Evaluation

I was looking forward to starting a blog as it’s a good way to process and evaluate my work in a more professional context. In the past I have kept journals but always ended up with unorganised notes and never kept up with putting in pictures. I found having my thoughts gathered digitally really useful, and being able to blog from anywhere meant that I didn’t have an excuse to get behind. I did keep on track with the posts, but didn’t blog as regularly as I’d planned and felt like I was writing quite vaguely and so went back and added in parts. Initially I was really efficient with my study visits, but as the term went on I did leave some till the end, but was careful to do the exhibitions before they closed. I think I would have got more out of them if I had done them with the lecture fresh in my mind.

I think my writing for the study visits was successful, I tried to expand on the questions and link the content to other research and reading I was doing. I also included a lot of photos to my posts which were good quality and relevant. I found it difficult to blog little and often, if I was to start again I would try to post every few days, I feel I would have more interesting reflections on my work. I also didn’t go into enough detail about technical processes, if I had included more pictures of works in progress, mistakes and written specifics of what was going wrong and right I would find it more useful to look back on in the future. I find it hard to write eloquently and thoughtfully about my own work. I can ramble and skim the surface of what I am trying to say, whilst not going into enough detail.

I found it a lot easier to write about the blocks that I had enjoyed, then the ones I hadn’t. For example in knit, I struggled to make anything that I was pleased with and was generally lacking enthusiasm, but I couldn’t explain exactly why and what I didn’t understand about it, so it was had to critically reflect without simply being negative. I found the stitch block really inspiring and was a lot more engaged, so I found it easy to write up about my progress and design process.

Through blogging I have learnt to reflect on my work in a more ordered and considered way; in the past I have mainly scribbled notes in loads of different places, but I can now gather and refine my thoughts. I plan on continuing my blog after the end of this unit, and I will post more often, with more detailed descriptions of what I’m doing and more pictures and comments on specific textile techniques. In the future I would also like to include more posts on further research, articles and exhibitions I have visited.