Ednah Anne Rich's book Paper Sloyd For the Primary Grades was published in 1905. My copy came complete with the hand crafted valentine preserved between pages. The green envelope at right was made in my first and second grade woodworking class where we have been doing paper sloyd as a preparatory exercise in developing woodworking skills. These simple things made of paper are the kinds of things that most children don't do anymore. I want to review Otto Salomon's simple theory of Educational Sloyd for just a minute, and perhaps you will grasp on your own why children need to begin their education with scissors rather than with laptops. Education should: Move from the known to the unknown. Move from the easy to the more difficult. Move from the simple to the complex. Move from the concrete to the abstract.

I am no Luddite. I use my Mac a lot. I do writing, accounting, photo editing, illustration and email on it. I use it daily in the writing and publication of this blog. I've even edited my own short videos. But children need to be tying knots, braiding string, cutting snowflakes and paper dolls and learning the full range of technology in order to understand its movement so they can anticipate its direction and be prepared to lead rather than follow or be pushed by the manipulations of others.

There is a well-documented link between math skills and what is called spatial sense, described by the National Council of Teachers of Mathematics (NCTM) as “an intuitive feel for one’s surroundings and objects in them.” According to the NCTM’s Principles and Standards for School Mathematics, "Geometry and spatial sense are fundamental components of mathematics education. They offer ways to interpret and reflect on our physical environment through abstraction. They support creative thought in all mathematics"

According to the Standards, “spatial visualization includes building and manipulating mental representations of shapes, relationships, and transformations.” There is no better means than the transformation of paper from its original flat plane into three-dimensional carefully constructed useful objects through Paper Sloyd!

For yesterday's post I wanted an image to show the baby in lap position for hand play with infants. To help me create the simple line drawing, I looked for images on an internet stock photo site that I could use to help compose the drawing below. It is amazing what happens when you search in stock photo sites for the keywords infant and lap. I found photo after photo of the tiniest children sitting at laptop computers including the image from istockphoto.com shown above.

Beginning with the hand play shown in yesterday's post, it is important to construct with your child a world of play and engagement. One of the things I find in teaching elementary school students is that they come to class with very little experience with scissors. They have a great deal of experience in play with toys of all kinds that can be manipulated in interesting ways predetermined by the toy maker. Computers are the same. They come with programs that allow predetermined manipulations. The kids get really fast in performing the manipulations, but never really understand the foundation of the technology.

Scissors you can get. Scissors are made in such a way that you can fully comprehend the technology involved. So, why would this be important? Can't we just let our children bask in the wonders of our current level of technology? First, it is extremely lazy on our parts. We can sip Starbucks, knowing that our children are safely entertained, and not demanding the attention we would give only half-heartedly anyway because it would distract from our own distractions. If you are reading this while ignoring the children in your house, I'll ask you to go away and come back at nap time.

Tomorrow, I will try to discuss the vector of development, what it is to be an artist, and why the very basic foundations of technology are important for all of us to understand. One last comment for today...we are spending billions of dollars to put computers in the hands of our children, but we're already shipping the computer jobs to India. We are investing our children's lives in a future for which they can't compete. In the meantime, we take such pride in seeing photos of our children sitting with their lap-tops, and miss the tragic irony that there are no real laps in sight.

If you are looking at something and move to a different position you may see more clearly and perhaps see things that completely alter your understanding. Years ago, when a friend pointed out to me that my "brains were in my hands," I was offered a different view of myself, that changed the way I looked at my own hands and offered me the insight leading to my career as a woodworker, author and teacher.

I hope to do for others, what my friend did for me...provide a slight change in perspective into the frame of reference the hands provide. The simple drawing above illustrates the first position of play between parent and infant. I discovered when I held my own daughter in my lap in this position, the wonderful opportunity that we had for hand play. I was also reminded of watching my father and mother holding my little sisters in the same position. My father was deliberately engaged and totally attentive as though he realized the significance of this play for his children's development.

Too often now, parents are distracted by other things rather than being engaged with their full attention on play. With your child in your lap, its head on your knees and feet on your chest, start by moving your hands into and out of visual range. Weave your fingers together and then pull them apart. Repeat and then vary your motions. Your child will watch and in a short time will engage your hands with hers or his. My daughter Lucy and I could spend what seemed like hours in contemplation of our hands. As she became a couple months older, toys and rattles joined with the hands, and we never tired of the play. We don't have any way to measure the profound impact such simple things can have except to observe the results. I could spend days as I suspect many parents might, proclaiming the wonders of my daughter. I won't. But I will invite you to play with your child in the manner I describe. Hold him or her as shown in the position above.

