attention to timing

Human beings are inclined toward relentless growth, provided we don't do something stupid to stop the train. The small clipping at left from Time Magazine describes the increase of ADHD diagnosis compared to age-eligibility cutoffs for kindergarten.

Parents should be advised to ease up. Don't make things easy for your children, but allow for their growth to unfold at a more natural pace. Fitting them too soon to the harsh institution of modern schooling is likely a mistake. By all rights a child should be engaged in his or her own self-controlled education through exploration of real world material qualities through craft, exercise of his or her own body, and observation of the great outdoors. Stick that child too soon in a classroom, you may find that child diagnosed ADHD, unable to sit still, and unable to remain focused for long periods of classroom instruction. That child may learn to hate school and that seems to be the choice we have presented to many of our children.

One of our teachers at Clear Spring School told me about a friend who had been called to school for a teacher conference because her first grade son kept falling out of his desk onto the floor thereby distracting the class. Can't people understand that children falling out of their desks in response to boredom is a good thing? It tells you of the possible torture you are inflicting on all the rest of the students, and that you are stealing from them the opportunity for actually learning something?

If we have become a nation of idiots, we have only ourselves and our schools to blame.

I have been working on making inlaid ties as you can see in the photo below. First I tape a number of pieces of veneer together in a stack, then make scroll saw cuts so the pieces of veneer can be rearranged in relation to each other. Tomorrow I will use a template to rout these inlay assemblies to shape and then rout the matching spaces for them to fit.