Silverwood Park - Christa Von Wald - residency - 3.5
This week I was at Silverwood Park for their first ever weaving workshop. Christa Von Wald led the workshop and has been at Silverwood for several years now. I’ll be working with here for a few of my events at Silverwood. She was also a former students of Lynda so it was really great to connect with her and see her teaching style.
I’ve never done weaving before but I got a chance to try my hand at it. It was really meditative and enjoyable; I understand why all of our students asked for a part two. Despite the rough weather we had full attendance! The program was open to anyone over the age of 16. We had 8 female students ranging from late twenties to mid sixties. Most people came with a friend and had attended other programs at Silverwood. No one had a lot of experience but they all had previous exposure to weaving and were interested in picking it up as a hobby or art form. Our class was only two hours and everyone wanted to keep going.
I arrived an hour early to help Christa set up. Each student got a loom (made locally!), two needles, several types and colours of yarn and a few handouts. I really like how Christa designed these; they were clear, brief and helpful references they actually wanted to keep. The first handout had a list of the materials they got to keep (like their loom and needles) and a simple description of the different types of stitches they would be learning. It also had pictures of finished examples. The second handout was a list of references and resources with everything from artists that can serve as inspirations, online tutorials and places to get yarn.
It was a really nice group to be with. They weren’t shy and asked for things to be repeated or for one and one help. Simples demonstration was followed up with individual help and advice. Christa was really wonderful and patient with everyone. Students helped each other readily which was really nice to see. The first hour had to be pretty structured as Christa needed to show everyone how to start and teach the different kinds of stitch. Once everyone felt good about that it was free time for them to work asking for assistance as needed. Everyone seemed to agree that they would have loved to spend more than two hours doing this and wanted a whole afternoon to just stitch away.
I don’t have a ton of experience with teaching adults. A big fear of mine with teaching adults is that I won’t be taken seriously. It was nice to see adults in their sixties take a young teacher seriously, treat her with respect and value her advice and instruction. Watching Christa handle one on ones with such patience and kind words was really nice to see. I’m used to kids and would hate to come off as patronizing to an older adult. Seeing how she was able to help but remain hands off is a great lesson I hope to emulate.
I loved the weaving workshop and am really excited to work with Christa again. She leads the senior program I’ll be involved with so by the end of the semester I’ll have a wealth of knowledge and observation of how to work with adults.
I was supposed to be with a homeschooled group on Friday at Silverwood. We were going to do some activities, read some books and go ice fishing. But the weather had other plans. The sponsor decided to cancel the event which was probably for the best. I didn’t want to sit outside ice fishing for an hour in that bitter cold, I’m sure the kids didn’t either. Hopefully I’ll get to another Field Trip Day at Silverwood.
Student’s set up
My practice weaving for demonstrations