Friedrich Froebel, inventor of Kindergarten realized the incredible opportunity young mothers were missing in the development of their childrens' capacities for learning. Much of his early work was in developing songs, hand activities and games for mothers to play with their children. We hope that schools will do enough to educate our children, but don't count on it. They can't make up for the opportunities lost in the earliest days. But take your child in your lap and with your hands make a start.

There are very clear differences between an academic and a craftsman. While academics can spend their whole lives processing written material, a craftsman has to take what he or she has learned and make something practical of it...something directly useful to others. I don't intend this as a criticism of academia... at some point, after academic knowledge is laid on the table, every scholar hopes to see the object of his or her work put to use, benefitting people's lives or building a course of study for others to follow.

We know a lot about the hands and how they directly impact our intellectual and cultural development. The story of our hands is told well in Frank Wilson's book, The Hand, and in a new book by Chip Walter, Thumbs, Toes and Tears. There's lots of research going on that confirms the hand's integral role in the development of intelligence. It is important for many of us to be aware of this research, but knowledge that doesn't lead to action is empty, null and void.

My own background as a craftsman and how-to writer makes me concerned with practical applications that lead to results that can be shared with others working where the rubber meets the road...in families, classrooms and workshops. The real meaning of this blog, and the Wisdom of the Hands program at Clear Spring School isn't to accumulate information, but to encourage others to do something to engage our hands and our children's hands in learning. For the next few days, I want to share some concrete steps. Please tune in.

George Herbert Mead (February 27, 1863 – April 26, 1931) was an American philosopher, sociologist and psychologist, at the the University of Chicago. He is regarded as one of the founders of social psychology. He lived with William James as a tutor for his children while at Harvard, and studied with G. Stanley Hall and Wilhelm Wundt in Leipzig, Germany. At the University of Chicago he was a colleague and close associate of John Dewey.

One of his important contributions was an analysis of human activities, looking at the relationship between work, the making of art and play. The link that follows will carry you to his paper, "the Relation of Play to Education," originally presented as an address on the Chicago Commons, May 1, 1896. The paper itself is too long for anyone to slog through on a blog, but an important point is that play itself, has educational function in children's lives far greater than the imposed "work" taking place within classrooms. Whether in 1890, or 2007, classroom work has been designed to push students to pass (or fail) the tests required to move on to the next levels of education and to meet expected levels of state requirements. Play, as pointed out by Mead and many others has educational value far beyond what most in education are willing to acknowledge.

While reading Mead's paper, be sure to note the comments about Mrs. Quincy Adams Shaw's School and about Sloyd. His comment about Sloyd carries particular insight. Mrs. Q. A. Shaw was the woman who brought Gustaf Larsson to Boston and founded the first Sloyd Teacher Training School in the US. You may have heard of the North Bennet Street School in Boston. It was founded by Mrs. Q.A. (Pauline Agassiz) Shaw and still serves as one of the premier woodworking schools in the US. The school to which Mead refers is one of the Frobellian Kindergartens Mrs. Shaw established in Boston. If you want to know more about Froebellian Kindergartens, please refer back to the December archive of this blog.

Much earlier in the blog, I referred to a paper on play (.pdf download) from the American Academy of Pediatrics. Another great source of information is Alliance for Childhood. At their site you will notice that they and Sarah Lawrence College are co-sponsoring a workshop on play.

Educational Sloyd...the student's choice? Two of my classes are finishing projects and and I asked what they wanted to do next. While they were wondering, I asked, "What about Sloyd?" "What's that they asked?" "That's where you learn hand-skills as a means of overall academic development." I gave them copies of my articles and showed them some of the most basic projects, thinking that perhaps they might consider them too simplistic and uncreative. Those were the charges that G. Stanley Hall made in his critic of Sloyd at the end of the 19th Century. Someday when I have a lot of time on my hands I'll embark on a very long, boring and detailed discussion of the psychologies of G. Stanley Hall and William James and their very different views of Educational Sloyd.

To my great surprise, the students were excited about Sloyd. We'll see how things turn out.


In the meantime, the 5th and 6th grades finished their toy cars in the woodshop this morning. My guest, Greg Mitchell, like nearly all the guests in the woodshop, worked on his own projects and assisted the students when they asked. Woodworking is actually such an engaging activity that it is hard to just sit on the sidelines and watch. Greg is a master in the making of rustic furniture, so it was wonderful having him as a guest.

