Intense Pattern, Friday the 12th. Mary and I arrived at Jane's house at 8:15 for the 9:00 class. I had to set up everything, so it took most of the forty-five minutes. I brought enough baggage that it looked as if I were moving in for a couple of months. Within minutes of our arrival other members of the class starting arriving too. Everyone was very punctual which is a Good Thing.
We started right at nine o'clock and after a few minutes of my explaining about the obligations of a piloter in a pilot class, we got started. I was one set of photos short, but luckily I had tucked another set in with my teaching materials so everyone had a full set. After going through the kit and explaining what we were doing--giving them a choice of either a sampler or a notebook--we dove into the patterning. First were the basic manipulations: translation, rotation, reflection, and glide reflection. Some people got off to a rocky start. Three or four of the eleven students were convinced that they were in way over their heads and that they could never do this. As I could see frustrations levels rising, I did some one-on-one with the troubled ones. Slowly they caught the gist of graphing the patterns. We were into the glide reflection when we all caught on. Glide reflection is the hardest of all the concepts in the whole class. It took me several days, when I was teaching myself, to become comfortable with it. I hope I helped these women over that hump. There was a little stitching in the morning--we needed the rest from the brain work!
Then all of a sudden it was time for lunch. We sailed through a morning break. By 11:30 we were tired. I ate my Braunsweiger and Swiss on rye sandwich, munched on my carrots, and desserted on two mini-muffins that Jane had brought in for the occasion. After a short rest, we were at it again.
In the afternoon we started on the basic networks: block, brick, half-drop, and diamond. These are easier in some ways than the others, but none are completely trivial. After I explained these, we stitched the rest of the class time until 3:30. At that time we had show-and-tell for people who brought in some of their past blackwork. It was an exhausting, but pleasurable day.
I need to explain the graphing a little more for the July class. I had made the assumption that everyone knew how to graph and I was wrong. About one-third of the class had no idea what I was talking about. The pace was about right. We did the concepts slowly, but thoroughly. Things will go a bit faster tomorrow.
One student who was busy scribbling and scribbling said that she was finished with the graph of the concept, but she had so many ideas that she was hurrying to get them all down. Another student said she could imagine the patterns she could make from the basic tools she learned. She also could see blackwork with her own patterns. Everyone completed all the graphing--and I hope they understood it. We went over several things that were harder and I had more individual time again in the afternoon. I believe that everyone is up to speed. I am amazed at how much everyone seems to like the class.
I personally could drop from tiredness, but I will not go to bed until after nine. Discipline!
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