Many people who get stuck in a pattern can knit. They can knit and purl, they can increase and decrease. It isn't their hands that stop them. It's the text.
I have a master's degree in guidance and change work, and I am a special education teacher. Both are about the same thing: making it easier for someone to get from where they are to where they want to go. A pattern is guidance on paper. It should take you through a garment without me sitting next to you.
Your head only has room for a little at a time
Working memory is the part of your memory you use while you are doing something. It only holds a few things at once. Everything that has to be remembered, interpreted or worked out takes up space there.
When you knit, your working memory is already busy. You count stitches. You hold the yarn. You keep track of where you are in the round. If the pattern also asks you to remember two things, find your number in a parenthesis and look up an abbreviation, it's full.
That's when mistakes happen. Not because you can't do it, but because it was too much at once.
What it looks like in a typical pattern
Here is a sentence of the kind you find in many patterns:
"Continue in pattern as set, at the same time inc 2 sts inside each marker every 4th rnd 6 (6) 7 (7) 8 times. See chart A and abbreviations p. 2."
The sentence asks you to do five things:
- Remember the pattern from an earlier section.
- Keep the increases in your head while you knit the pattern.
- Count rounds up to every fourth one.
- Find your number in a row of parentheses.
- Turn to another page for the chart and abbreviations.
Each of them is simple. All five at once are not.
The same sentence, rewritten
This is how I would write it:
- Knit 3 rounds in pattern.
- On the 4th round, increase 1 stitch right after each marker and 1 stitch right before each marker.
- Repeat steps 1 and 2.
Number of repeats: XS 6 · S 6 · M 7 · L 7 · XL 8.
It says the same thing. But now there is one action per line. You don't have to remember anything from before, and you find your number by looking for your size, not by counting parentheses.
As a special education teacher I know that some people learn best gradually, step by step, without being given too much information at once.
Five things I do
One action per sentence. If there is an "and" between two actions, I split the sentence.
Say where and how many. "Decrease evenly" doesn't say where. "Knit to the desired length" doesn't say how much. I write the number of stitches, the place in the round and centimetres, measured from a point you can find.
The size before the number. XS 46 · S 50 · M 54 is easier to read than 46 (50) 54. You look for your letters, not for the right parenthesis.
Everything in one place. What you need for the step is in the step. You shouldn't have to turn pages.
Words instead of abbreviations. "k2tog" is quick to write. "Knit 2 stitches together" is quick to read. I explain technical terms the first time they appear, and they are also in Strikke-ABC.
Structure and predictability
Two words from special education run through everything I write: structure and predictability.
Structure means every step is built the same way. First what to do, then how many times, then how you can tell you're done.
Predictability means you know what's coming. You find your number in the same place every time. The words mean the same thing from the first page to the last. No surprises halfway up a sleeve.
That helps someone knitting their first garment. It also helps someone who has knitted for thirty years and is knitting in front of the TV after a long day.
The format
My patterns are made in the CosyMonday Step-by-Step format: one step per page, with a box you tick when the step is done. All five sizes are in the same step. Striped garments have their own stripe sheet. Where a technique is hard to explain in words, there is a link to a video.
I write more about how the format works in practice in The special education teacher who knits.
A good pattern goes unnoticed. You knit, and then the garment is finished.
I hope you find joy and a sense of mastery in my patterns <3
Anne-Turid