Skills for life
Children are very interested in learning real skills. They love hammering, sawing, even sanding, and they love working on meaningful projects. Wood Shop for Kids provides this opportunity for children. Through woodworking, children begin to understand the process of construction, of putting parts together to make something new; they develop a confident "I can build it" attitude. Working with wood, children exercise their creativity and learn the values of planning, patience, hard work, problem solving, and the satisfaction of work well done. They can make projects that have real value - for themselves or for others.
Wood Shop for Kids is a traveling wood shop. All tools, equipment, and supplies are provided (supplies are removed between sessions). Your organization will need to provide adequate working space and storage for the students' projects while we work on them. Your organization will also need to have adult assistants available to keep a 1:5 adult-student ratio for grades 4 and up and a 1:3 ratio for younger students. These adults do not need to have any woodworking experience.
NOTES about Courses:
- The 1.5 hour sessions can be broken down into two 45 minute sessions to accommodate more students.
- Depending on the wood shop schedule, if your organization is interested, I may be able to come to your location more than once a week during the course period.
- It might also be possible to string courses back-to-back for a longer than 10 week stay at your location.
BASIC COURSE:
Grades 3 - up
10 week course
Students choose their own projects (see Projects). They learn sawing, hammering, drilling, sanding, lathing (with files, not chisels), basics about screws and bolts. All tools are hand powered; no power tools are used (see Safety).
Fees: $75.00 for one 1.5 hour session.
Plus supply fee of $12 per child for the 10 week course. (If I come down more than once a week the supply fee will increase accordingly).
CHESS SHOP:
Grades 3 - up
12 week course
Click HERE for more information and photos about "Chess Shop"
Each child makes his/her own chess set (board and pieces). The pieces are made on a hand cranked lathe with dental plaster, a durable, but easily tooled type of plaster. For safety, the pieces are tooled with files, not chisels (see Safety).
The course includes learning how the pieces move. Younger kids will be taught how to play "Tic Tac Check" - a game that teaches chess moves while playing something like Tic Tack Toe. Students can also make checkers pieces and Tic-Tac-Toe boards.
The course can culminate in a chess tournament with invited chess-playing family members.
Fees: $75.00 for one 1.5 hour session.
Plus supply fee of $12 per child for the course.
GROUP PROJECT COURSE:
All Grades
Instead of each student making an individual project, kids work together on a single project your organization might need. Projects usually take 4-5 sessions; however, Wood Shop for Kids can accommodate as many sessions as needed.
Some examples:
- A Sunday school class culminated a unit on caring for Earth by building a compost bin for their church garden.
- Students could make a playhouse for their own use or as a gift to a preschool.
- Students could make a large sculpture for your lobby.
- Students could build simple furniture.
Fees: $75.00 for one 1.5 hour session.
Plus supply fee: as required by the project.
Wood Shop for Kids uses real hand tools. Power tools are not essential to building and will not be used. Children can safely use hand woodworking tools and understand the need for safety precautions. Students are supervised closely and safe procedures are always emphasized. All children wear goggles at all times. Gloves are used whenever necessary.
An important safety issue is student/adult ratio. Your organization will need to provide enough adult assistants to maintain a 1:5 adult student ratio for grades 4 and up and a 1:3 ratio for younger students. These assistants do not need to have woodworking experience.
The work space is child sized. The work benches, for example, are child sized. Tool adaptations and jigs are used to make tools safe and easier for children to use.
Saws: Students use 15 inch cross-cut saws and coping saws for curved cuts. All sawing is done with vises. These vises are attached to a child-size workbench. With a vise holding the wood, a child keeps both hands on the saw. As an added precaution all sawing is done with leather work gloves.
Hammers: Students use 16oz hammers. Most bruises happen as kids start the nails; we avoid this by using nail spinners - these start the nail with a drill so that the child doesn't have to hold the nail. Kids can also start nails with paper nail-holders or with pliers.
Drills: Students use small drilling tables which clamp down the wood and which protect other surfaces from drill damage.
Hand cranked lathes: Children interested in making chess sets use hand cranked lathes. The chess blanks are made with a plaster which is very durable, but easier to shape than wood. For safety, the lathing is done with files, not lathing chisels.
It is the challenge of any educational approach to balance the children's need for guidance and structure with the opportunity to explore, experiment, and learn on their own.
