I found this on an education listserve and thought you might find it interesting, if perturbing.
Ellen
Cutting wood-shop classes goes against grain of craftsmen teachers
As school districts convert shop classrooms to technology education centers, wood-shop teachers are becoming a vanishing breed. Educators George Gosney and Mike Benton believe hands-on training gives many students their first taste of responsibility and pride in accomplishment. Contra Costa Times (Walnut Creek, Calif.)/
Replies
What a shame. Wood shop was how I knew where my interests were.
HA..and Ha again...I flunked WS..in 7th grade..would not make a chosen list of projects as MY project...I took a scrap of maple with a really cool knot...(looked like a ..well, lets say..a lower part of female anatomy)..and sanded and shellacd it to perfection...got an "F"..it was "art" not wood works...
so, armed with that knowledge..I became a woodworker..Go F yerself Mr. Barnel....
I remain..see signature...30 yrs. later
View Image
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations.
I almost failed wood shop in 7th grade. My dad was a carp and , at the time, I had NO interest in following anywhere near his footsteps.
As far as eliminating woodshop goes, I'm all for it. If there aren't any new guys coming in , and some of the old guys retire, maybe I can finally charge whatever I want. It'd be nice to charge more than a doctor or lawyer.
Bwahahahahaha..........hahaha
ha
haha.....very right there bro
LOL
aMy life is my passion!
http://CLIFFORDRENOVATIONS.COM
Thirty years since 7th grade?!?!?!
Yer just a pup! ; )Something is what it does.
How do you know how many years he spent in the 7th grade! :)
shhhhh...closer to 32 yrs. lol
View Image
Spheramid Enterprises Architectural Woodworks
Repairs, Remodeling, Restorations.
I HATE this trend! "Technology" has come to mean computers and nothing else. How is a society supposed to function without having people trained to make and fix things? Real things, like houses and cars. Also, in my view, most computer jobs are pretty uninteresting compared to jobs in the trades and crafts. I mean, how much fun can there be in maintaining some company's mailing list or accounting program? "Technology" programs promote the illusion that the students are going to be the next Bill Gates. That's about as realistic as thinking that every high school basketball player is going to make the NBA.
Bring back shop.
Javier
I have been saying the same thing for as long as they have been closing down shop classes.
The problem is that everybody is not cut out to be a techy, some people are meant to work wood, or fix cars, or do other things with there hands.
Doug
Except that auto repair is becoming more and more a branch of computer repair...
Shop or manual arts or any type of trade preparation has been held in low esteem by the educational establishment in the U.S. for at least since WWII. College prep classes have received the attention and students have been herded into them whether they were well suited or not. A recent article (don't remember where) indicated that a recent study showed that non-graduation rates from high school are actually much higher than the normally accepted figure of about 25%.
I think one reason might be because high school try to force everyone into an academic track that just doesn't suit everyone. (Of course, one reason for emphasizing academic classes is that they are generally much cheaper than trade-tech courses.) Much of trade-tech has been bumped from high school to community college. You pretty much need to have decided on your career course when you apply for a trade-tech after high school, however. I haven't seen much of traditional "wood shop" at the community college level, but I have seen some good programs in building technology and wood science.
Unfortunately, a lot of areas of higher education are getting squeezed at present, particularly in California. I think failing that failing to adequately fund both academic and trade-tech education is extremely short sighted and will result in a much less robust economy in the future. But most tax payers would rather take their money and buy stuffed animals from China than pay taxes to support schools...
Loved your note, Javier. I guess this is why, after spending my days managing software projects, I come home and work on "construction." OK, it's 1/12 scale, but it's still building something concrete.
I'm from the generation when girls could not take shop, so I don't know how I would have fared. Instead, I had to settle for almost flunking cooking and sewing in home ec. I'm pretty good at both, now, at least as good as I need to be.
Ellen (must think of a clever tag line some day)
I think "woodshop" in school was pretty worthless anyway.
What was taught in my woodworking class was pretty much useless information. We learned about dovetails and rabbets and made crappy boxes out of semi-exotic wood. If furnituremaking was a prospering field then it would be fine, but in the real world the majority of money making woodworkers are carpenters.
