one online course I have<\/a> is all pre-recorded – you can watch the videos at your leisure and if the internet is bad that day, then there\u2019s always tomorrow.)<\/p>\nMany of you are in very different time zones which don\u2019t overlap well with my daytime, when I am most coherent and able to teach. And if I’m teaching in the middle of my night, that disrupts my household, which isn\u2019t fair on them.<\/p>\n
I am not the sort of person who likes to teach, say, 2 hours per week over a period of weeks. I prefer a workshop that goes over 2 days or 4 days etc. Get in, get it done, get on with the next thing. If you were all in my time zone, we could probably do that sort of online zoom class. But we’re not all in the same time zone, and part of the reason so many people want online classes is precisely because we are in different parts of the world.<\/p>\n
3. Prerecorded video classes take time.<\/h3>\n
An online class in the prerecorded video format (like the one I have already done) takes a lot of time to create. I\u2019m not really one who derives oodles of pleasure from making videos. Books are my thing. And so I\u2019d prefer to devote time to that instead.<\/p>\n
4. I like being with people.<\/h3>\n
I love the personal interaction of an in-person class. I just don\u2019t believe you get the same lovely interaction through a video screen.<\/p>\n
5. Classes are not my main business activity.<\/h3>\n
Most other needlework teachers who do online classes primarily teach classes. That\u2019s their jam. Mine is writing books. That\u2019s my higher priority. I can reach far more people through my books.<\/p>\n
6. In the short term, online classes have a larger time commitment for me than in-person classes.<\/h3>\n
This probably seems counter-intuitive to you. However, an in-person class, or classes if at a conference, take between 3-10ish days to deliver, including travel time. That\u2019s a much smaller chunk out of my personal and working life than an online class which either stretches over weeks to deliver or takes weeks to create\/edit the videos.<\/p>\n
7. Catching people unawares (in a good way!)<\/h3>\n
I like to wander around my classroom, catching people doing lovely work (to praise and encourage them) and catching them making mistakes (so that I can help them before they realise they\u2019ve made one). As the teacher, if you sit up the front of the classroom waiting for students to come to you, you\u2019ll get those who love to ask questions and get all the help they possibly can. You\u2019ll also get those who\u2019ve realised they\u2019ve stuffed up somewhere and need help finding it and\/or fixing it. But you won\u2019t get those who don\u2019t realise they\u2019ve made a mistake. Catching people making mistakes before they realise they\u2019ve made one is much, much harder in an online class because I can’t simply cast my eye around the room and see them.<\/p>\n
8. Finding student mistakes is a big part of my job as a teacher.<\/h3>\n
As most of my classes are counted embroidery, finding mistakes and helping my students fix them is a HUGE part of a class for me. When you\u2019re working with fine counts of fabric as we often do, and needing to put the stitches in precisely the right spot, that\u2019s really hard for me to do over a zoom or through a photo. Let\u2019s face it, many people are not good at taking photos of their work, especially close up photos. It\u2019s incredibly easy for them to be blurry. If I can\u2019t see, I can\u2019t correct.<\/p>\n
9. Cutwork has a level of difficulty other embroideries don’t have.<\/h3>\n
\u201cOthers teach exacting work online just fine.\u201d Yes, I accept that is true. Many teachers teach fine needlepointing, silk shading, crewel work etc via online classes. If you get a stitch out of place in these forms of embroidery, it won\u2019t look as good. If you get a stitch out of place in some of the forms of embroidery I teach, the whole piece could fall apart. The scale of those mistakes is a little bit different.<\/p>\n
If you make a cutting mistake in an in-person class (hopefully I\u2019ll catch it before you do!) I will demonstrate on your work, how to fix it. (The second time, you can do it!) If you make it at home in an online class, there isn\u2019t that option. Many people find those sorts of mistakes absolutely overwhelming and the piece is liable to go in the bin\/trash or in a drawer to be fixed another day (yet never see the light of day again).<\/p>\n
I want my students to be successful. Sometimes that means holding their hand through a really difficult situation, and it is so much easier to do that in-person than through a screen.<\/p>\n
10. It’s hard for me to gauge what sort of feedback you want\/need, through a screen.<\/h3>\n
My classes are based around the student experience. I WANT you to be successful. I WANT you to have a great result. I WANT you to finish the piece and be oh, so proud of it. Being your cheerleader is a huge part of my role as a teacher. I want you to know when I think you\u2019ve done a marvellous job of something. I want to be able to gently and quietly correct when you haven\u2019t. Sometimes people only want praise. Sometimes people really want constructive criticism. Gauging which of those you need from me is so much easier when we\u2019re in the same room together and I can see your body language and the way you conduct yourself in class.<\/p>\n
You’re not just students; you’re people. And I want to acknowledge that in my dealings with you. It’s so much harder to build that rapport through a screen.<\/p>\n
So what does that mean for you?<\/h3>\n
I understand that many of you are a long way away from me in rural NSW, Australia. It\u2019s likely I\u2019ll never have the opportunity to come to most of you, and most of you will likely never have the opportunity to come to me. I\u2019m sorry about that. However, there is only one of me, and I have to live my life the way I want to and need to, and if that means I likely will never teach you (other than through a book – my books are quite good!) then that\u2019s the way it is.<\/p>\n
It all really boils down to this: People want books by me, in-person classes by me, and online classes by me. However, there is only one of me and my business is just me, and I can’t do everything.<\/strong><\/p>\nI am open to feedback. If you can think of a way to solve any of these problems, I’m happy to hear from you. I don’t know everything, and I acknowledge that!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<\/p>\n
Because of the way the pandemic changed our lives, we all realised that maybe we didn’t all need to be in the one place at the one time to meet. And so, since then, the increase in requests for online classes has been huge. For you, it often boils down to $$$. You don’t […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,9],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11476","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-embroidery-classes","category-teaching-embroidery","odd"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11476","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11476"}],"version-history":[{"count":47,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11476\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11524,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11476\/revisions\/11524"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11476"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11476"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/vettycreations.com.au\/white-threads\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11476"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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