a lovely book

I received a lovely book from the American Folk Art Museum, thanking me for sharing my home and studio with their members during two visits in the fall. Meeting them was a delight, as was the opportunity to sell some of my work, so no such lovely thanks were required. The boxes above are from that book, American Folk Marquetry by Richard Mühlberger, and published by the Museum of American Folk Art.

So many of the fine works of art in the book, most of which are boxes of some sort, were made by anonymous makers. The following is from D.H. Lawrence:

"Things men have made with wakened hands, and put soft life into are awake through years with transferred touch, and go on glowing for long years.

And for this reason, some old things are lovely
warm still with the life of forgotten men who made them."

Donald Trump exists within a state of juvenility. I sign my work because my customers insist upon it. But to place one's name in gigantic fake gold plastic letters on the top of buildings and to bask in such egotism is the sign of a diseased mind, bringing to mind the work of another famous poet, Percy Bysshe Shelley:

I met a traveller from an antique land,
Who said—“Two vast and trunkless legs of stone
Stand in the desert. . . . Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them, and the heart that fed;
And on the pedestal, these words appear:
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings;
Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.”

There is humility in the well crafted beautiful and useful thing. Many of the objects in the book were made as gifts to celebrate both craftsmanship, and the love one felt for another. May we, at some point return to such wholesome regard for the well crafted object and the spirit that leads men and women to create through the power of their own hands.

Make, fix, create, and engage yourself anonymously in the fabric of humanity, that we may all thrive in personal creativity and health and love learning likewise.

box drawings...

I have begun working on drawings to illustrate my box guitar book. Sketchup Make is my program of choice. The version I use is free and gives me enormous capacity to convey useful information to readers and to the illustrators for my books and articles. Like everything else in life, using it is part of the process of knowing it. The brain can serve as a repository for useless information, but use is what anchors ideas in the mind, and helps us to determine whether or not it's worth keeping in the first place.

Our democracy is poised on a precariously edge. It is becoming clear that while Trump won the election on a razor's edge of votes in key states, interference by the FBI director and Russian agents both played important roles in pushing the Trump candidacy over the top. Would it be right to allow Donald Trump to take the office of president under such circumstances? We will find out. And regardless of what happens in the Donald Trump escapade, one way or the other, the nation will suffer from the stupidity.

In the meantime, I've announced the holiday challenge, open to participants in last summer's box making class at the Marc Adams School of Woodworking. Winners will be announced in January. The competition is simple. Make a box, send photos, win prizes. While I'm at it, should I have a contest open to a wider audience?

Make, fix, create, and increase the likelihood that others are inspired to learn likewise

there are days like this...

I normally start my day by writing in the blog, but find there are mornings when I have nothing of particular interest to say.

My parties are over. My books have come out. My latest article in Fine Woodworking has been delivered online, in bookstores and in mail boxes. My children at school finished their toy making project and are now making Christmas trees out of wood.

Yesterday I went to a Christmas party to celebrate ESSA's volunteers. As my contribution I went to our local fudge maker and bought two pounds of fudge to share with guests. In the meantime, my rustic coffee table at the Writer's Colony where the party was being held had been taken out of service to return to me. I was uncertain how it had come into their possession in the first place, and was reminded that I had loaned it to them for a display, and they had not forgotten it was to be returned. That it was still mine came as a complete surprise to me.

In any case, when you've been working with wood for for as long as I have, you will remember your work, but may become fuzzy on the disposition of it. Rather than bring it home or find some other fresh place to put it, I've now assigned it to a more permanent loan to the Writer's Colony, and they were pleased. That particular table was made for my Rustic Furniture Basics Book available from Taunton Press. Remember the special code, Taunton1. Some of my other books can be found HERE.

You can see that I've made it through a day in which there was nothing to say. Making beautiful and useful things is just about the same. If you want to become a maker, you must set yourself in motion making things. And it you want to have a permanent, lasting impact on the world around you,

Make, fix, create, and uphold for others the likelihood of learning likewise.

hinges, fine woodworking, rubber bands and student made gifts...

I have an article in the new issue of Fine Woodworking on the selection of hinges, and a tip about making your own box making clamps. This is issue number 259, February 2017. I received copies in the mail yesterday as well as an inquiry from a reader. The tip is on page 17 and the article begins on page 50.

I spent most of the day yesterday writing text for my box guitar making book which I hope to have completed during this week. I submitted two chapters today. All together, there will be 10 chapters with two to complete before the editing process begins.

Today my first through sixth grade students and teachers will present student made toys for holiday distribution through our local food bank. The point of course is not that the children at the food bank need the toys that our students have made, but that our students need to learn generosity and to put themselves into relationships of service to the community. A child that may serve others in some real way represents the future of our human culture.

On the subject of box making, a reader asked about the large rubber bands that I use to assemble boxes in my books and DVD on box making. At one time, I simply went into our local office supply store and bought the largest sizes they had in one pound boxes, without paying much attention to the numeric size. But our office supply store closed last year, and ordering online requires precise information.

Here is what I recommend:

Go to Amazon.com and order rubber bands in sizes 105, 107 and 109. These may be a bit large for some of the smallest boxes you would make, but those can be assembled using more common off-the-shelf rubber bands that you would find in your desk drawer or in any big box store.

Make, fix, create, and extend toward others the likelihood of learning likewise.

if you are the best...

If you are the best in the world, what do you do next? If it is in behalf of your children, you take steps to become better yet. Here in the US, however, parents attempt to isolate their own children from the rabble and provide themselves an excuse to ignore public education.

Finland has been lauded as having the best public schools in the world, and yet they continue to develop and grow toward a more ideal education. Teaching is an art, after all, and artists should be supplied with all the tools necessary for their creativity and success.

The latest in Finland is that they have chosen to remove all the artificial boundaries between various disciplines. They will have no subject areas: no math, no chemistry, no social studies, etc. They have been involved for years now in an extensive teacher retraining, so that all the abstract and artificial boundaries will be removed. In case you are wondering, this is a bold move, and most of the educational world is astonished by what they have done.

Let's look at my own simplified theory of education. 1. Children love learning. 2. They have real interests that teachers can help to sustain, by doing real things. To develop a strategy to meet these two realizations, we must:  1. keep education real by doing real things, and 2. keep it meaningful by  supporting the child's interests to do real meaningful things on behalf of family, community and planet.

