woodworking | Scarfe Sandbox

Woodworking is an activity that can support life long skill development and the ADST curriculum across grade levels. With careful planning and consideration for safety (as well as appropriate school permission!) even very young children can learn to use hammers, saws, screwdrivers and other woodworking tools. In my own elementary school teaching, I had the opportunity to work with students using wood and the associated tools to ‘make’. One project, where students designed and built their own bird feeder based on the feeding characteristics and needs of a particular bird (think animal adaptations!) was particularly successful. Leading up to this kind of design project, I provided students with plenty of center time/playtime where they learned to use tools with no major product or project in mind.

Time spent hammering nails (to add to a class peg board, geoboard or piece of ‘art’) or screwing in some screws using different types of bits provided many hours of engagement and skill development. Through this play, students can develop their competence and were able to then recognize what kinds of structures they might be able to build using the skills they’d developed.

Recently, I connected with the wonderful educators at the Construction Foundation of British Columbia. This amazing group supports teachers (and their students) with learning woodworking and other building skills. In the Winter of 2020, I welcomed Randy Grey & Jordan Perrault to Scarfe where we got busy with the tools of their trade (and some pizza!) alongside 50 teacher candidates over two days!

Here is a booklet from the Construction Foundation that includes the Lesson Plan for our ‘phone/tablet stand’ and other simple projects: https://skillsready.ca/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/21323-Wood-First-Carpentry-Project-Workbook-_web-2.pdf