Teaching woodwork to school kids

[trumpetmonkey]

I have been asked by my local junior school to teach basic woodworking to Year 6 kids (aged 10 and 11), in groups of 2 or 3 once a week, as a volunteer.

Any tips or links to resources to help me work out an approach?

First session is this Monday! I plan to get them to draw their name or initials in bold straight lines on a plank of wood then cover the lines with rows of nails, as an exercise in marking out and using a hammer.

 

[Smudger]

You need to read the National Curriculum for Design & Technology here.

You will see from there that DT in schools is also (mostly) about choosing the right tools and exploring different methods and only a small part is about skills at Key Stage 2. It might be better to ask them, perhaps with a limited palette of tools, how they would complete the task, to try it and evaluate it, and then move on to a finished product.

You should also (if you haven't already) have a police check, and some sort of contract so that you, and the school, are insured. Kids can find some very inventive ways of hurting themselves, especially with hammers.

You need to discuss your plans with the class teacher, as not all kids will be capable of undertaking the same activities, some will be well in advance of others. If a kid runs through your activity very fast you need some extension ideas ready to go for them.

 

[Mr Ed]

Any tips .

run away.......



Seriously though, its great people are willing to volunteer and do things like this. I know my own limitations well enough to know I couldn't do it, so I have no advice, but best of luck.

Ed

 

[mrfixit]

s'How I got started. :lol:

Seriously, check your insurance.

 

[Mike Wingate]

Have you got personal liability insurance. £2m should be enough. I am a tech teacher. Avoid group work,otherwise one kid will hammer nails held by a second kid. Ask before you touch, kids and tools. Aprons and safety glasses, no trainers. Hair needs tying back, no loose clothes. Submit your lesson plan to the regular teacher prior to the lesson. Have you done your H&S audit of tools, processes and other possible dangers? Enjoy

 

[mrfixit]

Makes you wonder how we survived? By the time I was twelve (1972), we were casting aluminum copies of action man and I made a set of forged cold chisels and G-Clamps. All in nothing more protective than school uniform.

Just make sure YOU are fully covered. The kids will love it. :wink:

 

[woodbloke]

I have been asked by my local junior school to teach basic woodworking to Year 6 kids (aged 10 and 11), in groups of 2 or 3 once a week, as a volunteer.

Any tips or links to resources to help me work out an approach?

First session is this Monday! I plan to get them to draw their name or initials in bold straight lines on a plank of wood then cover the lines with rows of nails, as an exercise in marking out and using a hammer.

Beware on this one...you could be stepping into a minefield here. Make sure that you've got insurance and you're up to speed on all the elfn'safety stuff. Ensure that a qualified teacher is in the room with you at all times, never turn your back on them, and if you do, grow eyes in the back of your head. However tempting, do not touch them (sometimes it's easier to place a child's hand in the correct position by physically getting hold of it)
Emphasize tool safety...one or two horror stories always help :wink:
Teaching children at that age I found a bit disheartening. Tools are made for adults and children at that age don't have the physical strength to weild them properly, so I think you're on a bit of hiding to nothing, but the best of luck - Rob...20 years at the chalk face, last of the old woodwork teachers :wink:

 

[eggflan]

The really sad thing is the replies you have had already , the first thing that people come up with is , Make sure your insured and Dont touch the kids etc.

Its really a shame that it has come to this , our local comp (accross the road from my house) has done away with its woodwork department altogether :roll:

Guess its just easier to press a few buttons on a pc and get the big machine to do all the work for you ..

The only advice i would give is count all the tools back in at the end of the lesson to make sure they are all there ...

 

[trumpetmonkey]

Hello all thanks for the replies. Yes I am CRB checked since already been helping out in the classroom. I raised the insurance issues with the teacher before but haven't got a clear answer. She is just very keen for me to be involved and get on with it! I do need to get this straight though.

It'll only be 2 kids at a time.

Thanks Smudger for the national curriculum link, that is helpful. They don't seem to be teaching much DT at the school at the moment, but I'm not sure.

Eggflan yes it is a bit sad all the barriers to the whole thing. Check out this really interesting article about the failings of our academic focussed/risk averse education system compared to the more holistic approach of South Africa:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/life_and_style/education/article6975610.ece Or if you don't have the time here is a telling quote:

'...In London she was judged “highly academic”. In South Africa she was designated “special needs”. Pretoria, the state capital, was teeming with the children of diplomats and NGO workers from all over the world and educationists there were used to dealing with the offspring of their international visitors. “Don’t worry,” the child psychologist told me, “we see this all the time with children from your private and public [state] schools. Your system just doesn’t develop the whole child.”

Rob, I have a couple of horror stories and scars to prove it so i may start with that! And I was wondering how much the kids will be capable of, I guess I'll have to tailor things as I go along. I hope it won't be too frustrating, for them or me!

So, apart from all the red tape stuff, back to the original question - any suggestions for simple tasks or projects to get them started on?

 

[trumpetmonkey]

This is weird, my posts keep showing up blank...

You had a space at the end of the link, before the [ of the close tag
DaveL

 

[trumpetmonkey]

Hello all thanks for the replies. Yes I am CRB checked since already been helping out in the classroom. I raised the insurance issues with the teacher before but haven't got a clear answer. She is just very keen for me to be involved and get on with it! I do need to get this straight though.

