OT: What are our schools learning

[Lobby Dosser]

Is your "wall" thread still going? I haven't called in lately.

[Bill]

Thank you for asking. Unfortunately, the hours I needed to put into my job went up in August/September and the temperatures went down, so I had to stop playing with the drywall mud. I'm basically ready to sand and put on the final layer of mud...in the spring.

I did notice some small cracks along the edge of the ceiling following the temperature changes. My mud was thick there. The previous owner caulked over some irregularities like that. I reckon I'll need to do the same. I still need to choose my lighting.

Regards, Bill

[Jeff Gorman]

"Lobby Dosser" wrote in message news:i9qgqd$re1$ [e-mail]...

With regard to 'shop', ere's something I wrote as a young teacher some 50 years ago, addressed to 15 year old boys (in the UK education system).

We go to school to become educated people, and it happens that a study of designing and making furniture forms a suitable foundation for the study of design in general and for the formation of ideas of good taste, so cabinet making and other crafts are included in our studies. Let's look for a few moments about some more reasons for including craft experience in the curriculum. Imagine it were possible to keep a human brain suspended in a state of active life, gently pulsating in some kind of super fluid contained in a glass vessel, fed by numerous tubes attached to a battery of pumps connected in turn to an impressive array of dials and flashing lights and other science-fiction effects. No matter what brilliant thoughts this super-brain might conceive, it would be a virtually useless organ unless it could communicate its thoughts by speech or by actions such as writing or drawing or making prototypes of inventions and so on. The ability to use our hands (combined with a practical knowledge of materials is needed to communicate certain kinds of thought, so it is only commonsense that we should learn to use our brains and hands in harmony. People engaged in organising space research, for example, have found out that among brilliant young scientists, those who have not had workshop experience are at a serious disadvantage compared with those who have, because new discoveries depend on the invention and construction of new apparatus, and the scientist without practical training has been unable to give satisfactory instructions to the workshops. In some situations, in fact, the only satisfactory way to work out new ideas is for the scientist to do some of the practical work himself so again; the skilful and practically minded man is at an advantage. Of course, many other professions and occupations not normally regarded as crafts or trades require manual ability in some form or other ? few of us would like to place ourselves on the operating table of a clumsy surgeon or in the chair of a ham-fisted dentist!

A second reason for craft education is less obvious; it concerns character training. Now we may strongly object to having our characters ?got at?, but the kind of person we become affects other people beside ourselves so we must accept this apparent interference; it is intended for our own good. The point is that making things by hand demands perseverance, both mental and physical, and sets standards of accuracy and integrity (a kind of honesty). The simple acts of chiselling or saving wood, for example, demand perseverance when we become tired and our fingers and arms begin to ache (just as perseverance is needed during the last stages of a football match). If we are loosing the match, or the job is not going too well, we need a kind of moral courage to keep at it, or even start again. We also need the ability to resist opportunities for cheating (and there are many, we are not called craftsmen (ie 'crafty men') for nothing;) We might possibly learn that in some situations at least, honesty is the best policy. This insistence on high standards is deliberate. If, as a matter of self-respect, we never permit ourselves to produce anything that is not as good as we can possibly make it, we shall be well on the way to becoming successful and respected people.

Jeff