restoring creativity

Making finger joints

On Friday I demonstrated box making, made sleds and taught design for 25 students in Annapolis. Yesterday, the tables were turned at Annapolis Woodworks for 10 students from the Annapolis Woodworking Guild, so that they might learn as we all learn best, by doing. I had the opportunity to watch them work and to take a few photos in the process.


At Raise the Barn today in Eureka Springs, some of my students will be teaching woodworking to kids and their parents, making toy cars, tops and button toys.

I have one more day of box making class in Annapolis (today) and am pleased with what we have accomplished.

Installing keys in the corners of boxes.

As you can see, we are each hands-on learners, practicing and developing the wisdom of our hands.

Cutting a bottom panel for a box.

Susan E. Blow, in 1894, wrote of the child's relationship to greater humanity as follows:

If humanity is neither a mere aggregate of atomic individuals, nor a mere organism whose members, while participating in the life of the whole, remain forever different from that whole and from each other; if, indeed, it is a spiritual unity whose essence, "communicable but not divisible," exists whole and entire in each particular man, then obviously in history the individual may find a revelation of his nature and an intimation of his destiny. History paints life on a wide canvas and in a true perspective. Through its study man separates what in himself is essential and permanent from that which is transitory; from its drift he learns the direction in which he is tending and the ends he blindly seeks; in its achievement he finds the solution of his contradictions, the answers to his enigmas, and the vindication of his hopes.

Susan E.Blow was the person who introduced Kindergarten to St. Louis public schools. It might seem strange to educators of today to consider that part of their role is that of introducing the child to his responsibilities within the human race. But in the early days of Kindergarten, the concern was for the development of the child as a spiritual presence within the fabric of community. The focus now is on pressuring the child to read and do math, come hell or high water. And yet, the child is in need of being brought into relationship with the whole of humanity. While schools pressure children to all be alike in their capacities and objectives, human culture requires diversity in order to find strength. Creativity is a necessary ingredient and adults, too have a need to express themselves.

Make, fix and create...