It'll only be 2 kids at a time.

Thanks Smudger for the national curriculum link, that is helpful. They don't seem to be teaching much DT at the school at the moment, but I'm not sure.

Eggflan yes it is a bit sad all the barriers to the whole thing.

Rob, I have a couple of horror stories and scars to prove it so i may start with that! And I was wondering how much the kids will be capable of, I guess I'll have to tailor things as I go along. I hope it won't be too frustrating, for them or me!

So, apart from all the red tape stuff, back to the original question - any suggestions for simple tasks or projects to get them started on?

 

[Paul Chapman]

back to the original question - any suggestions for simple tasks or projects to get them started on?

Well, I'd teach it the way it used to be done. How to plane a piece of wood; how to mark out; how to saw; how to chisel. Then start to put all those skills into practice and make a few joints. Then use that to make a few basic objects.

One of the excellent things we used to have in my woodworking classroom back in the 1950s was examples of all the different joints on the wall and examples of things made using those joints. It gave us all something to aspire to. And it gave the teacher something to refer to when he was explaining things - you need to make it visual so that the kids know what you are talking about.

Without teaching the kids the basics, there's not much point.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

 

[woodbloke]

Tea pot stand :lol: - Rob

 

[Racers]

Hi,

I would check your CRB, my wife is a TA she started work at agency so sge needed a CRB check, then for year in a school so she had to have a CRB check, then again for the same agency so she needed a CRB check! it seems you need one for each job even if you have no break in employment.


Pete

 

[Smudger]

back to the original question - any suggestions for simple tasks or projects to get them started on?

Well, I'd teach it the way it used to be done. How to plane a piece of wood; how to mark out; how to saw; how to chisel. Then start to put all those skills into practice and make a few joints. Then use that to make a few basic objects.

One of the excellent things we used to have in my woodworking classroom back in the 1950s was examples of all the different joints on the wall and examples of things made using those joints. It gave us all something to aspire to. And it gave the teacher something to refer to when he was explaining things - you need to make it visual so that the kids know what you are talking about.

Without teaching the kids the basics, there's not much point.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

That's appropriate for a Carpentry and Joinery course in KS4, but these kids are 10. The school won't have the equipment or expertise to mainatin it if they have - if they had anyone half-way decent at DT they wouldn't be asking for volunteers. These kids need to learn about planning and evaluation, choosing the right tools and materials. Remember, they'll have a couple of hours and then nothing for what - half a term? 2 kids at a time, class of 25, helper sees the kids every 12 weeks or so.

 

[Mike Wingate]

Take care with the tools. My Grammar school kids mostly think that a marking gauge is a small hammer with a nail stuck in it.

 

[Mike Wingate]

You can all guess what they think a rosewood mortise gauge is for!

 

[big soft moose]

back to the original question - any suggestions for simple tasks or projects to get them started on?

Well, I'd teach it the way it used to be done. How to plane a piece of wood; how to mark out; how to saw; how to chisel. Then start to put all those skills into practice and make a few joints. Then use that to make a few basic objects.

One of the excellent things we used to have in my woodworking classroom back in the 1950s was examples of all the different joints on the wall and examples of things made using those joints. It gave us all something to aspire to. And it gave the teacher something to refer to when he was explaining things - you need to make it visual so that the kids know what you are talking about.

Without teaching the kids the basics, there's not much point.

Cheers :wink:

Paul

That's appropriate for a Carpentry and Joinery course in KS4, but these kids are 10. The school won't have the equipment or expertise to mainatin it if they have - if they had anyone half-way decent at DT they wouldn't be asking for volunteers. These kids need to learn about planning and evaluation, choosing the right tools and materials. Remember, they'll have a couple of hours and then nothing for what - half a term? 2 kids at a time, class of 25, helper sees the kids every 12 weeks or so.

personally i reckon the kids will lose interest if theres too much theory and not enough practice - they need to be making something worthwhile but simple

when I was 8 I made a teapot stand (ply backing, 4 pieces of ash mitre cut and a ceramic tile in the middle, tile glued on, ash eding nailed on with pins then varnished - job done) which my mum is still using today , and then when I was about ten I made a little stool ( softwoods and blockboard top with lipping) which again is still in use in my mums house some 27 years later.

The main thing these kids need to learn is that making things in wood is fun - everything else (except safety) is secondary to that - the theory of joints, planing, etc can come later for those that want to pursue it.

 

[Smudger]

In order to teach this

you have to look like this

 

[Smudger]

BSM - your point is sensible, but only if you bear in mind the circumstances. If this is the first experience these kids have of working with wood - or any resistant materials - and there is no real equipment, no workshop and no history of proper DT - how are they going to be engaged by making something?
Better to get them making something out of balsa and gluing it which they can enjoy than making them practice something they find difficult, but not for long enough to feel they have made progress. And at the end have something that they won't really care about.

My honest feeling is that the OP is on to a hiding to nothing, and should as someone else said, run a mile. If he continues he needs to look at the National Curriculum, some DT schemes of work for KS2 and prepare some proper plans, discuss them with the treacher/head and then set out. That isn't going to happen by Monday. DT teachers are trained for years before they are allowed to maim children professionally, and a good one is quite a find.