This does not mean the teacher simply sits at the sideline and watches a room full of cats playing on keyboards. The teachers are the adults who have experience and training in guiding growth.

It is tragic that in the USA,  people think that we are the greatest nation, that all good things were invented here, and that if it wasn't invented here, it is of little or no value.

Several years ago (2008) I asked the dean of the graduate school in behavioral sciences at the University of Helsinki whether they had been able to find evidence of the role of educational sloyd in the success of their schooling. It was actually too narrow a question. The one I should have asked was whether they might find evidence of Uno Cygnaeus' implementation of Kindergarten style learning in the success of Finnish Schools. If you go to Finland and visit a school, you will find evidence of learning through play and evidence of learning cooperatively by doing real things that break the boundaries of traditional disciplines.

In the US, we should embark on a serious program to learn a few old things about learning. In the meantime, some reality can be restored to American Schooling through the following things: Wood shop, music, field trips, museum visits, internships, math through manipulables, dramatic performances, art and other activities that are truly meaningful to kids.

Make, fix, create, and increase the likelihood that others may be empowered to learn likewise.

the nutshell: Make it meaningful, make it real.

Education, according to Salomon (and to Dewey) had two purposes. One was to prepare the child for economic success. The other was to prepare the child (and later the adult) to get along with others within communities: to grow as human beings in understanding of self. To focus on doing both is a tall order, particularly if you've created a contrived system of learning virtually devoid of real, meaningful work.

At my 40th year of woodworking celebration, family members came from Nebraska, and old friends came from Wichita Kansas, and in the midst of these two groups two young boys met for the first time, my nephew Knox, and Wyatt, the grandson of old friends. The two boys took to each other immediately, having age in common, but also sharing a profound love of dinosaurs. The two could have played and talked about dinosaurs for hours and days and it was difficult to pull the two boys apart when it was time for my show to end and for guests to part ways.

In planning the school experience, and in selling the necessity of the school experience to parents of young children, promises are made of the child's glorious future and economic success. But too little emphasis is laid on the social aspects of learning, and the election we just endured is an example of what we get when children grow into adults having not learned the fundamentals of interpersonal cooperation.

I was greatly relieved yesterday that the US Army Corp of Engineers shut down construction of the Dakota pipeline, thus handing a short-term victory to the valiant protestors who had already been forced to endure too much. I was so well reminded of our own fight against the destructive powerline three years ago, in which an ill conceived power line with no purpose but that of power company profits, was to be built needlessly across our lands here in Northwest Arkansas. We stopped that unreasonable monstrosity, and I again celebrate our own success in theirs.

Schools, focused only on the further academic success of their students put the entirety of human existence on the line. Without environmental studies to link our children to the splendors of the natural world (both large and small), they become careless of resources and allow corporate greed to rule all. Without training in how to cooperate and get along with each other, and without the opportunity to learn deeply of each other (in all classes, races and orientations) our democracy is placed in dire straights.

There are two basic principles that pull the whole of learning into alignment. Both of these can be derived from a study of Educational Sloyd, and have become the core of my own educational formula. Make it meaningful to the child (throughout his or her schooling) and make it REAL.

Tomorrow, I will get more specific in how this can be accomplished.

Make, fix, create, and offer others encouragement to learn likewise.

Educational theory and reform in a nutshell

Using toothpicks to attach the bottom of a Shaker box

No Child Left Behind was a top down scheme in which the feds set standards and rewarded or punished schools based on student performance on standardized tests. There was some resistance to federal mandates, so the states became involved setting their own top down scheme using the "common core." Great ideas, however, are hamstrung by faulty implementation and ill conceived methodology. Yes, it would be wonderful if all students were to arise to do their best. Despite the best intentions of policy makers, they are simply in the wrong place from which to interfere to make necessary change.

This takes me, again, back to 19th century educational sloyd. The principles, I repeat once again in the hopes they may become yet more clear: Start with the interests of the child. Move in necessary increments from the known to the unknown, from the easy to the more difficult, from the simple to the complex, and from the concrete to the abstract.

Planning the move from the easy to the more difficult is easy. Starting with the interests of the child, in a complex culture is not so easy, in that even in a small class of first graders interests and level of prior experience will vary to a great degree. So starting with the interest to the child requires that the child's interests be known and allowed for in the PLANNING of school activities. If planning instead, is done on the state level or federal level, where is the necessary skill and sensitivity in that?

Moving from the known to the unknown can also be problematic, in that some students will arrive on their first day of school, having had interests and supportive experiences far beyond, or far less than their classmates. Some students will arrive at school intent on scholarly success, driven by parental expectations, and some will not.

Moving from the simple to the complex is relatively easy, as it is always easy to make simple matters more complex, but to make that movement in such a manner as the complex is made simple and clear to serve as a foundation for the next level of complexity, is not a thing to be crammed through without careful personal assessment of the comprehension level and interest level of each child.

So here we come to the most important point, moving in increments from the concrete to the abstract. This is not to say that the concrete should in any way or at any point be moved away from, but that it should infect every branch and every level of learning.

So, to bring things home, I want to make planning for student success simple enough  for any teacher or any educational policy maker to understand. When it comes to schooling, make it real, and insist that what you offer is meaningful to the student.

In tomorrow's post, I'll address making it real and keeping it meaningful. And yes, woodworking in schools has an important role to play in educational success.

Make, fix, create, and increase through your example, the likelihood that others will be inspired to learn likewise.

cultural recapitulation theory.

A much beloved cousin with whom I share the same birthday sent me a link to a New York Times Article recommending a youtube program, Primitive Technology. The article alone should convince my readers of the potency of this program, even before watching a single episode.

There was a proposal at one time shared widely in education, that children should be encouraged to grow through all the earlier stages of human development as a means of fully grasping technology, and as a means of understanding human culture and each other. G. Stanley Hall was one of the proponents of this.  The idea was that the development of the individual would best parallel the development of human culture. With that proposal having been ignored in most schooling for the last century you can look around and discover for yourself that many folks are "out of touch." I had written about cultural recapitulation theory in education at an earlier point in the blog. And so it may make some sense for new readers to dig back into the whole of this blog from its early days.