Pre-planned projects can hobble a child's creativity by putting too much emphasis on following a very specific and unvarying set of steps. With too much focus on preplanned projects, children miss the most satisfying aspects of woodworking: coming up with exciting and personally meaningful project ideas, thinking through the process of building a project, feeling personal ownership and pride. By choosing, planning, problem-solving, and doing, the children experience the joys of creative achievement.
At the same time, some children feel at a loss if they are not given some structure. Children require a certain amount of instruction, and the stimulation of interesting and motivating ideas to get them started.
The class format attempts to balance a child's need for freedom with a child's need for structure. Children will be given very short (10 minutes at most) classroom-style instruction on basic woodworking information in every session. This instruction will cover basics about safety, wood, tools, joinery, hardware, woodworking terminology, etc. After that the children are free to work on their own projects. They are given numerous resources and support to help them choose and build their individual projects (see Projects).
To let their creativity run free, children need to feel confident, emotionally safe, and creatively stimulated. Wood shop for Kids tries to create an atmosphere where each child feels valued and safe from ridicule. A "can-do" attitude is encouraged.
The success of Wood shop for Kids depends on children finding very stimulating ideas that will make them motivated to invest the hard work woodworking requires. Ideas for projects will generally come from four sources:
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Project Library: High interest project ideas suggested by the shop's woodworking library will stimulate the student's imagination. The child may be captivated by a clever idea from a book or simply use the book as a springboard for creative thinking. Even if a child doesn't choose a specific project from the wood shop library, seeing interesting projects designed by someone else can stimulate the child's excitement and expand her idea of what's possible. Excitement stimulates creativity!
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Daily Projects: Children like novelty. Every day a new, optional, simple, but interesting and novel project will be offered as an option for children who haven't yet caught the fever of a project of their own, or who are in a holding pattern with their current project (paint drying/ waiting for supplies, etc). The children come to anticipate this regular introduction of novel project ideas. This keeps the atmosphere of the wood shop alive and exciting.
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Peer ideas: Often children catch a peer's enthusiasm for a particular project. In a non-competitive atmosphere, children enjoy sharing their own ideas and expertise with other students. Students often like to work together on a mutually compelling project. Wood Shop for Kids has a web site showcasing student work: (www.hiphiphooraymagazine.com/studentwork). This web site serves as another way for students to inspire each other (see more about this web site).
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Individual interests: Another source of project ideas is the students' own personal interests and needs. Wood Shop for Kids looks for, encourages and celebrates individual kid passions. These passions readily lend themselves to project ideas. Beyond project making, a child's confidence and self esteem blossom when the child's unique interests are nurtured by adult encouragement.
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Making gifts for others: Children also love to make gifts for loved ones. Thinking about the needs and interests of the gift recipient will yield many project ideas.
A few project categories:
- Toys
- Musical instruments
- Sports equipment (examples: stilts, go carts, target games, simple pinball machines)
- Magic props (examples: boxes for vanishing tricks)
- Doll furniture and accessories
- Pet houses
- Items for home (examples: shelves, bookcases, flower boxes)
- Gifts (for holidays, or for no particular occasion)
- Educational materials (examples: science experiment tools, math manipulatives, school projects)
- Theater props and sets
www.hiphiphooraymagazine.com/studentwork
Children's creativity blossoms when adults and peers take notice of their work. Even the simple act of photographing completed projects gives children needed adult attention. The wood shop's own web site showcases student work. Projects that might get broken or lost will continue to live in photos on the web. Photos of student work on the web will become another source of inspiration for project ideas for other students.
Sherina Carranza Poorman: Mrs. Poorman is an experienced woodworker and educator. She is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College where she majored in Fine Arts. As an employee of the Lower Merion School District for eight years, Mrs. Poorman assisted children with special education needs. She left the district in 2001 to devote her time to after-school work.
She has years of experience creating with wood for and with children. She has helped children build go carts, play houses, furniture, theatre sets and props, toys, and a myriad of practical items for their families.
Mrs. Poorman creates educational materials for after-school programs, which can be downloaded by after-schools from the web site she created for the purpose: www.hiphiphooraymagazine.com. Over 100 after-schools around the country subscribe to this after-school resource.
Resume
Samples of Mrs Poorman's woodwork
Sherina Poorman:
Phone: 610 525 7564
email: brick476@verizon.net
