desserted

Monday, August 25, 2008

QCX521 - website review 1

1. Sewing At About

Sewing At About falls under one of the many subsidiary sites at About.comthat cater to a wide range of interests and hobbies, such as gardening, travel, electronics and so on. With the slogan "Guidance, Not Guesswork", you definitely need little help in guessing the purpose it serves.

At Sewing@About, it's all about sewing!

The resident guide is Debbie Colgrove who has won awards in many sewing competitions and has more than 30 years of experience in sewing. She has had 2 publications on sewing and believes in the use of visual cues to help beginners in the learning of s

ewing. Naturally, you can expect an extremely guided and comprehensive learning journey over at Sewing@About if you are interested in picking it up as a hobby.

How it is applicable to HE lessons

As our students are namely noobs when it comes to sewing, they will need to learn and understand the basics before they can even start on any sewing project. Over at the LearnToSew page, it is divided into 4 main categories - Sewing Terms, Basic Sewing Techniques, Sewing Machine Techniques and Beginner Projects & Patterns. Each section is then further broken down into sub topics and comes with illustrated diagrams such that the student will find the information easier to digest. Sewing@About can serve as a useful revision site for students whereby they can refresh their memory on the sewing relevant information and at the same time, pick up extra knowledge on topics that are not covered in class.

For sewing lessons in class, the activities often include sewing projects in which the student may be required to brainstorm on little items that they can construct. The teacher can also gather ideas on what is appropriate to be taught in class for sewing projects. As such, Sewing@About offers some simple projects which come with step-by-step guided instructions. Of these sewing projects, a number of t

hem e.g. hair scrunchies, tote bag, pillow covers, are things that the students may be interested in making. At the Project Index, the projects are classified under different skill levels, which makes it easier for the students to sieve out projects that are suitable for themselves.

Is that all to Sewing@About? Of course not!

Sewing basics form just one of the many subtopics at Sewing@About. On the main page, one can find hyperlinks to other areas such as Home Decorating, Sewing Fabric, Costumes, so on and so forth. Under Holidays And Occasions, especially, the students are likely to be very interested in the different valentine's day projects that are available. Information on the applicability of various fabrics and the comparisons between each are also given. Thus, if a student is required to work on a fabric-related project for lower sec coursework (for example), this website can be a good guide for them at the research stage. A simple ICT/TLLM lesson can be constructed and students can explore the various avenues in sewing.

Besides, Debbie Colgrove blogs regularly at Sewing@About where she will post her most recent seasonal sewing projects and ideas, so it is interesting to take a look at how one can constantly come up with new ideas on what can be done. Readers can exchange ideas with Debbie by leaving comments in her blog. A sewing forum is also in place, so students can make use of this platform to inquire more about the topics or clarify their doubts with the sewing experts out there, outside of the classroom. Sewing enthusiasts from all around the world will upload their completed projects from time to time and most of them are very functional items. Therefore, students can get a good insight on how textiles and sewing is relevant in our daily lives.

(picture credits: sewing at about)

Labels: QCX521, Review

by Ms Lim HM @ 7:27 AM - 0 comments