It makes even more sense to dig into the early culture of man so that we may know where we came from AND sense the vector of human destiny. Are we to be disembodied observers of man (unnamed) on a youtube channel, or are we to become more? Can we move from passivity to action and evolution? Here I'm not proposing adoption of new technologies, but that we use skill and craftsmanship consciously to reshape the human spirit.

It does not surprise me that modern man would be fascinated by the ancestral means through which the human species developed. Various episodes of Primitive Technology have been viewed over 5 million times. We have a longing, particularly in this age of abstraction, to sense our origins asconcrete relationships to the environment. The question remains, however, whether we will be voyeurs of reality or engage in our own concrete creativity.

Today I have a Xmas holiday sale of work at Lux Weaving Studio from 4-8 PM, 18 White St. Come see me. Buy books and buy work.

Make, fix, create, and encourage others to discover the joy and effectiveness of learning likewise.

Iceland's wonderful holiday tradition

Yesterday I worked on large timbers for a dining table, continuing with the forming of mortise and tenon joints. Tomorrow in addition to teaching at the Clear Spring School, I will begin setting up a display of my books, cabinets, sculpture and boxes for a holiday sale at the Lux Weaving Studio on Saturday, from 4-8PM.

Iceland has a wonderful holiday tradition that my wife has taken up here, and that I suggest for my readers as well. On the night of Christmas eve, Icelanders exchange books as gifts, leading to long hours of reading in the night.

Jólabókaflóð in Icelandic refers to the Christmastime flood of books. In Iceland, it seems that almost all books are published at Christmastime when they have the greatest sales. There are not so many readers of Icelandic, so the annual flood makes sense. Consisting of fewer than 600 new books, the flood is a great way to keep their unique language and culture alive. In the spirit of that tradition, I'll offer my own flood of books. Just in case you need to buy my new book Tiny Boxes, Here's a link.

To qualify for free shipping from the Taunton Press Store, you will need to spend $25.00 or more. To make a sweet deal, and meet the requirement for free shipping, add my book Building Small Cabinets, which is currently on sale for 1/2 price.

To sweeten the deal even more, take 10% off, using the promotion code "Taunton1" as described in the banner add below. Then to raise the tide in your own flood, you will find even more of my books there with special discounts. Use the search function at the top of the page and type in "Doug Stowe."

Have your own flood of books. Acquire the instructional books that set your hands and mind in motion for the coming years. Do not forget to use the code "Taunton1" for an extra 10% off.

Make, fix, create, and insist that others have the opportunity to learn likewise.

a table and a sleigh

 In the CSS woodshop, one of my students has been busy building Santa's sleigh out of bits and pieces of wood. He keeps adding things to it. But with each addition, adds also to his understanding of construction.

How does one measure the success of such a thing? The measurement is not something that goes on a report card, nor will it fit the statistical framework into which school districts and educational policy makers attempt to cram kids. One important measure is that when he carries things home from school, his father asks with some surprise (as he reportedly does), "Did you really make that?"

In my own shop, I'm working with timber larger than is usually the case for me. Large mortise and tenon joints made in heavy timber to form a table base presents a change of pace. Ripping a large beam down the center so that joints can be cut and that it can then be re-glued into a single solid piece, is not something I do every day.

I received a wonderful letter from a young wood worker who has found inspiration in my books. He will grow on to other great things. At 12 years old, he's already cut dovetails and box joints.

Make, fix, create, and extend what you do and love so that others may be inspired to learn likewise.

Handling a chisel

Saw and plane the handle to shape

Yesterday, I put a new handle on a chisel from the Sloyd School at Nääs, using an illustration from Otto Salomon's Teacher's Hand-book of Slöjd as my guide.

You can see the steps above and below. First was to select a piece of beech and cut it to an approximate size and shape and then plane and sand the sides flat and edges round. It is designed to have a taper from the butt to the steel on four sides, and "to be greater in breadth than in thickness."

Next, I drilled a series of stepped holes for the tang to fit. I started with a 3/16 in. drill bit and drilled a hole deep enough for the the full length of the tang. Then I drilled a shallower hole of 5/16 in. diameter, and finally one 3/8 in. diameter going only about 3/4 in. deep.

Drill for the tang to fit. Two larger stepped holes to follow

Two more larger holes will follow
These stepped holes allow the tang to fit tightly but without splitting the handle, and without making it subject to splitting during use.

I finished the handle with a coat of paste wax.

The handle feels great in my hand, and unlike some turned handles, will not roll off the workbench.

It is now an exact representation of the firmer chisel illustrated in the book and is exactly as was described in the text. Thanks, again, Jonas Jensen for a wonderful gift. It is ready for another 100 year's use.

Make, fix, create, and lure others to learn likewise.

Even with the stepped holes, some force is required to drive tang to full depth

With a coat of wax, the Nääs chisel is ready for another century of use.

arrowmont fire...

The wood studio at Arrowmont

Parts of Arrowmont School of Arts and Crafts were destroyed by a wildfire that engulfed Gatlinburg, Tennessee. Arts and crafts enthusiasts all over the world have been terrified over the possible loss of this school. Fortunately, it appears that the studio buildings survived with little damage. The following is from twitter at about 7:30 AM:

Phones were not working at Arrowmont this morning, and there was limited power. But Arrowmont General Manager Bill May posted an update on his Facebook page to worried supporters. May wrote just before 7:30 a.m. that “All buildings except Hughes Hall and Wild Wing survived with what appears to be little damage.”

Arrowmont has a special place in the hearts of woodworkers from all over the world. It was the place where the American Association of Woodturners (AAW) first gathered and was formed. It was the first craft school in which I taught classes, and it was the inspiration and model for our own founding of the Eureka Springs School of the Arts. The following link tells a bit about my own teaching experience at Arrowmont, Turning left at the Hard Rock Cafe.

I've not taught at Arrowmont for a number of years, but it remains dear to my heart.

In my own shop, I've selected a piece of beech to shape into a Nääs style handle for my Nääs firmer chisel, and will do so today, using Salomon's Teacher's Hand-book of Slöjd as my guide. In the meantime, my thoughts are of Arrowmont, and the joy of creativity I hope it will be able to offer for many years to come.

Make, fix, create, and use your own life to suggest that others may learn likewise.

handles at Nääs

I have begun the restoration of the Nääs Firmer chisel and replacement of handle by reading the following from Otto Salomon's book, The Teacher's Hand-book of Slöjd:

V. –– Chisels, Gouges, Carving Tools etc.

These terms include a whole group of tools which are used in wood-slöjd for the removal of small pieces of wood, in cases where the knife, the saw, or the plane could not advantageously be used.

