I am a jr high teacher and I teach Art twice a week. I am a bad Art teacher, so this year I decided to make it a woodworking course. I found a great plan for a trebuceht (mideval catapult) and we made it from 2×2’s. Kids loved it, and I really enjoyed teaching it. The entire project was made with handtools, from start to finish. I was so happy with the project I would like to continue it with other classes, but I need new ideas. Does anyone know of any plans for a cool project that would take a small group of kids (4) 15 hours. I am hitting brick walls.
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For several possible ideas and some really offbeat projects try: http://www.instructables.com/
riden,
fellow teacher!!
been at the h-school level for a while. the kids get to use the power machinery so this opens things up quite a bit for my program. if you can find a way to make sleds, jigs and fixtures totally safe for repeatable results, you can keep them very busy (this being the name of the game). i take them, (4 classes/day of 1 1/2 hours each), through the steps to complete four or five cool little projects. i do understand that you may be limited in power tool use due to the age of your kids. you might even make some of the more risky cuts yourself for,say, a jewelry box and have them do what ever hand tool work you can think of. i know how hard all this is. it took years to get to the point where each kid is busy AND safe.
perhaps you might want to continue making ancient, scaled-down machines. one time a class built a full-size guillotine, steel blade and all. that was fun.
eef
You never said what the childres ages WERE!
jr. high, will. they call it middle school now. 11 to 14 year olds.
eef
How about a tool box? Front, back, bottom, two ends, and a dowel handle. Nails or screws for joinery.
Baseball bats were really popular to make in shop class.
hi chris,
you got to make base ball bats in high school? not five minutes ago three deans and a security guard just nailed me for letting a couple boys make plywood ak-47's. we are talking crude,awkward, silly looking things. and i guarantee you i will be explaining things to the big-lady, real soon.
eef
Well... my shop classes had about 32 students, that's 8 benches, four students per bench. One teacher. Only about half a dozen students like myself who were actually there to work, so you can imagine that the teacher had his hands full. Some guys just started turning bats at the lathes in the back corner of the shop, and I guess the teacher didn't know what they were turning - only that they were turning "spindles". When he found out, he put a stop to it.
I taught art grades 7-12 for 4 years.
One year as a special project week we made geodesic dome. It seemed to be a hit with the students although an 8th grade truant trove a car into it two days after it went up. The triangles were about 3 x 3 feet covered with plastic. There is some machining of the frames, but it was an interesting lesson in geometry and prodcing the parts we bolted together. Somewhere in the year book of that year there is a photo of the thing.
Try making inflatable structures. We seamed together sheets of plastic and inflated them with fans. The kids could walk through them. But there was that moment as a long tube inflated and rose from the floor that caused some giggles. Teaching as my father taught me is about being able to scowl on the outside and laugh on the inside and laugh when you want to kill.
Try digging your own clay, making small pinch pots and firing them in a bed of sawdust. Oh yes, I remember. Sophomores really don't like to get dirty. Yes clay is almost every where.
Try turning the room into a camera obscura. Its a good lesson on how they actually learned about perspective. After they understand the principle of a single ray of light being allowed to fall on only a single point inside the room they will get the idea of how a camera lens controls light.
Live dangerously. Try a life cast of the kids faces in plaster. We then used them to press clay into them and paint them like war paint.
Try building kites, small sticks, string and paper. Just watch out for gluing glass onto the string.
Mostly try to get across that Art is about making things and learning about controlling how things look. It wasn't until I went through architecture school that I realized that art should be taught as problem solving to learn about the visual world. We spend years learning to control the printed word and just a few moments concerned with what our eyes take in. Your job is important. It's easy to forget.
Have fun
Peter
One other tact was a project I did making dragons out of newspaper rolled around clothes hanger wire, bent into shapes lashed together with string and paper mache (sp) Add cardboard wings, tongues, fire coat with paper and paste and paint.
The woodworking project I did while teaching can be seen in post about doll houses. We called our company Captain Art Man Doll House Company. My kids came in and saluted me smartly, saying aye, aye Captain...once. Sometimes once is enough.
