consider the reality of life for people up and down the Essex coast in the 18th century engaged in smuggling or the fight against it.

We shall discuss the tidal waves of history which enabled the Low Countries to become the driving force in trade, exploration and also painting at this time. This course will educate and entertain those with an interest in the life and work of three of the greatest artists of their age and probably of all time – Pieter Paul Rubens, Rembrandt van Rijn and Johannes Vermeer

In order to redress the balance of the narrative, each week this course covers different women artists depicting aspects of war set within the historical context. There will be a bias towards British artists, but not exclusively. You will look at artworks that these artists produced before, during, and after a war and these artworks will be in different mediums from pencil to oil and encompass print mediums too.

This friendly creative writing course will invite you to enter into relationship with your bodies and surroundings. The session will be held in a supportive way and will integrate some simple meditation (adaptable to all bodies), prompts for creative and reflective expression through writing, and even some environmental science! You will be guided to a holistic understanding of person and place. This course is ideal for people who like to write and to contemplate how to live more skilfully as individuals, as a community and in relationship with their surroundings. There will be time for sharing small parts of your writing towards the end of the workshop but no pressure, it’s about an unfolding individual/shared creative process and participants need to feel at ease to write freely.

This exciting new course in art appreciation provides close attentions to particular works of art from ancient and modern periods. Ancient art from Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece and Rome; the European Renaissance; the Enlightenment and its derivations; twentieth-century Modernity; the present day. The focus will be upon the specific and often connected comprehensions of beauty and coherence through understanding specific works of art in relation to these concepts. The course will present a range of work each week and will select one part of the subject for a Close View for detailed attention. The focus will be upon works of art in relation to their sometimes specific and often varied concepts of beauty. This will encourage a range of attentions from ideal sculptures to presentations of works with planned proportions as well as incidental measurements. This will also involve attentions to both forms directly from the natural world to objects representing different aspects of humanity.

This ESOL Literature course is for E2/E3 students who want to improve their English. You will read and talk about different stories, poems, and parts of books. The course will help you understand what you read and learn new words. You will do fun activities, talk in groups, and write about what you read. This will help you get better at reading, writing, speaking, and listening in English. The course is designed to make learning enjoyable and to help you feel more confident using English.

If you are getting ready to take an ESOL entry 2 speaking and listening course, this course can help you prepare. Learn verbal communication skills to get up to speed before starting your entry 2 ESOL course. Get ready courses help you learn English at your own pace. This is an introductory English course for beginners. If you’re helping others access entry 2 ESOL classes in the UK, you’ve come to the right place. You must live in the Peterborough and Cambridgeshire postcode areas to get this course free.