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Can't sew, won't sew: unpicking
negative thinking
How we think about our ability to sew comes
from a variety of experiences and associations. If you want to
break the pattern of negative thinking, it helps to understand how we
arrive at these thoughts.
I teach teachers how to teach. When I ask them to think about bad
or unhappy learning experiences they can easily give me examples. They
can easily remember their exposure to these situations because over
time they have remembered the emotions that went with them. But
experience is only part of the reason that we develop poor attitudes to
the craft process.
Another important factor is how we think about ourselves. Imagine
that you are having a bad time in a learning situation. The
teacher is ineffective and can't manage to present the information in a
way that stimulates you. Frankly you are beginning to dismiss their
ability to teach.
It might be at this point that you rationalise your inability to
participate by telling yourself that you didn’t want to do it anyway!
However, if you already had a good opinion of yourself and your ability
to do the subject (in another situation) then you wouldn't be starting
to think negative thoughts. Ideas that you were stupid, inept,
etc. would not figure in your thinking. Instead, if you have a
good picture of your abilities. You'd probably by now thinking that
about the teacher.
Those of a shaky confidence though start to think that the problem in
understanding is theirs - and not the teachers. And if they have
had a number of previous poor experiences in the subject, guess
what! They will add this feeling to the others, and it will just
serve, once again to convince them, that yes, they really find this
subject difficult.
What's more troubling, is because they are convincing themselves of
their hopelessness, they decide that they will not put themselves in
this situation again, if they can. (There may have been times you
bunked off P.E. for instance because you dreaded showing up your poor
ball skills!).
All this seems pretty dire but it's easily changed. Use words of
encouragement and present information in a way that enables learners to
learn.
By that I mean
- Break down your project into tiny
steps.
- Make it easy for them to get started.
- Look for ways to involve them in the
subject.
- Chose subject designs that they like,
colours and materials.
- Make the project suit them as best you
can by encouraging them every step of the way and congratulating them
on these tiny success.
It is possible to change thinking. We know from research that
memories are 'telescoped' into one big memory. If there are lots
of poor experiences to craft then they will all be lumped together and
there will be negativity. The experiences that are strong on
emotions are likely to be remembered more.
If that's the case, make the experience memorable by making it
pleasurable. Enable them to interact with the project with
emotion.
This is made more possible through using the senses.
- The words you use need to be encouraging
and involving.
- The materials they feel should be
exciting and pleasurable.
- The things they see around them need to
be fun and enjoyable.
If learners in your class are negative, it is because they have
accumulated experiences that have had them believing they can't.
If you make every effort to re-teach them that they can, then you
should congratulate yourself that you have unpicked that
negativity. You may also have re-started someone on the road to
happy crafting.
=====================================================
Geraldine Jozefiak is passionate about
crafts and their place in
education. Be part of raising standards in teaching and learning
by offering the best possible creative opportunities.
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projects, books, teaching manuals or courses? Need ideas on what
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