The photo above is of Greg helping Brendon.

I grew up hearing stories about Bunny Lawrence, a friend of my father's from the period just before WWII. He quit college his first few days of school when he realized there was very little to learn from his professors in his chosen field of Engineering. He managed to find employment with IBM while he pursued his passion of rocketry with friends. Their break down rocket launch platform is in the air and space museum at the Smithsonian. It had to break down so they could load it into the trunk of the car to make a quick escape in case something blew up. Bunny was one of the early members of the American Rocket Society.

My father was on leave in WWII before going overseas to Europe and spent a day with his friend Bunny who was working as a consultant on the B-25. At the time they were trying to solve problems in the de-icing of the wings. While the various engineers with all their specialties argued for mechanical solutions, electrical solutions, hydraulic solutions, etc., Bunny quickly developed an overview of all and laid out the multi-disciplinary solution required.

Following WWII, Bunny was one of the founding partners in Reaction Motors Incorporated, a company formed to build rocket engines for some of the most important American space projects including the X-15 rocket plane. The technology they developed is still in use in the space shuttle. For some of that important work, Bunny Lawrence was presented the Goddard Award for Rocket Engineering.

In 1964, Bunny became head of Chrysler Research Engineering where he worked on the development of the Lunar Lander.

Bunny Lawrence's story was told to me by my father because it was important to him. It illustrated the limitations of over specialization and the opportunity that lay in the cracks between disciplines. The greatest leaps of insight and imagination don't happen in school, but in the interface between disciplines, when driven by passion to learn and create, we choose to ignore what we have been taught, the artificial constructs of human thought, and challenge life under the scrutiny of our own hands.

Bunny, also known as Lovell Lawrence, Jr. died much too early of cancer at the age of 55 in 1971.

You may also be interested in the history of RMI, Reaction Motors Incorporated. The photo above is of the XLR-11 engine built by RMI on display in the NASA Exchange gift store at Edwards Airforce Base.

A friend of mine, Reuben, wrote me the following:

...I was talking with a friend..his neighbor designed power dams, etc. They had a problem with some huge gates that would not close. As dozens of engineers stood by, one worked on closing them. Over the radio, someone asked "How much further do they need to go?" The engineer said "2 inches and 3 lines."

The same guy said all these engineers at a tool company in VT were called in as one of their machines broke down. While they talked about how to get a replacement part made, one older guy went downstairs and made the part. He came back up in an hour or so and said "Will this do the trick?" Too many theoretical folks...not enough hands-on folks...
---
I will repeat something that I've mentioned earlier in the blog: Manual training was started in American schools by Runkle at MIT and Woodward at Washington University because engineers of that day and age were lacking in basic skills...measuring, and spatial visualization. That was in 1870. It is amazing how much we think things change when in reality things are so much the same. We just keep growing fresh crops.

My fifth and sixth grade students could have told the engineer that those were 3 sixteenths, not "lines." And I'm not sure about Reuben's distinction between theoretical folks and hands-on folks. What would happen if "theoretical folks" had some real hands-on experience like Runkle and Woodward intended? Occasionally someone makes it through the engineering profession with enough hands-on experience to illuminate the world. Tomorrow, I'll try to find time to tell about Bunny Lawrence.

A great day in the woodshop! Rustic furniture maker Greg Mitchell from Fayetteville visited to observe classes. In the 3rd and 4th grades students worked on making toy cars with some work left to finish next week. The students in 1st and 2nd grades made cars, start to finish, but less complicated to make than those started by the older kids. In the high school, some of the students had expressed an interest in doing some hand tool projects taken directly from early Educational Sloyd texts. These old projects are a great way to begin learning about hand tools. So in high school classes, some were working on the lathe while others were busy with marking gauges, hand saws and planes to cut material to size for making objects that could be used as trivets or plant stands. They all got a good start at Sloyd. At one point, I looked up to see 15 students all working independently and safely on projects of their own choice. There are days for all teachers when things don't go just right. There are in fact days in which even the best teacher will be led to question his or her choice of careers. Thankfully, this was not one of those days.

The photo above is of the first and second grade class from Clear Spring School with the toy cars they made.

Yesterday, I wrote Baba Dioum in Senegal to thank him for his quote, and the wisdom it conveys. He wrote to me this morning and expressed his hopes of visiting the Henry Doorly Zoo where I was grateful to discover it. I hope he has the chance to do that. There is something about Africa that puts the hands in perspective. In the mind, all things are distant and removed. In the hand, all things are close to the heart. In the mind, we can rationalize conditions in a foreign continent. In the hand, we are either in service, or we are not.

