Teaching Knitting at a Non-Knitting Class

No, I didn't finish sock #2 yesterday while at the training session,only because I had to frog back to the beginning- 3 times! Twice because my stitch was wrong, once because a dropped stitch didn't make itself known until the maximum damage was done. *sigh* But I did make it to the heel flap in class. And while I was knitting before class, one of the trainers came by to see what i was doing."Oh I could never do that," she remarked. I am amazed at how many times I hear that exact phrase and I have to wonder why. Because once, everyone knitted. They had to. Sure, not everyone knitted with great attention, say finishing (me) or was a great designer (guilty again). But everyone can manipulate the needles to some extent, pretty much. Then as class was gathering, another woman came and sat near me. She was very intrigued. She had recently learned to knit but never saw circular needles. She also told me she forgot how to cast on, so I showed her the thumb cast-on, being limited to just my in-play ball of sock yarn. And we discussed great knitting books, essential knitting books, and where the good LYS are in our neighboring towns. While I showed her the cast-on she made sketches so she could do it later. She confessed to having a project stashed away because she had dropped stitches on it, yet her son pesters her to complete it, since it's a scarf for him. You can guess what kind of yarn she was using, sold to her at by the LYS,knowing she was just starting out. Yup, highly-textured novelty yarn. Now I have to ask, was the immediate profit on that expensive yarn worth so much more than selling the novice knitter a ball of inexpensive smooth worsted? In the first scenario, the project is now languishing in a closet. In the second, she'd be better able to see her work develop. I hope she takes my advice and buys a ball of smooth worsted-weight yarn and a stitch dictionary, and just makes a few swatches. We need all the new knitters we can create!