They consist of a flat or concave blade made of steel, the cutting end of which is cut straight across and sharpened to an edge, and the other wrought into a four-sided tang, which is set into a wooden handle. The tool in working is driven into the wood either by the pressure of the hand, or by blows from a mallet. In order that the handle may not slip or twist round when grasped, it is generally made with four sides, greater in breadth and in thickness, and with the broader sides rounded. To keep the handle from splitting under violent pressure, the base of the tang is furnished with a shoulder, on which the handle rests.

These tools vary greatly in size both as regards length and breadth. The latter dimensions determined by the dimensions of the edge. The broadest tools are generally also the longest. In order to be able to execute all the different kinds of exercises which occur, it is necessary to have a complete set of each description of tools. There are usually 12 to a set, all of different breadths.

The first step was the removal of the handle, allowing the blade to be more easily "handled" in honing the face side flat. What appears as brown discoloration is actually rust, and small rust pits must be removed in order to be able to hone the angled side flat. The rust pitting is the result of the chisel being stored under improper conditions over its very long life. Honing the face side perfectly flat can take over an hour or more, depending on how deep the rust pits have become.

Woodworkers often spend a great deal of time honing the beveled side to perfection, but the actual sharpness of the cutting edge will only be as good as the surface developed on both sides of it. Once the face side of an old chisel has been honed to a mirror like finish and if it is stored under proper conditions, keeping the edge sharp will be easy, and accomplished by honing the beveled side with only minor attention to the face.

Later, I will made a simple handle in the Nääs design.

Make, fix, create, and suggest by your example that others learn likewise.

footballs and chisels.

Hans Thorjbörnsson, historian at Nääs, sent me a list of tools purchased at Nääs between 1900 and 1920, pointing out that my E.A. Berg chisel would be found someplace upon it, and it may be surprising to some that tools and equipment would include the following:

Buys 24 footballs No. 4 and No. 5 soccer balls 24 through Aug. Abrahamson & Co.

There are a couple important lessons in this simple quote. The first is to re-emphasize the role of physical fitness at Nääs. The school was not just about woodworking education, but considered the whole child and the teaching of the whole child in its training of teachers. The second point is to re-illustrate the role of August Abrahamson's business in Sweden of the time. August Abrahamson was one of the most successful businessmen in Sweden in the latter part of the 19th century, and it was his generosity that fueled the expansion of Educational Sloyd to every part of the world including the US, Cuba, and Japan. His business sold everything from wax paper, to sports equipment, and he spent his resources generously to support the growth of character and intellect of children throughout the world.

Hans ended his note to me with a note of serious concern. How could Americans, and particularly American women, have voted for Donald Trump? It is a question I ask myself. It is certainly distressing to me and most of the world that they did so.

In the meantime, I am headed home from Colorado, and will be back in my wood shop and familiar stomping grounds this afternoon.

Make, fix, create, and extend to others the likelihood of learning likewise.

chisels and Nääs

I heard from my friend Hans Thorjbörnsson, historian at Nääs about chisels, as I had sent him images of the chisel that Jonas Jensen sent me.
He wrote:

The steel blade of the chisel is of course the original one, probably from the period 1900-1920. The tools sold by Naas were mostly bought in parts from different producers in Sweden, Germany, England and perhaps more countries. But the wooden parts were often manufactured at Naas by craftsmen living in the neighbourhood. (sloydbenches, planes, handles etc.)

The very robust handle we discuss is definitely a replacement from the second half of the twentieth century. It has an elegant shape, it has the two strengthening metal rings. The handles of the Salomon era, were entirely made by wood resting upon the shoulder of the metal blade. No strengthening metal rings as far as I have seen in pictures and from what I remember from the tool-collection at Naas.

My grandfather was a rather skilful sloyder in his leisure time during these same years. I have inherited his chisels and their handles are of the same Naas type, just wood, no strengthening metal, rather angular, simple design.

Jonas Jensen had suggested that the handle was one made to fit a file, that was then added as a ready replacement. I've decided that it is far more robust than would be required for sloyd work. So the question arises, should I replace it with one more delicately crafted and fitting the type of work done at Nääs?

Make, fix, create, and show others how to learn likewise.

practice lesson

Froebel's gifts in the Trondelag-Sverresborg Folk Museum

Last night I dreamed that I was required to present a practice lesson before a group of adult observers. My point was to show an integrated lesson that gave the opportunity for cross disciplinary engagement. So I had some materials prepared that would be used in the course of my presentation, but I began by instructing the observers in my own philosophy of education. I have some doubts as to how much good that can do. But the teacher must consider how a lesson might fit the child (or adult learner). Even when a lesson is likely to be absorbed at only a cursory level, it is good to prepare for it to run broad and to run deep.

On Wednesday we went to the Denver Nature and Science museum, and among the many activities they had to do for kids, was a discovery/play room filled with blocks with which to build structures of various kinds. There were many high-tech exhibits, but interest in the simple blocks was high. Some of the children and adults were stacking blocks as high as they could. That's one of the  things that we humans do. To then knock them down is another. Some blocks were made from tree limbs, carefully sanded. These had the bark intact, but  would have been so much more lovely and interesting if the names of the species had been included in each piece. It would have been obvious to most that these special blocks came more directly from the natural world, and an important point was missed when they neglected to lead the users into a multi-disciplinary discovery and engagement. If they had labeled these blocks, children and adults would have been led more deeply into their use.

In the photo above from the Trondelag/Sverresborg Folk Museum in Trondheim, the gift blocks are mixed up. The number 4 blocks are in the number 3 boxes, a thing you might not notice if you are unfamiliar with their use.

This is black Friday in the US and I'm being bombarded by those trying to sell me things I do not want and do not need. We would be a better nation, if we were to learn to make things for ourselves, and the gifts we gave to each other would be more meaningful expressions of our own character, and development.

Make, fix, create and suggest by your example, that others learn likewise.

pages 9 and 15 Happy Thanksgiving!

An article about my 40th year celebration can be found in the Lovely County Citizen and be read here. Look for pages 9 and 15.

The photo at left is of my wife and I following her introduction of me to the guests, so many of whom I've known for 40 years and more.