There is an article in this week's Time Magazine about Malaria in Africa, and the millions of children's lives lost each year, each of whom could be saved by the price of a cup of Starbucks coffee in your hand or mine. There are organizations to help. malarianomore.org is one. nothingbutnets.net is another. You may hold the Starbucks in one hand and the mouse in the other. Between the price of the Starbucks and the power in your mouse, you hold the life of a child in your hands.Click your mouse and use your credit card please. At nothingbutnets.net through the generosity of the Bill and Melinda Gates foundation, your contribution will be matched. You will save two for the price of one.

Over 30 years ago when I was beginning my woodworking career, the diverse hardwoods of Arkansas were being sprayed with defoliants to allow faster growing and more profitable pines to become dominant. I realized that our hardwoods were being lost and neglected because so few knew either their beauty or their value.

I came to realize that by making beautiful things, I could have a role in restoring an appreciation for our hardwood forests. More recently (about 10 years ago) I discovered a saying by Senegalese environmentalist Baba Dioum that puts in words the role that craftsmen like myself can play in awakening the world to an understanding of our precious resources.

In the end we will conserve only what we love. We will love only what we understand. We will understand only what we are taught.

Woodworking is a means through which students and craftsmen can engage directly and positively with our natural environment. Our use of wood carries the responsibility to respect and preserve our natural resources. If done right, and if done with love, we become teachers, awakening others to understanding, love, and conservation.

The small box at right in the photo below is inlaid with spalted maple, a wood whose patterns come from the natural processes of decay. The one at left has a patterned inlay which I make from a wide range of Arkansas hardwoods, illustrating the beauty, diversity and value of our forests.

A common question that people ask when looking at crafts is "how long did it take to make that?" People want to be able to understand the object and its price in terms they can understand. Few people in today's society can understand from their own experience all the various elements involved in creating an object. The photo above is of the kinds of small boxes I've sold through craft fairs and galleries during my 30+ years as a craftsman. There is no way to explain the work in terms of time alone. The following is a woodturner's poem.

How long does it take to make one of those?

Do you mean…
not plant the tree, but find the wood,
just ‘see’ the piece, (as if I could)?
to find a highly figured burl,
a crotch, an eye, or pearly curl?
And once I spy it, perhaps buy it,
inventory, store, and dry it?
Then saw or cut it, possibly I kiln it’
glue, imbue with fill, or drill it?
You mean, that once I’m satisfied
it’s stopped the warps, checks, cracks, once dried?
And mounted on the lathe, to turn it,
(which takes much practice, just to learn it;
and then employ a gouge, or two,
or use a skew, which I don’t eschew,
to mold it, shape it (what’s your pleasure?)
by all means, I’m sure to measure,
then sand it smooth, please wear your mitts,
from coarse to fine, 10,000 grits,
then braze, or burnish, paint, or polish,
(the goal: enhance, and don’t demolish)?
Is that your question, start to end,
how long’s that path, its way to wend?
Or do you merely want to know how long it turned?
Ten minutes, or so.

John A. Styer, The Lathe-meister

This poem helps to explain the concept of finger blindness. If you have never had the opportunity to be involved in the making of objects from your own vision and creativity, the only way you will be able to relate to objects at all is in economic terms as in the question..."how long did it take to make it?" ...a question that seeks to place an object in an economic frame of reference from which the questioner can review the making of the object in the only context he or she may actually understand...dollars per hour. This poem also explains why all children need to have the opportunity to be involved in the arts and the process of making. We are finger-blind without it.

Before I get you thinking that wood-working is just kid stuff, I want to remind you that work with the hands can be contributory to the mental health of all, even the oldest among us. The November 2006 issue of Woodcraft had an article written by Sarah Brady about an interesting and important program for Alzheimer patients using pen crafting as a means to counteract the tragic effects of this debilitating disease, restore patient self-esteem and alleviate depression. Woodcraft has graciously provided a link so the article can be read on-line. The Hands of Altzheimers. I don't want to get you distracted from the immediate task at hand, that of engaging our children's hands in education. The article does help us to understand the incredible relationship between the hands and brain, and cues us to the significant role the hands play in the well-being of all. Because the hands work in seamless integration with thought, we are generally unconscious of their importance. I am here to remind you and to stir you to take notice and make whatever changes lead to a more meaningful life, for yourself and for those you love.

