Reflect & Evaluate your first year experience
My first year of Textiles in practice has been a brilliant learning experience. I really enjoyed having different textile worlds to explore in different units.
My first Unit was Embroidery and I loved learning things on the machine side of embroidery that I always wondered how to do.
I found this to be the project I excelled most in as I really enjoyed making different samples and for me I think that it was the most structured textile world that I went to.
My next world was construct. Firstly I had a wall up with knitting machines and weaving machines, however it turned out to be easier and more enjoyable than I first expected.
For this project I was poorly throughout most of the weaving section of the module, which really set me behind. However I tried my hardest to pick myself back up and get back into it with the knitting section. Being able to be taught how to use these machines was also such a good experience and something that I wont forget. I still would like to be able to push this textile world and I currently think it is what I would like to choose for my second year. My time management was becoming a lot more easier to handle when I had certain times to use the machines I found this useful as it helped me plan a full days work.
I would say that I didn't fulfil all i could with this unit. I was really disappointed that I couldn't do the weaving but maybe I will get a chance in the future. For this project, I decided with the knitting machine the samples that didn't work out so well were the ones I wanted to work with, this for me was again hard as I was so used to creating a finished project that was perfect in detail.
For construct the project name 'Data' led me to study the Latin term 'Data' which was 'Something given' Having a project with a certain skill along side to study for me was the best way of working. At first I was struggling to link the two projects together to find a common ground. I found tutorials really helped the constructive criticism was the best and helped clear my head when everything felt like it was getting to confusing.
For the last project 'UNIT X' we were assigned a group. Group tasks are hard and difficult but I have learnt so much and it was useful to see how the other students worked. In my group I have 3 film students, 2 fashion and 2 other textile students. I have learnt so much by just having one unit with different students. I have learnt how to manage my time, how to schedule my own meetings with the group and put aside certain times to see each others work. I have learnt how to take in ideas from other people, to bounce of each others ideas was so good and useful. Usually with a project you're on your own and your ideas are stuck in your head and you can get lost within it all but having a group to vent your ideas too was so good and helpful. I also learnt how to find common ground with ideas.. Changing my original ideas to help other peoples projects evolve better. The best thing that our group had was communication, having a Facebook group just for us was fantastic, sharing work online and always having influences. However I believe that I personally could have pushed myself more.. for our final group outcome we created a video that consisted of us and the changing art school. All of our projects revolved around the term 'Evolve' but personally I believe I could have done more work, more illustrations and managed my time better.
My first year over all has been an amazing experience I have learnt so much in such a short amount of time. Its nice to look back and see what I have achieved by having a blog to. I cannot wait to push myself in second year and get my head down. I personally think in second year I am going to have the dyslexia tests and have more constructed help to help me manage my time and work.