I am in Denver with my wife's family for Thanksgiving.

Happy Thanksgiving. I have a huge amount to be thankful for. I enjoy my work, and have a wonderful family. I have those simple wishes for you, as well.

Make, fix, create, and offer others your example to learn likewise.

finding the confidence to begin...

Imagine you are standing along a trout stream for the very first time, there are small trees along side and you have your fly rod in hand. You must do some things you've never done before in order to "present" your fly at just the right point in the stream. Imagine also that there are other fly fishing enthusiasts up and down stream, and your first thought, may be related to concerns that you not embarrass yourself with an inept performance.

I've been woodworking for many years now, and have made enough mistakes in the process to have embarrassed myself many times in a field just as arcane as fly fishing and in which I've learned it best to not take myself too seriously.

I heard a radio interview with Nick Offerman last week. He is an American comedian, general all around goofball, and woodworker. He reminded his listeners (particularly those who want to do woodworking) that we all make mistakes.

I have been contacted by many people over the years, who have wondered how to start woodworking programs. I am reminded of my own hesitancy to take the plunge with regards to entangling my lines in brush, and in neighbor's lines and the embarrassment that might ensue. The thing a person has to do whether beginning to fly fish for the first time, or do woodworking, is to simply begin. Either can launched (if you prefer) as a solitary adventure. Try fishing in your back yard first. Try woodworking in your basement with the fewest possible tools. Then seek guidance. Friends can help.

Yesterday I got a phone call from a doctor in Nebraska, asking for a bit of guidance on gluing up a box. The best I could actually accomplish over the phone was to remind him that this whole thing cannot be taken too seriously. Learning must not be that way. When we remember that learning is the most natural thing a human being can do, aside from eating, and sleeping, and most things in which we find joy had to be learned for the first time.

Launch yourself. Then when you have learned a few things, share them, share the techniques through which you, yourself have learned, and launch others. Doing it yourself first will bring what seemed abstract into the concrete, in your life and in the lives of others. Gaining some small level of confidence as  a woodworker will help a great deal when it becomes time to teach others.

Tomorrow I will offer a link to the Taunton Press website, giving a 20% discount on my new book, Tiny Boxes.

Make, fix, create, and increase the likelihood that others learn likewise.

pictures at an exhibition (not Mussorgsky)

These are a couple pictures from my Sunday event. Shown from left, are Peggy Kjelgaard, director of ESSA, me, my wife, Jean, and an old friend Jan who volunteered to cut the cake.

Over the weekend, I had interesting conversations with guests from out of town. One was a retired school superintendent with her PhD in curriculum and development. We talked about the challenges in education,  and the necessity of eliminating the contrived aspects of it.

Most educators recognize the value to integrating lessons to transcend the boundaries between various disciplines. One approach would be to make up artificial situations in which connections are made by the teacher, demonstrating "this is related to that." But there is no real substitute for engagement in real life. Woodshop is one of many great ways that connections between fields and that children can discover those connections for themselves. Artificiality and contrivance needs not apply.

We shared the idea that teachers are under extreme stress and face unreasonable expectations, even though learning is normally an irrepressible inclination, innate to our human species. Schools too often take all the fun out of it.

Make, fix, create, and extend the likelihood that others learn likewise.

a party...

Yesterday we celebrated my 40th year of woodworking with an event at the Eureka Springs School of the Arts. The largest space available on campus was our blacksmithing studio. We fired up the forges to take the chill off, but the weather warmed during the day, allowing us to  shut down the heat, open the studio doors and enjoy a very beautiful day. We had about 140-150 guests, buying my work, and getting a preview of the new ESSA woodworking studio, now under construction. Many of our guests had never been to ESSA before, so it was a great introduction to what we offer to the community. Many were surprised at our lovely campus.

We also raised money to buy tools and equipment in our new wood shop. It was an extremely successful event, thanks to my wife's organizational skills and friends who helped with the preparation of food, the dispersal of beverages, and the sale of my work. I was kept busy visiting with guests and signing books.

After going for weeks with no feral hogs in our around out trap, we were visited by three hogs recorded by the game camera. Once we begin to get confident we've made a dent in their population, there are more that appear, so we are convinced the problem will go on for decades unless the state of Arkansas steps up to the plate and makes a major effort at eradication.

The image above is of objects from my new book, Making Classic Toys that Teach.

Make, fix, create, and offer others a pathway, by your example, to learn likewise

a mystery and a celebration.

I will be at the Eureka Springs School of the Arts today for a book signing, sale and celebration of my 40 years of woodworking in Eureka Springs.

The invitation is included in Friday's blog post. and you are welcome to attend.

In yesterday's mail, I received a gift from Jonas Jensen in Denmark. Jonas writes the very interesting blog, mulesaw.blogspot.com and does many of his interesting woodworking projects while on-board ship. What Jonas sent me is a chisel, the blade of which came from Otto Salomon's sloyd school at Nääs.

A part of the story of this chisel is that Jonas' father travels to Sweden each summer and buys old tools on occasion, some of which he sharpens and sells to make a bit of money to provide the excuse to buy more.

This particular chisel caught Jonas eye when he found the marking NÄÄS shown in the photo above.

The handle is unusual for a Erik Anton Berg chisel, and may either be a replacement handle or possibly one custom made for the school at Nääs. The handle is more robust than is usually required on a firmer chisel.

In any case, I am honored to receive such an appropriate gift... a chisel that has a story attached and that requires further research.

During the latter part of the 20th century, and after the sloyd school had closed, a huge bonfire of educational sloyd models was built and most of the work of former students and teachers was burned. Tools? Who knows where they all ended up. This one has a story to tell, that we may never know. 

Make, fix, create, and extend the likelihood that others learn likewise.

This day...

This day, I continue to prepare for my 40th year of woodworking celebration and clean the house to welcome guests. Being a part of ESSA is a remarkable experience and to see its growth in our community is even more than I had hoped it might be.

A number of years ago, even before ESSA was born, I was invited to the Chamber of Commerce "Vision Committee," so that I could explain what a school of the arts would be and how it would perform in our community and what its effects would be. The business community then largely ignored us as we put things in place and began building what we have built. But we are now at the point that even they are beginning to understand.