Last year, I worked with Jack Grube, president of the New England Association of Woodworking Teachers to come up with the following list, 21 Reasons for the 21st Century which was distributed to High School administrators throughout New England.

I would like to note that these same 21 reasons also apply at all grade levels. I seem to be one of very few to advocate woodworking in elementary school. A magazine editor recently asked me about the Wisdom of the Hands "movement." I told him, there is no "movement" as yet. The movement will come when some of the readers of this blog start doing something. Invite your children or grandchildren to your woodshop. If you don't have a woodshop, buy some tools and start working first. If you aren't interested in woodworking, start in the kitchen or garden. Then armed with what your hands have given you, talk to the parents and teachers in your community about the role of the hands in learning. We know we will have a "movement" when tools are put in the hands of children and their hands are allowed to arise in service of knowledge and intelligence.

Woodworking education:
1. Assists students in communicating and
understanding ideas non-verbally, through
sketches and technical drawings.
2. Enhances the skills of spatial visualization
required for geometry, trigonometry and algebra,
thereby helping students to prepare for careers
in engineering, architecture and science.
3. Provides students with take-home, physical
evidence of their mastery of skills.
4. Instills a pride of accomplishment and
self-esteem.
5. Gives the student the opportunity to execute
precise work and to produce useful products,
and become “self-assessors” using measuring
tools, squares, etc. and then the fit of things to
self-assess the quality of their work.
6. Trains the eye and hand to see accurately and
to feel the sense of beauty in form.
7. Inculcates the habits of attention, perseverance
and patience.
8. Offers opportunities for students to go where
their hearts demand by selecting designs and
projects that motivate them not only as a
woodworker but also as a student.
9. Provides opportunities for students to overcome
setbacks that occur when working on real
objects.
10. Provides relevancy of other subject matter to
their lives, thereby preparing them for a lifetime
of learning.
11. Provides non-academic areas for demonstration
of skills and pursuit of excellence.
12. Provides a non-contrived opportunity for
engagement of multiple intelligences.
13. Provides an opportunity to engage physically
and actively in learning exercises.
14. Provides an opportunity for engagement and
success even for those disinclined for academic
involvement.
15. Helps students gain confidence as real world
problem solvers.
16. Helps students gain confidence in tools use and
learn safety considerations required for a career,
lifetime of general home maintenance or a
life-long hobby.
17. Offers an appreciation for the values inherent
in physical labor and the work contributions of
others.
18. Connects students to thousands of years of
human creative endeavor.
19. Provides a much-needed break from oppressive
classroom routine.
20. Helps students to better understand the sources
and process of technological change, placing
human development in historical context.
21. Is a class that students enjoy!

One more poem for today:
A Piece of Wood
by Henry Rohr

Every possibility is sleeping in such a piece of wood
It depends on you
how you look at it
what you see in it-

some useless obstacle in your way
fuel to light your fire
material
to build a fence around your isolation
to build a house- a door- a table.

OR a challenge
waiting just for you
to be set free
to be called to life.

The woodcarver, the artist sees it like that.

He takes it in his hands
and sees the hidden life
and makes it speak
Of growth and death
joy and pain
all the mysteries of life.

All this is contained
in a piece of wood.

One day last year, my first and second grade woodworking students surprised me by reciting the following tongue twister:

Of all the saws I ever saw saw,
I never saw a saw saw
like the saw I saw saw in Arkansas.

A friend brought me a clipping saved for over 30 years from the Wasington Post. The photo above is a box from my new book, and was made from black walnut that had been around the block and captures some of the spirit that Mr. Fenyvesi describes. The hand forged iron pull is from Horton Brassses.

Woodworking --Sunday March 7, 1976
By Charles Fenyvesi

There are worlds of difference between working with new lumber and wood that has seen years of service to man.

New lumber has the smell of oak-moss, leaf-mold, and sometimes violets. Its smooth, uniform surfaces speak of the glorious technology of gang saws ripping through the knots and gnarls of a thick log.

Old wood has a woodsy smell only when it is sawed. Then the heavy fragrances of rotting timber fallen long ago blend with the acrid odor, from the finish singed by the saw. There are also hints of the room once inhabited, as the blade unlocks secrets of a subterranean dampness or a wine spill.

The raw, often dewy touch of new lumber awakens projects dormant in the files of the mind. It takes steady character--or lack of confidence--not to be overwhelmed by the infinity of ways in which the treasures of a lumberyard can be converted into shelves or picture frames, paneling or a cradle. All plans seem feasible when the saw makes its first cut and the blade bids the hand to follow.

