IF our country is supposed to make things again...

[Mark]

Then we better stop getting our ass kicked at events like this: http://vimeo.com/70617787

So many kids would "light up" if exposed to the trades and were able to directly apply knowledge rather than be force fed a mash of information through the education funnel like geese for foie gras. But it all starts at the top. Here in Hawaii our top department of education folks are an attorney and head of a bank who both send their kids to private school. Bring back industrial arts, homeec, call them design or industrial design programs and culinary programs and you will see a lot less kids "hating school" or "being indifferent" to school.

Yeah, foodnetwork has elevated the interest in the culinary arts but we need the same for all of the other trades. Mike Rowe on YouTube is a great front man for this sentiment.

40 years younger and I'd become a builder rather than pixel pusher... though I will say pushing pixels at my age is a lot easier than lifting a gluLam or digging a ditch...

Just look at this forum dedicated to German engineered tools... why hasn't the US created a class of tools of this level?

 

[gkaiseril]

We have to recognize that not everyone is destined to be a college graduate and that manual arts are an art form and should be respected like any other art. Other countries like Germany and Japan respect the manual arts and celebrate the art and artist.

The U.S. has become obsessed with "college graduation" and standardize test but yet the educational skills level for the U.S. is dropping. I see college graduates being trained so specifically for a degree they are like the old trade school or industry school graduates. They know how to perform a specific task and not much more. They also think they have learned all they need to know and older workers cannot teach them anything new.

Once education has taught the basic skills like reading writing and arithmetic the students should be taught how to learn and that some of the "old" or "out dated" knowledge still has a place in the world.

The best example on this site is the process of squaring the MFT/3 rail and protractor. The best technique is centuries old was used the Egyptians and others to lay a square foundation for the pyramids or other buildings. Roy Underhill and others are trying to show that the old skills and tools before mechanization are still needed today and maybe more so.

Schools are dropping arts, shop, recess, etc in the name of cost savings and not realizing these activities build the mind and body in many ways including mental ability and social interactions.

It is said that medical doctors are having their basic knowledge being replaced at a rate of 50% every 10 years. That means that over the course of their careers they will have had to replace all they learned in medical school, their internship, and residency programs. That is upto 9 years of training after college. To raise to the top of their profession they need know how to learn.

 

[galwaydude18@gmail.com]

What a great video that was. Kids should be thought all these kinds of skills in school while they are young and it will help keep them away from xboxs and the likes. Also they should be thought that its either right or it wrong and that good enough can be better the next time. When it goes wrong they need to understand what went wrong and how to go about solving the issue rather than botching it and saying ah sure it's good enough it will do.

Look at those guys in that video. All from different countries and they all had the same result. They all had access to the same machinery but yet they didn't all do it the exact same way. Kids these days see how do one thing one way and forever believe that is the one and only way to do it and that any other way is incorrect. It's all about seeing things being done different ways and trying different ways and coming up with a solution that works for you.

My kid has for ages relied on using a number square for doing her maths in school and myself and the wife couldn't get her to stop using it and one afternoon after school I refused to let her use it to do her homework and showed her how to add and subtract without using it and she is a lot better at it now.

 

[tiralie]

Great video! Thanks for posting. I thought it was really well done.
Some impressive machines those folks got to use.
I saw the Festool logo up there but didn't hear anything about them...not that I understand any German, Austrian or Italian.
Tim

 

[jacko9]

"IF our country is supposed to make things again..." the last time I responded, I was informed by the moderators that my opinion was too sensitive (or too political) so all I will say is where did you hear that our country was supposed to make things?  We now live in a "World Marketplace" and we all compete accordingly.  I hope that this is PC.

Jack

 

[Kev]

Corporate driven mass production and consumerism has killed the idea of craft, along with the craftsman that makes a long life product ... and the corporates don't want them back!

We all (planet wide) need to fight this and the only way to do that is to think before you spend and make s better choice for everybody's future - not just your pocket in the short term.

 

[rmwarren]

I think there is a sea change underway, small but growing. The entire Maker movement is about learning to do create for yourself and make do with local materials, hand crafted items. True it is still a small movement but it has potential.

I started fiddling with/learning about CNC stuff perhaps 5-6 years ago. Back then I would scour eBay to try to find linear rails and other parts and everything was hit/miss, used or overstock. Now I can order a wide range of CNC parts direct from China with a click, pay via PayPal and they show up in 1-2 weeks. A few years ago I would have never imagined this. And the China made items are every bit as high quality as what was formerly US made.

CNC stuff is very different from hand crafting but both skills converge with the Maker movement. Also young folks now are totally comfortable with technology and their ability to make their own computer controlled machines. Doing this involves developing had skills as well.

As a medium-old guy now I look forward watching this develop with some envy, in my high school days I took every shop class I could cram into electives. Make me wonder what it would have been like to have access to all this stuff back then. My gut is that there is a cohort of young folks coming up that are going to do some really cool stuff, should be fun to watch.

RMW