I wanted to thank everyone for their suggestions for teaching adults. I've folded with small groups before, but never been in the position of being the "teacher" for origami... thanks to all of you it went very well.
The sequence I taught was: 1. Yohizawa's butterfly-- because it is such an elegant model that unfolds at the end in a delightful way and because it has one petal-like fold that is easy to handle. 2. The flapping crane, nice big inside reverse folds 3. The traditional crane-- petal folds! 4. I tried Petty's "Beating Heart" model, but that didn't go so well because if the petal folds are made without the horizontal crease, it proved to be too difficult for most and if we did the horizontal crease, it came back to haunt us when trying to make the heart beat. 5. the business card/index card jumping frog. That last got everyone laughing again after the beating heart trauma and then I went into free time where they tried folding from various books I brought. I was particularly proud of one of the participants who had never folded anything before but folded Nick Robinson's "Ali's Dish" and many folded Neale's "magic star/ring" too. Nick Robinson's naughty origami book was a big hit too :) I brought along some advanced books such as LaFosse's Origami Art and Engel's Origami Odyssey, which really opened some eyes as far as what origami could be. Finally, I took them through a brief visual tour of some amazing advanced folders' work: Lang, Joisel, etc. I think I have some converts; all of them certainly have a much greater appreciation for the art. It was interesting to me how divided the group was at first: about half had no idea how complex even simple looking models could be to fold and were quickly surprised, the other half were very intimidated at the beginning, but overcame that nervousness rather quickly. I have a lot to learn about teaching origami folds and overcoming some of the logistical hurdles: helping everyone to see what I am doing, folding in the air proficiently, etc... All in all, a great time! Thanks for all your advice. c -- Chris Lott <ch...@chrislott.org>