A project with second-hand lumber or cannibalized furniture means accepting limitations. Knotty pine or oak paneling rescued from a condemned house can be refinished or flipped around to make use of the side that once faced the wall. But the supply is limited, and the boards were cut to fit windows and doors, the fuse box and the furnace.

The wreckers' pile is a mine of two-by-fours and two-by-sixes (They used to be one-fourth of an inch thicker and wider before the 1940's.) Made of yellow pine or Douglas fir, they can be converted into benches and sofas, mantles and dining tables. They have the substantiality of furniture built to last generations and to survive wars and revolutions. Stained dark, they evoke the grandeur of Spanish castles: left in their natural light shade, they suggest the taverns of Central Europe.

New Lumber has not forgotten the green, growth of the forest. It has sticky resin--sometimes a pocket, sometimes a sheen--and juices which make it expand and contract, curl and cup, bow and warp. This youthful inconstancy can defeat the best plan and mock the skill of the most fastidious carpenter.

Old lumber is resigned to a life of service to man, and it submits to his will and whim. 1t does not move, it does not change. It is stable and mature, accepting of the time and space found. But occasionally, an old board lets out a sigh that sounds like a whimper or a bullet's report.

Finishing new wood means choosing from hundreds of stains. Plain pine can be made to look like rosewood; walnut can be turned into ebony. There are bleachers and darkeners. Varnishes do not seem like varnishes, liquid plastic that produces the effect of wood encased in glass.

The scrutiny of sandpaper reveals the original shade of old wood. Boiled linseed oil mixed with turpentine cleans the pores and gives a golden glow. There is no need for special stains: umber rubbed in with another coat of linseed oil brings out the grain and underlines every whorl, check and nick.

New wood looks like a topographical map. Old wood depicts history as well: coronations, civil strife and invasions. The ubiquitous nail holes have crowns, halos and lances that can be metallic russet or black. Discolored streaks and patches reveal where pictures once hung, the sunlight fell or the molding was. There are bruises and gashes, charred traces of cigarettes stamped out too late and tiny particles of ghostly chalk that seeped through from plaster boards into two-by-fours.

Used lumber is an inheritance that usually goes unclaimed. It becomes one's own when it is turned into needed objects. The rehabilitation project is an adjustment; the start is where others left off.

Fenyvesi was editor of the National Jewish Monthly, gardener, carpenter and essayist in 1976.

The heft and feel of a well-worn handle,
The sight of shavings that curl from a blade;
The logs in the woodpile, the sentiment of huge
beams in an old-fashioned house;
The smell of fresh cut timber and the pungent
fragrance of burning leaves;
The crackle of kindling and the hiss of burning logs.
Abundant to all the needs of man, how poor the world
would be without wood.
---Everard Hinrichs

A friend sent me this poem this morning. The photo is taken on my workbench of a Stanley No. 5 at work on walnut. We may be moving to an age in which wood becomes irrelevant except as a source of biomass for fuel and toilet paper. Can you imagine human beings living in such poverty of spirit? Can you imagine children growing up without the tools and processes through which generations past have discovered such beauty?

Tool talk... One thing that comes up often in discussion with other wood-workers is whether hand-tools or power-tools are preferred.

In my woodworking, I find that hand-tools when used to augment the accuracy of power-tools can increase both quality and efficiency . Here's an example. The first photo is of tear-out that often happens when the router bit has to remove fragile material at the end of the cut. In this particular instance, a great deal of care was taken in the feed direction and rate to avoid this event, and yet, as you can see, even with a skilled operator, use of the router can lead to disappointing results. The following photos are of quick hand tool techniques that allow the routing of rabbet joints to be done cleanly and without error.
Step one... set up a marking gauge to scribe a line across the grain corres-ponding with the depth of the rabbet.

Step 2... place a sharp chisel point into the marking gauge line and strike it with a mallet to make a relief cut.

Step 3... Rout carefully as before, but you will get much better results.

There is a saying attributed to psych-ologist Abraham Maslow, "If the only tool you have is a hammer, you start treating the whole world as if it is a nail."

You can see that it is important that we give our children a variety of tools, including woodworking tools, if we want them to be able to work with sensitivity toward the achievement of quality, both in school and in life. If the only tool you have is a computer, the question becomes, will you treat others and the whole of the natural world as virtual and essentially meaningless?