Or,
in other words if you want to become an expert at something, teach it to
others. A very arrogant way to look at knowledge, I agree, but if the
counterpart in question have enough critical view of your ability to teach, and
if they are volunteers, why not?
In
fact, this is a part of my personal story: when I graduated from the secondary
school I had just marginally higher command of English, compared to my peers.
It is when I became a teacher to adult classes, at the age of 19, that I got
the drive to improve, make sure that I know the answers to, well, most
questions, and grow confidence at the pace my command of English improved. And
yes, I know, I still have a way to go, but the progress and the use I made of
it, were enough to make me trust the method.
And
as stated, I believe learning only works when we take things further, so here
is what I see as a plan to learn interior design …
Simplest
way to learn up to now was to enrol in a class. There are so many of them out
there. There are classes for beginners and mature students, for people who want
to know all about design in depth and for those who just need the basics of
decoration. There are classes with mandatory attendance and virtual classes
….and yet I chose to dismiss this method for two reasons:
- · I have my degree and experience in construction, just not the design department. I need an upgrade but I am conscious throughout the experience that my vision is already bigger than the Interior design picture, or shall I say 270 degrees aiming at 360? Is not a modest statement, but is very much how I see things (will try to keep this post as a bragging high, and go back to the practical later)… and
- · Structured learning is great, pushes you out of your comfort zone, makes you strive for deadlines, achievement and recognition, but without a project at hand, it can be oh so theoretical. And I need the variety of solid knowledge that I could apply any day out of a classroom.
Next
method proofed is ploughing one’s way through books. With books, one can pick
and mix the areas which matter, experiment and compare results to suggested
benchmarks…However it is a solitary method. I am nevertheless happy to announce
that I have found some precious paper companions, went true them, and plan to challenge,
share or compare what lies in them, hopefully subject to other posts!
And
finally, a thought I love – when you want to become expert on something – teach
it to others. Teach, however is way too confident to put it this way. I don’t
want to teach – I would love to share my learning curve with other interior
design enthusiasts, and if they can learn from my mistakes, and I hope, from my
victories too, then I will have put in my head some lasting knowledge.
My
teaching method is simple: there is a goal and means to it. And the process is
going to make the learning curve.
The
project, my goal, is my own apartment – my white canvass where I have unlimited
access and freedom to experiment. I also have immense responsibility regarding
all the mistakes to be made, and I also know that I want to go gentle on myself.
Is there a better educative framework I wander?
And
how can I measure the success of the endevour? Well, there’s going to be beforeand afters of accomplished work, but also – look into the evolution of
individual projects.
One
such evolution “under microscope” is going to be my recently acquired knowledge
about sample boards (in the next post). I was hoping to proceed in chronological
order, but my sample board task based class only happened a week ago, I already
had a few less than noble attempts at sample boards, and here I am rushing to summarise what I
got from the experience, and hope it could serve as a notebook to someone out
there!
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