They should have evolved the class into something like "Building Technology". Teach kids how to build a house, how to apply shingles, how to hang a door. The kind of things that make a good carpenter....or things that every homeowner should know about.
As it stands, I have never met a H.S. kid who took woodshop that knew anything about carpentry.
gk
My school dropped the wood shop in favour of the technology department. I feel that it was a big loss for the students. WE could have easily had both. But the vocational programs do not fit into the testing mentality of education today. Test scores are what count not what you can build. The vocational programs needed to change with the times and there demise was partially there fault. But watch the day will come when the schools will again be called upon to offer those types of classes and they will spend millions if not billions on new buildings and equipment that only a decade or two before they sold for pennies on the dollar and converted the older buildings into computer labs.
I like the "building technology" idea, but only in the upper years for the kids who are actually headed toward the trades- a kind of pre-community college training. It's pretty expensive to have kids install doors or build stud walls as a school project! The key is the DOING- the hands-on component. Teaching them the technique without giving them an opportunity to get out the tape measure, the saw and the hammer is pointless.
For the younger grades, what you want to do is give these kids an inexpensive opportunity to do something, ANYTHING, with their hands. Many kids have a very hard time with abstract learning (i.e. pencil and paper). They learn by DOING. Many teachers find that hard to accomodate, because it involves kids not sitting passively at their desks. And the supplies and equipment (and insurance) cost a bit more than pencils and paper do. But what's the cost in terms of real learning? How do you put a value on that?
I learned far more by doing things at home, and later on the job, than I ever did in a shop class. But I had the good fortune to grow up with a lathe, a milling machine and a welder in my basement- and a Dad who was a mechanical genius with a grade 8 education and a wealth of practical experience with every sort of work- a true "jack of all trades"- who spent his leisure time building equipment for pocket money and the sheer joy of creating new things. To graduate from his household, you had to be competent at DOING a few things with your hands aside from pushing a pencil or clicking computer keys- and that'll be true of my kids too. But many kids don't even have a half-handy parent who tackles the odd job around the house- and for a great many, the only time they've ever built anything themselves was in a school shop class. At least a basic shop program in middle school will spark the imaginations of a few kids who wouldn't otherwise even think about doing anything with their hands. And it may teach the rest to respect people who actually CAN do the job professionally!
I HATED woodshop in Grade 7. My Dad was not a carp (my uncle, Jack Rosenthal is the Master Cabinetmaker) and I always loved working with my hands.
Nope. The first class, the authoritarian teacher decided we were having too much "fun" and gave a lot of us the paddle.
Second class, he decided I was being too disruptive and paddled me again, even though I feel to this day, I was the soul of decorum.
SOB ruined what should have been a great career and a happy person.
I've found myself now, though, but it took me until I was 55 to have the guts make the change.
Quality repairs for your home.
Aaron the Handyman
Vancouver, Canada
Yep. They eliminated most shop classes around here and sold the equipment at auction. Unfortunately they did the same with science. Not because of computers, but because of insurance premiums. They're afraid of the chemicals and bunsen burners or some kid cutting something off with a bandsaw. In Washington DC a couple months ago, some idiot got hold of a flask of mercury from a high school chemistry stockroom. Poured it all over the school and contaminated it. Cost them a fortune to clean it up.
axing shop is bad ...
but it does get worse ...
school dist around here ... hit by budget crunch ...
decided to cut the budget ....
and eliminated geography!
oh yeah ... thay kept their winning football program ... after all ... the million dollar stadium is only 2 or so years old ....
Jeff
Buck Construction, llc Pittsburgh,PA
Artistry in Carpentry
Dumb bastards. Many people, especially boys, learn academic subjects BETTER if they get a chance to work things out with their hands rather than a pencil and paper. Subjects like wood shop teach kids WHY they study math (fractions and geometry), and how to solve problems in three dimensions.