Peter
Doll House
I can't believe I found this post. I have a doll house that you built! My parents bought two when my sisters were young (so we are going back about 38 years or so). The houses have been passed around the family. My neices enjoyed them for years and now my boys use them as garages and "Lego guy" houses. I love them and always have. I was unable to ever get rid of it. I am unsure if the other is still in the family or not. They were both identical with many layers of wallpaper applied over the years. Thank you for so many, many, years of happy play. I can't say any other toy survived our childhood! I will try to attach a picture. Such an old post I hope you see this.
Warmly,
Deb
I have been there. With middle schoolers they need to take something home on occasion. So.. I have made peg boards(4" wide x 24" long) with shaker pegs to put on the wall to hang up their coats at home. I still get notes from parents thanking me. If you google "Nice Knobs" they have inexpensive shaker pegs and other things. If you call them and tell them you are a starving mid-sch teacher they will work with you if you push their name. Have the kids drill the hole for the peg tenon to fit in. I cooked up some hide glue and they went bat $h!t with the stuff. They got it all over the place and washed it off and got some laughs at "Mr Old-fashion" who hates plastic. Maybe an opportunity for some Green talk. Hey if it doesn't work out, take the glue home cut it with lots of water, pour it over the dogs dry food and watch him have a fiesta.
If you want to go big: make some speaker cabinets out of particle board. Wow. I was the big shot on campus for about a day when I built klipsch horn speakers. I got the parts(guts) from a business called Speaker Lab out in Wash state. Great folks. They worked with me for ed purposes. Maybe?
Kids love to look at pictures of themselves. Making picture frames and letting them do the design. Call a couple frame shops in your area and tell them its for kids. Ask: Do you have and framing materials you can't move? Be advised you might get a pile. I did. I still have some of the stuff. This is a winner. Call the art teacher and have that person come down and take digital shots of the kids together and you are rollin' in there. Attach the photos to an email to the principal and ask him or her to come over and have their picture taken with your kids and you are catapulted into the hall of fame. Ha.
Another idea, awards. A walnut plaque for good student of the week is priceless. I used Snapfish photo developers to print digital shots for 12cents a pop. Put them on a chunk of walnut and presto.. I'm the hero. I took the ugliest scraps of walnut, laminated a bunch of these strips and made plaques. You won't find these at Colonial Williamsburg but they are big stuff on the bus ride to the house.
If you have some math kids, you can make a "corebox with strips and 1/8" ply. I taught my kids about how aircraft wings were made this way. Cut a ton of 1/4" strips. Make a grid of the strips. Make a sandwich with the plywood and you have something the kids can stand on and no deflection. This is a big step for them. Lots of learning here. Again, these are Mid-Sch not HS so I am trying to limit the gee whiz I'm smart stuff. They can see it and try it out.
Ok. That's a start.
Good luck
dan
There was a story by a high school teacher last fall in Pop Woodworking describing a high school physics class making different boomerang shapes and trying them out.
You might get some ideas for projects made with hand tools in Roy Underhill's books.
Puzzles, toys, whirligigs.
"Making Mechanical Marvels in Wood," a book by Raymond Levy.
I can think of a few things, but I think you could really have a lot of fun with the first one.
Long bows. Yes, bows, like the kind that shoot arrows. Get the PE folks involved. And teach it from a historical perspective. When, where, and how were they used. It would be great fun, low cost, and students would learn a lot about working with wood.
Second, a bridge. I happen to need one. Bigger than you might make, but a good bridge would be a fun project.
Brent
I can think of a few things, but I think you could really have a lot of fun with the first one.
Longbows. Yes, bows, like the kind that shoot arrows. Get the PE folks involved. And teach it from a historical perspective. When, where, and how were they used. It would be great fun, low cost, and students would learn a lot about working with wood.
Second, a bridge. I happen to need one. Bigger than you might make, but a good bridge would be a fun project.
Brent
Lots of good ideas here, thanks guys.
The longbow has really got me thinking though. First, my school is all country boys and almost all of them hunt.
Second, it follows the medieval weaponry theme.
I am thinking of buying spokeshaves and rasps and carving down an 8/4 piece of ash. Thinking ash may be the safest bet in wood.
Really appreciate the help.
You might get some help from these guys
http://tradgang.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi
Brent
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