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| A sailboat with minecraft blocks |
When an object is carefully and lovingly
crafted, it is empowered to express the concerns and character of
its maker in a voice that can resonate for generations.
Woodworkers have a unique opportunity to reveal the beauty and
value of our native woods in a way that encourages understanding
and preservation of our trees and forests.
At one time, the trees of our forests
were so well known that the common man, standing at a distance
could tell the species being cut by the sound of the
axe. His knowledge of each species and its uses was an important
factor in his life and even his survival.
It is ironic that now with our survival linked so closely to the
fate of our forests we have become so ignorant of our trees.
As I began my career in 1976, I was fortunate to discover the
wealth presented by the wide variety of woods, and learned that to
protect them, we must know their value. Sharing an understanding of
this value is the objective of my work.
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| Making a battleship |
With those words, I opened my old website first designed and coded 20 years ago in 1997 and now close it and open a new one that can be found at my old address:
DougStowe.com
The old one served well, as long as you were looking at it on your computer. The new one has much of the same information, can be read on a wide range of devices and I hope it serves just as well.
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| A boat and a tiny house |
Yesterday in wood shop, my first, second and third grade students made wooden boats to carry them on their study of the oceans. An ocean, studied from Northwest Arkansas is an abstract subject. Woodworking is not and the small boats add an element of the concrete necessary for enthusiastic learning to take place. As I mentioned, children have an enormous capacity for the abstract as long as it comes at least in part from their own imaginations.
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| A chocolate chip rainbow boat! |
If you want real engagement in learning, nothing beats engagement in the real world and the opportunity to do real things. That is why my students love wood shop and is why woodworking should be included in all schools from grades 1-12.
Make, fix, create, and increase the likelihood that others learn likewise.
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| Jingle bells? Why not? |
Hello Doug,
ReplyDeleteYou write:
"If you want real engagement in learning, nothing beats engagement in the real world and the opportunity to do real things. That is why my students love wood shop and is why woodworking should be included in all schools from grades 1-12."
One thought about it: What about effects of comparing the own work with the work of others (or the own expectations)? What if "the other's" result is "better" (in children's eyes) than the own one? How to deal with disappointment? Isn't it possible that such early results in "failing" woodworking leads to the decision/point in a youngsters's life where they lose their engagement in woodworking? -- Followed by a list of explanations: "I'm not talented...", "...others are better...", "...work is too painful...", "...and by the way: who needs that stuff...", ...
greetings, René
That is an interesting question. We discuss the process of developing skill all the time in wood shop. My students observe that things get easier for them and know the development of skill and the refinement of the objects we make take place through practice. They may decide that they would rather do easier things, but even the things that are made easy for us by technology require the development of some skill and interest and knowing the process through which we get good.
ReplyDeleteMy wife had similar concerns when my daughter was 3 and we would sit at her craft table, with each of us forming things from clay. My wife challenged me to do things that were less complex to thus be careful not to squelch my daughter's sense of her own skill. But she knew she was a child, and that her skills would develop. If I had squelched my own creative abilities in deference to her lack of skill, she would have interpreted that as me not caring about exercising my own skill. What would that tell her? That I was willing to work carelessly and dishonestly?
We might look at the student's works and see shortcomings that they do not. And at some point they may laugh at what they are taking so much pride in now. But the rewards of creativity are enormous.
You write:
Delete"We might look at the student's works and see shortcomings that they do not."
I think, more important is, what they see and we are not.
On the one hand we cannot see the objects (that often become subjects :-) through their fantasy glasses; we are not able to understand what the children's mind is creating inside.
On the other hand we cannot date the moment when interest rises or collapses for engagement in later years. That might be the hard thing in education.
And in my eyes this is, what a "good teacher" is capable of: To be a role model: showing interest in nearly every matter of the students concerns - not to present solutions, but to present opportunities.
Your blog entries are an example of this.
greetings,
René