The 16″ childrens’ bike project has cleared my outbox. I’m busy in reflection mode with the students, examining all the different parts of our work for ways to improve the product, teaching and quality next time. I thought the bike itself came out well:
If you’ve followed the blog over the past two months, then you’ve seen some of the progress. If you haven’t, or are interested in doing this yourself, the I’ll recap the project after the jump.
Filed under Classroom Project, Education, Teaching Strategies, Technology, Workshop
It’s that time of week again – I’ve had some personal living arrangements wetness and have been living out of a dufflebag and a smile. Reminds me of college, but at that time I didn’t have two in diapers…
At the home workshop, I’ve been banging away.
So, in one project, my segmented tube experiments paid off. I glued the old-bruce-springsteen-poster-paper drumhead, slapped on some cut-off t-shirt trim, rubbed on a little butcher-block wax and called her done. The little tyke likes it. I’m going to build a bigger one, only this time I’ll down two tall cans of Lonestar and use those as drumheads. After the week I’ve had, I’m really looking forward to that project!
Work, as always, has been rewarding. The stakes worked out well and the Rose Garden’s about done.
That’s rich, organic soil on top of a four-inch leaf layer. If that don’t make me grow into a prince with a narcissitic streak, I don’t know what will.
Part and parcel to the Rose Garden is the coffee grounds/chaff composting center which was built, painted and placed by a fellow teacher this weekend/early this week.
I have to write a news article on this. I might just tell everyone that he actually can get a project done on time and ruin his good reputation.
My ramblin’ men put together more of their Quadracycle. I’ve blogged about them before – we had CAD drawing class a few weeks ago. She’s got two rods placed on it and the Quadracycle works after a fashion. I’m expecting they’ll finish it up sometime in the next two weeks.
We got to drill through metal \../–\../
And used some wrenches (with a nice interior shot on how those get bolted down)
After placing the last rods and testing it out, one of my guys turns to me and asks if they are done with the project. I say, “No, we have a few more parts to place. Then I think we might paint it.”
“Good,” he says. “It’s pink.”
Make it safe and keep the rubber side down.
Filed under Classroom Project, Workshop
It’s been quite a week here on the range. My sawing post made Make Magazine’s Blog. Traffic soared. My father finally subscribed to my blog, which is intensely gratifying. He taught me most of what I’m passing along.
At work, we had some great stuff happen. The kids worked very hard and made great strides working on the Rose Garden and Apprentice Bike projects, despite early closings, late openings and cold, cold weather.
Word came from above that we would delay digging out the entire bed – we’ve gotten roughly halfway and for the moment, we will focus on planting trees. We still have to put down some timbers to raise the depth of the bed.
With the timbers placed,
It’s time to start drilling holes for stakes.
I raised the stakes off the ground with rebar, then drill 1/2 in. holes through the timbers. I’m relying on friction between the rebar and wood to keep the pieces together and minimize movement. I’ll tell you how that brilliant decision turns out when the stakes get driven in.
For the bike, we finished spray painting all the parts and began the reassembly process. As the kids ran out the door to lunch, this is what the bike looked like:
When this particular projects done, I’ll see what I can do to assemble some before and after shots.
Last but not least, the Production class has been experimenting with segmented tubes, or something.
The Production Co is working on building some awesomeness prototypes (I’m thinking lamp stands, stained a deep cherry red?). We’ve failed completely at actually finishing some products for tomorrow’s Valentines/Rodeo sale, but hey, we tried. Bad weather & the normal prototype issues got to us.
With that, make it safe and keep the rubber side down.
Filed under Classroom Project, Education
Over this past week, I’ve been linked/promoted by WordPress’s “Freshly Pressed” page and www.makezine.com. I’ll be honest, I am completely stoked that Make’s Blog editors took me up on my suggestion. They do check that “Site Suggestion” box!
Anyways, thank you to the new visitors and I hope you stick around. Thanks to the new subscribers (hey, Dad!), I hope I justify your click.
Make safe and keep the rubber side down.
–Mr. Patrick
Filed under Uncategorized
I have a perfect record in the woodshop. No fatalities.
I have had two injuries though this year (I average about one a quarter or semester). Both happened due to good sawing habits gone bad.
This picture shows my basic hand-saw set up when I cut a board to size. I’m right-handed and for south-pawed students, I mirror the set up.
I would saw about an inch from the edge of the table. Notice I use a bench hook to keep slips/movement to a minimum and pinch my thumb in so I don’t catch it on a saw (though I’m lazy with that index finger!). I have the kids put their weight into their left hand to steady the workpiece. I generally build the workbenches 30″-32″ high to accommodate younger statures. I’ve never had a student cut themselves after setting themselves up like this, righty or lefty.
Trouble is, sometimes that’s not the most accessible way to hand-saw a board. Small pieces for example, or a face-vise set-up in the left side of a bench like this necessitate a different technique:
Now pretend you’re a student. You go to make this cut (a rip down the pencil mark) and the board naturally wiggles. Remember how I teach to use the left hand to steady the work? Well, my student’s see my “good” habits and this is their solution:
And so, midway through the cut, this happens:
And there goes the finger! Nurse! Nurse! We got a bleeder!
Both finger injuries have happened in this manner – a cut at the end of wood when the lumber is chucked/clamped down on the student’s strong-hand side. I researched a bit and I’ve seen two ways to avoid this from happening. One hand behind the back,
or the two-handed approach.
