I taught my first "Learn to Knit" class at The Artisan Hatchery this week! There were eight very nice ladies who signed up, and by the end most of them had gotten the hang of it and knitted several inches of garter stitch, hooray!
I've taught friends and family how to knit individually, but this was the largest group that I've taught at one time and I am shy and hate being the center of attention. Nevertheless, I love talking about yarn and getting more people interested in knitting, so I did okay teaching the class.
I provided each person with a skein of chunky-weight yarn (in their color choice), a pair of bamboo knitting needles, a stopper, and a tapestry needle. I casted-on the stitches for everyone in advance so that they could dive right into knitting a headband.
That worked out pretty well for most, and they liked that the needles were grippy so that their stitches didn't slide around. Towards the end of the class I showed them how to do a knitted cast-on, and how to bind off.
There are things that I will tweak for my next class to make things go smoother, but overall I think it was a success. At least one person finished her headband a few days later which makes me so happy.
I plan on teaching this intro class once or twice a month so long as there is interest. I'm also starting a Knit Club for the folks who want to continue on with their knitting adventures in a group setting.