Last week, however, I got a new perspective on ants from my three-year-old grandson. He actually seems to like them! At the least, he finds them very interesting. During our visit, we checked out online information and videos and talked about the little critters. I couldn’t help but tell him the story of Two Bad Ants, written by Chris Van Allsburg. It’s one of my favorite books that tells about ants coming into a home. Unfortunately, I didn’t have the book with me, so I just told the story of how a couple of ants lingered behind in the sugar bowl while the other, more disciplined ants, carried their treasure out of the house. The entire story is told from the perspective of the ants and it was difficult to get the real effect without the pictures. Yet, my grandson was intrigued.

Tonight, I decided to dig out that book and take with me on my next grandmotherly expedition. At first I couldn’t find it. That meant I had to dig through the many picture books housed in my closet and that’s when I realized. Those books were my old friends. I touched worn copies of Winnie, the Witch, Roxaboxen, Rabbit and the Moon, The Last Dance and other familiar works. My reaquaintance with them didn’t even require page turning as the memories flooded back from the mere sight of them.

I could tell you that I read these to my own children, but that wouldn’t be right. I read these to teachers and university students in my classes. No workshop with me was complete without story time after lunch. While some thought this was silly, others looked forward to this part of our day. I usually told, rather that read, the story as I showed the pictures. At times I used a prop or two such as the shawl I wore in various ways for The Last Dance. I not only remember the stories, but I remember the people and the situations wherein I used them. Those books are like little capsules of my past that hold more than I ever realized until this evening.

Lest you think I neglected my own children, I should tell you that the pages of other books like Drummer Hoff and Where the Wild Things Are have well worn pages as well from our family sharing. I’ll bet my adult son can still recite most of the verses in Drummer Hoff.

I believe in this new period of publishing where many books are ready electronically, but wonder what will remain from these to help hold the memories of sharing books with others. My hope is that we will always share real copies of picture books and that these will be passed from one generation to the next as treasured gifts, not just relics. For now, I’m just anxious to share with another little person . . . hand-on.

I’ve truly enjoyed the two jewelry classes that I taught last week, one in Wimberley, TX and the other in San Marcos. I worked with seven women as they learned to make a wrap bracelet in Wimberley and then four more who worked on wrapping cabachons. I enjoyed hearing from the first group about who some of them planned to pass their bracelet to as a gift. I regret not getting a photo of that group, but note the happy intensity on the faces of the second.

It’s common for someone to ask a designer ideas come from. I have no doubt that many of mine come during preparation for teaching. I think that is why it takes me so long to get ready to teach a class. There’s something about this pre-planning that gets my creative juices flowing. I used to fight this urge, trying to stay on task, but now I just go with it. I do, however, have to resist my propensity to want to teach the new idea instead of that which was designated for the class. I just keep wanting to pass it on.

As an example, a couple of gals came over for a little assistance in starting their journey into soldering with a torch. They hardly got off the ranch before I was cutting and planning the piece below. Yes, I know it’s a bit bird-like, but it wasn’t planned that way – oh well, it’s definitely different!

I’ve also done a new soldered design that someone on Facebook suggested is Bohemian. The legs on this piece are soldered to the bottom half of the arc and then wire wrapped. I was tickled that the very first sale of this went to my good friend who often calls and says “is the Dreamcatcher Designs shop open?”  (Of course you know I don’t have a shop!) Sometimes she just runs out to the ranch and gets what she needs. This piece was gifted from her to a co-friend of ours and I’m pleased for her to have it. Do you think you can wear “Bohemian” at the Lutheran Church?

As you read, many things, both concrete and ideational, were passed on last week. From teacher to student, student to teach and friend to friend. I think life was very productive.

I’ve been making cold connections for the past couple of weeks. No, I haven’t been meeting cold people and the weather here has been quite warm. Instead, I’ve been making cold connections with metal. When we join things to metal in a way that doesn’t require heat, usually through soldering, we say we’ve used a cold connection. This week my cold connections have been through riveting.

It was my turn to lead and share a technique at our monthly Faux meet up. Yesterday, we had about 20 in attendance and I think most of us got a little better at riveting in the time we spent together. I was determined to have some new projects that my fellow designers could try and thus the reason for the past weeks of making those cold connections. I thought you might enjoy seeing a couple of the pieces I designed.

