For me, there is not much more daunting a task for a teacher than lecturing to teachers. I enjoy taking on tasks that scare me, and this is one of them – the Southern Vermont Educators Symposium. Each year, this event tasks me with lecturing educators on a topic I hold very dear to my heart— teaching creatively. This year’s focus was differential/universal design. I see much of my teaching style in that arena, and couldn’t wait to offer a workshop. I chose the topic – Experiments in Wet Felting – as my way of introducing “soft art” into the classroom. This is the workshop excerpt:
Explore a workshop that will inspire you to take new creative leaps incorporating fiber arts into your unit planning. Learn how easy it is to hand make wool felt — in this workshop you will use soap,
warm water and some “elbow grease” to create two different types of felt beads. While creating our experiments, we’ll talk about using fiber art for differentiated learning– tapping into each student’s diverse needs & creativity, while developing their science, math, history, spatial skills, and physicality. * You will get wet in this workshop, bring an apron or a change of clothes.
I had a great group of six students, and each once of them made a felted bead, and a long sushi roll of swirly felted beads. I had a blast, but more importantly, everyone got excited thinking about ways to add this type of activity to their own classrooms! Best of all, I got really great feedback from the students on the workshop evaluation- Here are a few I’ll share-
- Fabulous, informed instructor who could speak to how to teach felting
(rich hands-on-project) in and out of the art room. - So much fun-Really enjoyed this . . . took me to new creative places.
- Very exciting class. I learned a lot.
- Great! So many possibilities for my classroom.
You can check out my FELT links on pinterest to whet your appetite.
Have a workshop, event or class in mind? Contact me for class availability.