I read an article that laid the results of our recent presidential election at the foot of foolishness in schooling. It has long been recognized that schools have two primary functions, that of preparing students for the economy (to make a living), and of socializing them to perform as meaningful persons in democracy (to make a life). The article said we've focused on one and not the other. Otto Salomon said that schools have both a "Formell"  (or formative) purpose and an economic one, with the word formell referring to the school's role in forming the individual to meet the non-economic responsibilities of citizenry, community and humanity (to which I'll add, the responsibility of stewardship of planetary resources).

The way Salomon proposed to meet both goals was to foster a sense of understanding of the dignity of all labor, so that all within the culture would have deep respect for each other. Woodworking for all in school was his essential tool for this.

In the meantime, over the past 50 years in the US, the educational and political elite decided that all children must go to college, whether they were actually interested or not, and so manual arts programs were extraneous to their plans, and could be safely eliminated. And so millions of students took on unnecessary college debt, taking courses they would never have use for, and those who were successful in business and in their university educations did not garner the sense of the dignity of all labor that Salomon proposed. So what happened was that schools failed to perform either of their traditional functions well. Students were burdened by unnecessary debt, and the formative goals of education that would have integrated all levels of society in a united citizenry were not met.

The highly polarize election we just endured is an example of what happens when children in schools are not helped to get along with each other, are not given the skills to work out their disagreements by talking to each other, fail to recognize the greater things they have in common, and do not put those things first.

As you might be able to tell, I am gathering and refining my comments for a brief talk at tomorrow's event. Your invitation is in yesterday's blog post.

The photo at the top shows one of my high school students sanding his freshly made shaker box.

Make, fix, create, and offer others the opportunity to learn likewise.

setting up...

Today, I have high school students in the morning and begin setting up for my 40th celebration in the afternoon. The event held at the Eureka Springs School of the Arts, ESSA, on Sunday, November 20 from 2-5 pm in the metals building. Rising alongside now is the framing of the new woodworking studio which will be ready for classes beginning the summer of 2017.

We will have music, refreshments, new books to be sold and signed, and some of my work to sell with a portion of the proceeds going toward the purchase of equipment in the wood shop.

In addition, we will have a preview showing and tour of the new studio.

I realize that most of my readers are from far away, but I have a few close by. Join us if you can.

It appears that throughout the US, folks are awakening to the idea that not all scholars want to go to college. Some it seems would rather learn from their hands and from actual experience rather than become indebted to colleges and public institutions. Here in Arkansas, the newly passed medical marijuana law proceeds will be targeted in part to a renewal of career and technical education.

That is all well and good, but accompanying a renewal of interest in the trades and in the arts, must come also, a renewal of respect, and a rising of the sense of dignity that must accompany all labor. When a man (or woman) puts his hands an heart toward a rising sense of public good, we all rise likewise, and the blessings of community are widely shared.

Make, fix, create and inspire others to learn likewise

direct connection to the natural world.

University of Helsinki's secret museum of needlework

Yesterday after school I had an interview with the editor of one of our local news papers about my 40 years of woodworking in Eureka Springs which we will celebrate on Sunday, Nov. 20, 2016. The editor asked me a variety of questions and wanted to know what things I thought were important for her readers to know.

One thing that is crystal clear to me is that working with wood is a very special gift. You can go directly from what you find in nature to your own act of creating useful beauty, and do so in a manner through which the entire creative process is known and made clear.

There are some distinct differences between wood shop and the Maker movement's methodology of using pre-programmed digital devices. In the wood shop you are reliant on learning the simplest of technologies and can go entirely from rough wood to finished product. In a maker space, on the other hand, you are reliant primarily on technologies that most students may never understand and need not master.

The production strategies are abstract and complex, ignoring two principles from Educational Sloyd which had been formulated on careful observation of how we learn: Moving from the simple to the complex and from the concrete to the abstract. How many students delve deeply enough into the workings of a laptop or desktop or iPhone to understand how it works? Even if a child is adept enough to do programming or understand programming, the abstraction of it, means that the basic understanding of the material world and particularly the world of nature are commonly ignored. The use of digital devices simply connects to the world of man, and the much needed connection between man and nature is neglected. The results may be that human beings, disconnected from nature, are prone to damage it through ignorance and neglect.

The preceding should not be considered an attack on the maker movement. Kids and adults need to be included in the creative process and having access to creative technologies of any kind beats having nothing. The point is that more basic tools and technologies give a better foundation for further unbound creativity.

I have been engaged in a conversation with Frank Wilson, author of the Hand, and Elliot Washor, co-founder of the Met Schools, about education in Finland. Elliot had been interviewed by Finnish broadcasters who themselves unfamiliar with their own educational traditions, were surprised by Elliot's familiarity with Sloyd... a thing that came from Frank having sent Elliot my articles about sloyd written from about 2006-2008, in which I described the use of the hands as the engagement and furtherance of mind. Those articles can be found in the resource file in the column of links at right "Doug Stowe's WOH articles and papers" and through this link.

The Finnish broadcasters not realizing the impact of their own traditional methods could be used as an illustration of tacit knowing. The Finnish school system was built upon the system of folk schools of Uno Cygnaeus, the inventor of sloyd. Naturally they would take all of that knowing for granted, as it would have moved over the last century and a half into a foundational subconscious knowledge base. There were several features built into Cygnaeus' folk school. One was the Kindergarten learning style promoted by Cygnaeus. Another was the purposeful integration between home and school through the making of useful objects. In order for any of this to be grasped, even by those brought up in Finnish schools, it's effect would need to be brought to their attention.

In Finland now, they’ve gotten away form the making of useful objects and are more interested now in expressing creativity through the tactile arts. But hidden away at the University of Helsinki, is a room unseen by all but a very few that is full of the finest tatting, and lacework done by students that you could find nowhere else in the world. Just because something has moved to the unconscious does not mean it is completely gone and with no effect.

One of my first graders yesterday made what he called "organic wood,"  simply a slender stick of pine with a nail driven all the way in at each end. Could I understand it? No, not in full. But what I did understand was a child working through his own creative process and attempting to come to a better understanding of the culture in which we live. He gave it to me as a gift that he knew I would treasure. That's wood shop for you.

Make, fix, create, and demonstrate for others the joy of learning likewise

collaboration and knowledge...

One of the tasks in the wood shop that I have students do together is drilling holes in the center of wooden disks to make wheels. The point, of course is that collaboration with others is an essential skill. It also makes sense that students communicate their skills with each other in both tacit and not-tacit means.

