Although I’m very excited and nervous about teaching these classes especially since I have absolutely no experience, so I put the word out to the experts bead artists that I follow on Facebook hoping for some direction on offering bead weaving classes to teenagers and was a bit surprised not to get any feedback or comments at all.
This made me really wonder what in the world am I getting myself into!
I did explain to the girls that teaching about beads and bead weaving is all new to me and that we’d be learning from each other and they seem ok with that.
Thank goodness they are a talented and exceptionally smart teenagers!
True to my nature in that I try not to let obstacles totally defeat me I decided that it would be a good idea to blog about the experience – who knows someone else may ask a question similar to mine and hopefully this will give them some frame of reference.
I may not be very experienced at teaching this stuff but my research skills and avid desire to learn as much about the beading world as possible I feel gives me a certain edge; for instance, one of the websites I will be using as a primer was one I happened on several years ago when I was looking around for an online tutorial to learn basic stitches. Beads East was the only one that I could find out of all the tons of beading information on the internet that offered free animated lessons.
So I will stick with what worked then and is even better now because their website has improved and the tutorials are still free!
And too, recalling what my main challenges were starting out I figure that the first class or two will focus on how the variation in beads and bead types and bead color basics.
Understanding how to read patterns, especially if we are going to focus on bead weaving, is an extremely important skill to learn right from the start.
So I’m hoping to accomplish the following in the first two classes but in a very hands on way:
Introduce:
- bead size, type, color
- bead differences by making simple beaded projects like a peyote stitch ruler (I still have the one I made)
- reading a basic bead pattern
My main online source of reference for learning the bead weaving stitches will be Beads East.
I’m still open for suggestions and comments, but at least I feel like I’m off to a good start! Here’s a picture of two of the girls that will be attending