The one-handed technique is great for students to gain a “feel” for cutting the wood correctly. A saw should glide through the wood with minimal downward pressure for the user – the saw does the work. Long strokes produce cleaner and faster cuts than short strokes. Move your body so your arm swings in a straight line in the direction of the cut (similar to a proper stroke of a pool cue actually). I will (once I re-teach the safe way to saw during this cut!) ask the kids to try a one-handed approach to reinforce proper technique. Then the students will switch to a two-handed approach to gain speed. Also, remember to teach how to re-adjust the placing of wood in the vise to minimize board movement, the original reason the second hand got involved in the first place.
So, a few things to remember when teaching woodworking to young students:
Two sites which enlightened me on my quest to solve the sawed finger mystery: http://woodworking-kids.com/ & Doug Stowe’s Wisdom of the Hands.
Filed under Education, Teaching Strategies, Workshop
It’s going to be a snow day in Houston! we canceled school two days early….
The last big piece of work I’ll do this week:
I can’t really explain this one. Context is nothing when you have a big cow sculpture hanging out the back of your truck. It’s like trying to explain missing homework to a grouchy teacher. No story counts.
It’s thirty degrees out in the balmiest city I’ve ever lived in…had to macgyver this together:
And finally, I ran across this shot – a first try at a bullnose profile with a handplane.
I have a very interesting volunteer opportunity planned for Sat. I will take pictures if it happens. I first typed that sentence as: If I’m lucky….it’ll be 40 degrees F and I’ll be digging in wet mud for three hours. It could be thirty degrees! Maybe a how-to-shovel expose? The weather is making participation pretty dicey. We’ll see.
Last but not least, some cool news:
Make Magazine will be doing a “woodworking skills showcase” over the next few weeks. They will be going over the basics in woodworking, so many of us will be experts. But if you are interested in something creative other than woodworking, you ought to check the site out – and leave a few nice comments for the nOObs with soldering irons. It’s a cool mag.
Filed under Classroom Project
Took over our conference room to work through some design challenges today. My students used Google SketchUp to start creating jewelry boxes, art car vehicles and bookshelves.
During the Art Car class, I led the group building a 3D model on the big (like 50-60″ screen) TV. Computers+big screen TV+3d modeling software+we are building a car = interested, motivated students. Or so I thought. I turn around, two students are asleep.
I have only three kids on the dang project. Terrible numbers. Mendoza line terrible.
I quickly got out the sketchbooks and pencils. More success, more interaction.
So, what I remembered and learned again the hard way today – the project material supply (in this case, laptops w/ the programs added to it) has to match the student’s learning styles (one-on-one direct involvement is the only way) and interest. Sometimes, this is hard to make happen. Like in a science lab.
A science lab means 4 (5 kids/project?) to 15 (dyads) to 25 (each kid gets an experiment) per class. If an average middle school science teacher has 100 or so students, and there is two to three science teachers per grade, we are talking about an enormous amount of dead frogs for a biology lab. I like to run a “bridge to nowhere” contest where students build bridges from packs of 50, 100 and 150 craft sticks. If I did that in a large student population (100 students paired up), I would end up with 5 boxes of 1000count sticks, enough hot-glue to cover that (who knows that amount…) and the tool cost of 10-15 glue guns. It’s an investment closer to $50 to $100 a learning cycle. And that’s a cheap lab. You really don’t want to know the cost of a dead frog. So instead of engaging a students ability to learn with their hands or observation of real world phenomena, only students who learn best by textbook will be served. Or rather – only those students who learn by lecture, reading text and maybe watching movies will be best served. Tactile, kinesthetic learners like my students are out of luck.
One of my students will build a bookshelf from pine this semester: $40 of pine. 1 student. If I had more kids, could my school keep an educational woodshop/environmental science/art class operating (three teacher’s salary + benefits, supplies, tools, space/housing costs and insurance)? We have a budget for my program, and it’s HUGE to me. I’m very, very, very grateful for it. Because I remember the budget for my last job: $80 a semester. If my schoolteachers had an operating budget like that, it’s little wonder why my inner-city, low-income students never had a single science lab. How could they? 80 bucks and 100 students won’t even get each student a candy bar. I think for all the uproar over how science education and creative arts have left the modern education system, we should also remember one reason why we lost them first: they are expensive.
Computer labs seem to have taken over as creative arts labs. Computers represent a smaller 5-yr investment than a woodshop. Many educational leaders get blinded by the screen and think computers can replace true tactile learning. Computers don’t replace it. The two asleep students refused to even try the CAD program – it’s why they did pen-and-paper sketch work.
So, to sum up. Support your creative, tactile arts teachers if you still got’m. Get’m some paint. Throw a 2×4 my way. I won’t say no.
And remember to bring enough computers to keep everyone involved in your third period class. And some paper and pens.
Filed under Education, Technology
An Idea: have students present projects to the internet in a controlled, safe way with my school’s brand on it. I’m unsure the success or necessity of this particular brand of teacher-activism because it’s mainly driven by my need to go
HOW COOL IS THAT!
If I could spend half my day yelling “how cool is that” out loud, I would. The picture, by the way, is an edited version of the toolbox project which I showed off on this post. My students have been learning CAD (and practicing spatial math skills) and the model is what one came up with (the toolbox builder, actually). I just slapped some fancy coloring and styling to it last Fri.
At the end of this week, I plan on walking the group through these steps and uploading the finished toolbox to Google’s 3D Warehouse as a final “presentation”. No names will be used and other precautions will be taken to protect the students, but at some point I have to ask why? Why do it at all?
I answer with same thing my fiction teacher said the first day of his class: if you write and do not wish to share, you are not a writer – you are a diarist.
As a woodworker, teacher, writer, father and any of those things, I still believe he had it right: In order to be an artist, you must share it with the community. In my workshop, my students do not create only for themselves and their own (my own, who cares which) gratification, but for the consideration of the community as a whole.
Filed under Classroom Project, Education, Teaching Philosophies, Technology