Tacit knowledge consists of those things that we know instinctively or that have been learned or communicated to us or through us by example, experience or observation without having ever been stated or communicated in a purely academic or intellectualized form.

As Michael Polanyi wrote in The Tacit Dimension, we should start from the fact that ‘we can know more than we can tell‘. He termed this pre-logical phase of knowing as ‘tacit knowledge’. Tacit knowledge comprises a range of conceptual and sensory information and images that can be brought to bear in an attempt to make sense of something (see Hodgkin 1991). Many bits of tacit knowledge can be brought together to help form a new model or theory. This inevitably led him to explore connoisseurship and the process of discovery (rather than with the validation or refutation of theories and models – in contrast with Popper, for example).—infeed.org

In educational sloyd one was to proceed from the known to the unknown, but at that time, most children started with a similar tacit knowledge. Most children in Sweden at the time were at least familiar with the use of a knife. Even if they had not whittled wood on their own, they would have at least cut their own meat, or helped in various forms of chores that required the use of sharp instruments. These days, kids are all over the place even within a single age group, in that many parents do not trust their children to use tools, and they will not have gained the tacit knowledge that comes from having done so.

Exploring the sloyd precept of moving from the known to the unknown is made rather complex when and if you consider that much of what a child knows cannot be easily shared without them being in a position to actually do real things.

Teaming children to work together allows them to use tacit knowledge, but also converts tacit knowledge into forms that can be verbally shared. When a child becomes a teacher for other children, what had been tacit, becomes reflective knowledge, and thus gains greater significance and power.

Make, fix, create, and provide others the opportunity to learn likewise.

der tischler

Yesterday I had a new student in wood shop, and it was exciting for him and for me to see his creative energies unleashed, and to see the eagerness of my more experienced students to help.

I received word this morning that wood is ready for me to pickup to build a large dining table. So I'll be a "tischler" for a time, a table maker in German. Froebel's poem to der tischler that accompanied the illustration above was translated as follows by Nora Archibald Smith

The joiner.

Plane, plane, plane——
Joiner follow the grain!
Smooth as silk the table grows;
Not a brake the fiber shows.
Plane, plane, plane——
Joiner, follow the grain!

Strong, strong, strong,
Push the plane along!
Make the bench all glossy white;
Not a splinter leave in sight,
Strong, strong, strong,
Push the plane along!

Please note the hands at the top of the image, and the small girl below at work on her own table. Of course, a picture is worth a thousand words. The joiner's garb expresses the classic nobility of labor. The hand gestures at the top were what they children would do with their own hands as the poem would be recited. The small child at the bottom tells that even girls would be ennobled and empowered by the woodworker's craft.

My sister Sue loves to promote my books and decided to contact a friend involved in promoting Montessori schools about doing a review of Making Classic Toys that Teach on her blog. In response, the friend confessed that her own family was completely "unhandy" including her children and that the book would be of little interest to her or her readers. To which I once again quote Maria Montessori, that the hands are the path to the mind.

Last night my wife and I watched Michael Moore's movie, "who should we invade next?" And I was surprised that it had so little to do with war, and so much to do with how our American government and American society fail the American people. A particularly telling episode visited the schools of Finland, and provided very clear lessons in what we could do to improve American education. No specific mention was made of sloyd, but there were scenes showing children making things from wood.

What we have done by making school in the US so abstract and unrelated to the lives of kids is one of the lingering tragedies that must be addressed to really make America Great Again. In the movie, Michael Moore "invaded" countries to take the best of what he could from them. The great irony was that the ideas he found were American ideas and ideals that had first arisen in the American experiment, but that had been discarded by those greedy for money and power.

Make, fix, create, and suggest to others that we learn holistically by doing real things.

schreiner

a reliquary of woods

A number of years back, I made my first "reliquary of wood," a simple case, or box, for samples of 25 different Arkansas hardwoods. As you can see, it is a simple thing made of maple. This one won best of show in a 4-state regional exhibit at the Springfield Art Museum along with a cash prize.

It was first made for an exhibit of shrines at the University of Arkansas in Little Rock, and when I was invited to participate in that show along with a number of other local artists the suggestion was to create a shrine to some of those things that were most important in my life. This photo was taken for the UU World Magazine where my reliquary of wood was featured as religious "art".

What could be more important to a woodworker than the beautiful woods that are found in and around his home state? This piece is also based on the child's finger play, "here's the church, here's the steeple, open the doors and see all the people." The turned hardwood samples are the "people" of this church, and for some, God is as much likely to be found in the forest as anywhere else.

Thanks to my friend Barbara and her mother, I learned that:

a "schreiner is the box maker, a joiner. Schreiner comes from schrinaere, the Middle High German and old English similar, a little chest or box. In Norwegian the same word for chest or box,  is 'skrin' or 'skrine'. To write is 'skrive', the latin scrinium, a writing box or chest.

Barbara notes that it is "Always interesting to follow words around." And I learn that I am a schreiner who made a shrine. Along those same lines, I looked up the etymology for the word case, and found that it in turn equaled reliquary, a word associated with the small chapel shaped boxes that the Catholic Church once used to house  important religious relics. A small tin reliquary served as the inspiration for my own reliquary of wood. Can you see the way words and things are interrelated in ways that both defy and inspire the imagination?

I learned from a blog reader that he was greatly distressed (angered and insulted) by my opposition to Donald Trump's election as President of the US. I pray that he and others find no further cause for remorse and that Trump, a man who conducted a campaign as mean spirited as his, based so strongly on generating fear and insulting others,  and infused with such outrageous proposals can rise to the responsibilities of guiding our nation toward greater justice for all, and most particularly for those he insulted and threatened during his campaign.

In any case, when we begin to realize the overwhelming interrelationship of all things, we begin to realize that even the most minuscule act when performed for the right reasons can lead in some way toward the goal of the good even in the face of outrageous behaviors.

I learned from a parent that her daughter being in her first year of wood shop at the Clear Spring School, had been terrified at the prospect of tools. Thinking of them in the abstract, they, for her, presented the risk of sharp and dangerous edges. Using tools, has helped her to overcome her fear. May the same happen for each of us, that as we learn more about each other, we find less to fear and that those who have successfully used fear against us, will lose all their power.