For years, shop classes have been relegated to the dustbin. Most of the guys who I took shop with in the later years were stoners or worse. Two guys made hash pipes in every material we worked in (even plastic...not so smart, I guess!).
As an engineer, I can say with absolute certainty that engineering schools which educate mechanical and chemical engineers MUST have a machine shop class and a project class where the kids have to build something they design. Those robot projects are some of the best things going for teaching engineers the practical aspects of their profession. And without that basic experience, schools graduate BAD engineers- ones that know the theory but know NOTHING of the practice.
"Dumb bastards. Many people, especially boys, learn academic subjects BETTER if they get a chance to work things out with their hands rather than a pencil and paper. Subjects like wood shop teach kids WHY they study math (fractions and geometry), and how to solve problems in three dimensions."
Molton,
Couldn't be said any better. Hate to break it to you, but it only gets worse.....
When kids get to college, so much seems to be taught in the abstract. Hands on seems to be looked down upon.
Can't tell you how many engineers I've met who couldn't fix a car if it broke down.
Been a long time since engineering schools taught actual hands-on engineering. Even when I was in college (30 or 40 years ago), they had phased out most of that stuff. No drafting, no machine shop. Some rinky-dink electrical stuff with springs and plugboards, but that's about it. Pretty sad. People are not hands-on anymore. You can't really fix your own car anymore. Appliances are disposable. Can't count how many times my father fixed the same old toaster with a butter knife. Now you trash them and buy another. Heathkit, Knight Kit and Dynaco are gone. None of the hobby stores around here sell balsa model kits anymore. Needs to be a serious re-evaluation of of what we teach or the skills are going to disappear completely. Kids get computers before they can even talk.
I'm reading all the posts on this thread as I pack up a high school woodworking program. Our entire innner city Catholic high school is closing because the local Catholic Diocese insists that our school survive on tuition alone - we serve "at-risk" inner city students, many from single parent families who can't afford $6000 a year.
Our woodworking program - girls and boys (and some of my best students are the girls) - emphasizes learning by doing. After some safety oreintation, we start right away in making things. Everyone builds a Shaker footstool - angled legs, shelf under the top and mortised side rails. Students learn to use hand tools - rules, squares, handsaws, etc. - no power tools till much later.
Students learn that everyone makes mistakes - and it's the craftsperson who has the ability to recover from the mistake. Students learn to think on their feet, solve design problems, safe use of tools and relax in a non-threatening "hands-on" environment. Our class is ungraded at this time - it's Pass or Fail and I was planning to introduce followup courses that are graded - but we're closing.
I've got some private schools interested in my program (much of my tools, machines, etc. comes from public school auctions) but I'm a "new budget" entity and that can be difficult. Interestingly, some of the very elite private schools across the country offer woodworking. One boys school in my area whose tuition starts at $16,000 requires woodworking from K through 8 and many of the high school students take it as an elective. Richard Starr's FWW book "Woodworking with Kids" is the only text that really addresses true woodworking as an academic subject.
As I write this, I have students continuously stopping in my office to discuss their next steps in their individual projects - they've progressed to turned goblets, spice cabinets, CD shelves, ash plint woven seats on a Shaker bench, etc. Tis a shame to shut it down.
OK, this isn't exactly "woodworking" but it is 3-D, hands-on. I'm working with a young man (age 18) at a local residence for kids. I don't know all the details of why he's there, but I do know that his best memories from his days in public school are of a shop class he really enjoyed.
We're building a dollhouse together from a kit. It's not a high-class kit, but one where you punch the pieces out of plywood, sand them, and glue them together. Last night I gave him the pieces for the chimney (punched out and sanded at home to save time, since we only have an hour a week for this project). So he had about 20 pieces of wood (from about 2" x 1/4" up to 4" x 24"), the printed diagram, glue, and a few clamps. He was done in 30 minutes, and he needed very little prompting. His main problem is with scale, which probably relates to having too few chances for hands-on work. A piece looks "too large" or "too small," and I have to prompt him to try it with the other pieces.
I'm very proud of him and think he could someday have a job in a manual trade. But because of other educational and environmental issues...I just don't know.
Ellen