The first is the easier of the two and is just a simple variation of the wave necklaces that I’ve made. This one features a riveted charm in the center. This charm utilizes both a copper disc and a nickel silver disc with the center cut out. I riveted these two together and also riveted a pewter finding in the middle. I used a headpin that I balled with the torch for the center rivet. The other rivets were purchased from Rio Grande Jewelry Supply. I wired the charm onto the wave necklace armature.

The second necklace is a bit modern looking, but it’s definitely different. I used alcohol ink to color some copper discs and then riveted them together with nickel silver discs. Again, I used balled headpins for the rivets. I also riveted some big hole rose quartz beads that I got from Magpie Gemstones (www.magpiegemstones.com) onto a couple of the discs. Although you only see two rose quartz beads on this necklace, it took four to make it if you count the two I broke while trying to rivet them. You really have to be careful when riveting a gemstone.

I demonstrated how to make a few other riveted charms, but haven’t yet used all of these in a particular design.

I really enjoyed working with my friends yesterday and helping them initiate or hone their riveting skills.  Although they were making cold connections, thankfully none of them were cold!

Here’s hoping all your personal connections are warm and that if you end up with cold connections, you’re riveting!

Yesterday, while preparing to teach a leather wrap bracelet class, I went back to pedagogy in designing a teaching aid. The bracelets, which I’ve shown before, are below.

  I had close to the maximum number of people enrolled in the class and wondered how in the world I was going to show everyone how to do the weaving required on this bracelet. For this bracelet, we were using smoke colored Fireline fishing line which it difficult to see and weaving it with beads over and under leather cord. It’s a piece of cake to demonstrate when you can sit right beside someone, but not so easy when the person is across the room from you. Therefore, I went with an enlargement of the technique. I dug in my ribbon stash and found some gold cord and some red ribbon. By attaching the cord to my giant clip board, I had my enlarged replica. It looks a bit silly, but it seemed to work and people could see it from across the room. I appreciate the participants who didn’t laugh at my replica.

This happening reminds me of teaching preschool piano classes when I had my father cut large music notes out of wood which we painted black. Then I made a big music staff on heavy white plastic. The children and I sat on the floor to learn concepts. (Those were the days when I could still get up off the floor as quickly as they did!)

One of the best things about teaching is that students inadvertently teach me what works. When I demonstrate something and they don’t get it, I have to figure out what to do next instead of just thinking they were slow to learn. As these difficulties arise, I need to figure out a different way to teach the same thing and make it clearer. Also, when numerous students make the same error, I know it’s because I did something wrong. That’s something I need to fix.

Students also teach me through their questions. A query is often indicative of something I might demonstrate in a better fashion next time. The students teach me through these questions.

I think one of the best parts of teaching is that the process is reciprocal. Both the students and the teacher learn when the environment is risk free.

As an educator I spent considerable time studying the art of questioning. I hesitate to tell you how many books there are on this single topic.  You may have fond, or not so fond, memories of learning Blooms Taxonomy of Cognitive Objectives which forms the basis for some questioning procedures. At the university level, I enjoyed helping new teachers develop their own questioning techniques and researching their progress. I enjoyed using DeBono’s Six Thinking Hats for developing questions. Now, as I teach classes in jewelry making techniques I again find myself knee deep in questioning.

Lately, as I have listened to myself and others teaching, I’m aware of the fact that we occasionally answer the question we thought we heard rather than the one someone actually asked. (It reminds me of the parent who calmly and carefully explains the physical differences in boys and girls when the young child only wanted to know if there’s a difference in boys and girls jeans.) It can be quite perplexing when a teacher misunderstands a student’s question regarding how to do something. In this case the instructor may provide a thorough (and sometimes lengthy) explanation as an answer. The student is then even more perplexed since the explanation doesn’t fit with the problem. Then the teacher is perplexed because the student doesn’t understand the answer. (what a mess!) This really slows the learning process while frustrating everyone involved.

I’m attempting to remind myself to clarify the question before providing an answer. I may begin by saying “are you asking . . . ?” Or I may start my answer with “I think I hear you asking . . . “ Then there’s the useful phrase “do you want to know . . . ?” I hope this will make me a better teacher.

As I again practice my questioning techniques for the jewelry classes, I wonder if my developing skills will help me with a three year old. Some how I have my doubts! I’m beginning to think the real question is “are you smarter than a three-year-old?”