Woodworking, done with right mind, can be an act of devotion that can change the world, admittedly only a very little bit at a time, and while that may never seem quite enough, persistence helps.

Today in the wood shop at the Clear Spring School, children will be making toys.

Make, fix, create, and offer others the chance of learning, and growing likewise to find connection in the vast interconnectedness of all things.

seeing is not enough

I have been working through my email contacts to promote my new book Making Classic Toys that Teach, and Frank Wilson, author of The Hand reminded me of Albrecht Dürer's classic woodcut illustration, Doubting Thomas, in which Thomas probed Christ's wounds with his hand in an impulse to ascertain their truth.

This illustration shows the classic relationship between hand and mind, in that the mind may seek the truth, but it's the hand that finds it.

Some might think Thomas to be burdened by doubt, whereas his explorations of Christ's wound's might have been considered heroic instead, as an example of the kind of healthy skepticism  required of our humanity.

One of the risks inherent in manual arts training is that students may learn to think for themselves and to be confident to actually test what they are told.

I spend a lot of time on the blog telling why the hands must be engaged in learning. And perhaps not enough time actually setting my readers in motion. It is through doing woodworking, and teaching wood working, poking your hand in Christ's wounds so to speak, that truth will become clear.

If you have a shop, get busy and reflect on what you have done. Invite children to your shop if you have one, and simply reflect on the process and what you and they have done together. If you have no shop, but have kids, start with scissors, paper and string and let your own experience lead you forward.

Make, fix, create, and extend to others an understanding that we must all learn likewise.

preview...

A preview of my new book, Making Classic Toys that Teach is now offered as a flip book. Click the link to read parts of the book, and share  it with anyone you think might be interested the full version of the book. It is targeted to parents, teachers and grandparents who may have an interest in developing woodworking skill AND increasing the intelligence and creativity of their kids.

If you wish to order go to Amazon.com or to the publisher's website. Some time in the next few days, I hope to offer a discount code for those who want to order direct from the publisher and receive a discount.

I have learned that the book will be offered soon in many of the usual woodworking stores and online shops.

I am almost ready to launch a new website, so I have been taking additional photos for it, like the one below, showing 8 of my 11 books, and not counting my two books translated into German. Not shown also are my 3 DVDs.

You can now join my facebook page. 

Today I have a board meeting for Clear Spring School and in the wood shop, will begin forming large mortise and tenon joints in walnut.

Make, fix, create, and suggest to others that they might benefit from learning likewise.

teach what you want to learn and do first what you wish to teach.

Yesterday in the wood shop at Clear Spring School, I began attending to the final details in making shaker boxes, so I could demonstrate for my middle school students what would come next in their own steps. The point, of course, is that it is best to test things in your own hands before you bother to instruct others. An experienced woodworker will test what works and define his or her steps to guarantee a better success rate for students.

One thing I love demonstrating is how a person can simply hold a pencil, and with one finger trailing the edge, mark an even line all the way around a box or other object. This is required for marking where the holes are to be drilled to fit toothpicks that secure the bottom of the box, and the top panel in the lid. It is also a demonstration of the wisdom of the hands, as no other measuring instrument is required but the fingers themselves.

Over a period of time, a teacher learns the general capabilities of each student: where they can be encouraged to do better, where to relax standards because they've already done their best, when a new tool can be introduced, and whether or not an individual student can be trusted in its use. Otto Salomon called that sensitivity, "the teacher's tact." The problem in many teaching situations is that no two children are exactly alike, and tact is a requirement. We think that teaching is about knowledge. It is also about relationship.

I have begun work on a dining table for a friend, and the 4" x 8" walnut had a twist (wind) over it's 40 in. length. If you try to pass twisted wood through the planer, the wood simply follows twists all the way through from one end to the other without becoming straight. Without a very wide jointer, it is difficult to remove twist in heavy stock. But by using a carry board and shimming under the stock to make it stable, you can remove twist, making one side perfectly flat, before turning the stock over to plane the other side. The photo above shows how it works. Simply insert shims in one end and the other until the plank rests without rocking.  Screw those shims in place so they don't move. Then screw blocking in place to make certain the plank stays in position on the board as you plane.

I received my author copies of Making Classic Toys that Teach, as you can see in the photo at left.

Make, fix, create, and increase the likelihood that others learn the value of learning likewise.

making wheels

As you can see in the photo, my new drill press is working well in the making of wheels. Shifting more of the making process to the kids, making my life easier, and their lives smarter and more fun. Older students are allowed to simply make them on their own (following instruction). Younger ones, in first, second and third grades I ask to work in teams, with one locking the wheel blank in place while the other turns on the drill and and turns the handle to lower the bit to form the hole.

One thing that makes this drilling process relatively safe is that if the wheel were to lift up from the clamp and spin, it would simply be a round object spinning with the drill and not something that could hit small knuckles.

As Elizabeth said, "This is fun, can I do more?" In the past, I would have to make hundreds of wheels at a time so that I could leave the big drill press free to drill axle holes in the bodies of the toy cars and trucks they make. This small drill press made in China costs less delivered than a cordless drill.

The small chuck used in the drill table to hold the wheel blanks is shown in the image below, and is available here and from other sources. The three jaws reverse to hold wheels centered under the drill.

Today in the wood shop, my middle schools students will be fitting top panels on their shaker boxes.

Make, fix, create and offer others the encouragement to learn likewise.

a night of anguish

I could barely sleep last night after watching the American people elect a liar, bully and misogynist president over a well informed and capable woman. Much of the world is reeling in dismay, with the exception of Vladimir Putin, who called immediately to congratulate.

I have prayed in the past that I might be wrong about American Presidents. For instance, when George W. Bush invaded Iraq and I knew it was an utterly dumb idea, I prayed that I might be mistaken. Quite sadly, I was not.

Fortunately, I have work to do, and can do good things, despite the apparent darkness that has descended upon our land. I can pray for some kind of miracle, as I know many people throughout the world are praying right now.

In the Clear Spring School wood shop today, we will be making toy cars and trucks, and Jenga games that will become a useful way to encourage our students to learn their math facts.

The bright spot in all this election stuff, is that the world is much kinder when shaped in and through our own hands and through the encouragement we offer directly to each other. We are each empowered to make the world a better place when we take matters into our own hands.

Make, fix, create, and encourage others to learn likewise.