mel jacobson on thu 17 dec 09
you don't have to teach people to watch, look and be
a part of a fire.
it is in our dna, it is our primal self.
to make things, anything, is in our dna, potters, clay makers have
that same dna, but with an X factor of 100.
children in this society are `starving to death`...a need to make
things, anything. just make something and call it `mine`.
take ownership of the process and let it belong to self.
`cookie cutter craft is boring`. it does not teach making.
to make an animal form from clay, your animal ,is a problem solving
system that reaps many rewards. look, study, understand the form,
manipulate, change, change again, and finally completion...and
your form is unique.
that is one of the major topics discussed at amaco. the death
of clay in schools. people without any sense of `making things`.
it is an outrage that boards of education, administrators and of
course training schools for teachers have just punched out
of making things.
mental education. never the hands or eyes.
of course they have just shut out about 70 percent of
prime learning. and, those that do not read well are screwed.
there is always lip service to `hands on, brain on`.
all the data is in place, all the learning style data is in place.
they ignore it. far too often, the ph.d. of education is more
interested in something
else...more than likely a political agenda...a social agenda. who
cares if the kids learn? and to hell with dumb kids. re/write
american history.
(you know those kids, who they are, and how they learn. and of course
they love clay.) they are `many of you on clayart`. you are filling
your lives with the thrill of making, doing, finding self in your work.
exciting times for us.
that is why most of us make pots. the thrill of making, problem solving
at its highest level, and then we add creative art to the mix and we
have what everyone else in the world wants...`satisfaction of problem solve=
d`.
then we do it again. it is ours, and ours alone. we suffer defeat, get up
and try again, re/tool, try again, seek advice, try again. then success.
we are in the third generation of teachers that cannot do anything.
fire a kiln? too scarrrrry. make clay? tooo hard. make a simple glaze...
wow, that is impossible. and that story may be a teacher of a college
ceramics course. technique, skill and knowledge of the material that
you use. hmmm. hard to imagine not wanting to know
all the answers. for some, putting gas in a car is a major challenge.
we get the posts all the time...`i want to build a kiln, i want to
make a unique
glaze from scratch...i want to build a studio.` these are serious people.
clay novices that want to stretch the limits...pushing hard to have
value. amazing
and exciting. we respect them.
`i want to learn glaze chemistry.`
`i want to learn thermo/dynamics`.
`i want to build a wood firing kiln.`
big questions. the heart of clayart.
and, many of you support and give permission to those people.
and often, it just takes `permission to be good` that drives them.
that same theory is a part of children's education.
it is like the modern thought...`what do i have to do to get an A+ in
this class`.
hmmm, as a teacher i waited for that one.
1. learn all the skills taught in this class and master them.
2. do 500 clay projects this semester.
3. learn chemistry.
4. learn physics.
5. make things that are yours.
6. then teach others what you know.
7. give more back to this program then you take away.
`now you can have an A+. are you ready to try?`
and what is amazing? many exceed that list. go way
beyond it. they become the heart of the program. and
when you point it out to them...they don't get it. their
natural need to make things just pushed them into excellence.
it was not planned.
those that work for an A+ never get there. that road is far too hard.
those that desire to make things, solve problems and get excited...well
they just dance to the end.
it is like our kelly (primal mommy), dancing along, loving making
things, building things,
solving problems every day. clay, kilns, teaching, food, saving the planet
with logic and doing...not slogans.
she is the metaphor for a double AA++.
there will be a place for her to stay at nceca. mel will know how
to get that done. she will not have to sleep in the lobby of the hotel.
mel
from: minnetonka, mn
website: http://www.visi.com/~melpots/
clayart link: http://www.visi.com/~melpots/clayart.html
new book: http://www.21stcenturykilns.com
David Hendley on thu 17 dec 09
Excellent story and analysis Mel.
Just attend a campout with Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts and
you will find that the highlight of the weekend is the campfire.
It is downright impossible for a 10-year-old boy to be
near a fire and not pick up a smoldering stick and wave it
around.
I don't know about Girl Scouts - I imagine it is the same,
except with less aggressive stick waving and mock sword
fighting.
A group of Boy Scouts heard about my pottery catapult and
showed up at my Open House this year.
It was such a hoot - they thought the catapult was the coolest
thing they had ever been involved with. They couldn't believe
that an old man (me) would spend his time making and using
such a thing.
Are campfires and catapults dangerous? Heck yeah, but
that's reason to teach responsibility instead of substituting a
virtual 'knights in shining armor' video game for the real
experience. Kids know when they are involved with 'real'
things.
David Hendley
david@farmpots.com
http://www.farmpots.com
----- Original Message -----
> you don't have to teach people to watch, look and be
> a part of a fire.
> it is in our dna, it is our primal self.
>
> to make things, anything, is in our dna, potters, clay makers have
> that same dna, but with an X factor of 100.
Vince Pitelka on thu 17 dec 09
David Hendley wrote:
"Are campfires and catapults dangerous? Heck yeah, but
that's reason to teach responsibility instead of substituting a
virtual 'knights in shining armor' video game for the real
experience. Kids know when they are involved with 'real'
things."
This is something I have thought about a lot. David gives good advice. On=
e
of the worst things many parents do in supposedly preparing their kids for
the real world is to isolate them from every potentially dangerous
situation. Getting kids involved in all sorts of mildly dangerous things
and teaching them how to be safe, resourceful, and responsible is some of
the very best training for the real world. Joe Winter, who fires with Paul
Herman, sent me pictures of his 4-year-old daughter poking sticks into the
firebox on his wood kiln. There are so many things that are incredibly fun
but a little bit dangerous, and if you "protect" kids from those things,
then will often end up doing them behind your back and without your teachin=
g
and supervision.
- Vince
Vince Pitelka
Appalachian Center for Craft
Tennessee Tech University
vpitelka@dtccom.net; wpitelka@tntech.edu
http://iweb.tntech.edu/wpitelka
John Post on thu 17 dec 09
Mel is 100% right in his assertion that kids need to make things.
Many classroom teachers can't get their kids to start their work. I
can't get my elementary art students to stop. My biggest challenge is
getting them to clean up when it is clean up time, because they just
want to get that one more part or piece done. When was the last time
you saw a kid filling in a ditto feel that way?
There's a 3rd grade teacher at my school teaching lessons this week
about minerals and rocks. She is teaching it from Xerox handouts.
She didn't pass around one rock to any kid in her class.
The first thing I would have done is have every kid bring in a shovel
and go out into the field behind the school and dig a big hole until
we hit clay. The kids would have a blast, finding grubs, worms,
beetles, rocks, seeing where the topsoil ends and the clay starts.
Here in Sterling Heights, the clay is only 6-12 inches below the
topsoil. A second grade student in one of my classes made a snowman
from clay he dug in his own backyard. He told me it was 5 inches
down. Naturally he did this on his own. He's a kid who just needs to
make things.
You can see a picture of his tiny little snowman here... (just scroll
down the page a bit)
http://www.macomb.k12.mi.us/utica/Schwarzkoff/art-archives/10-art/art-2010.=
html
A couple of years ago they dug a sewer line on the road behind the
school. I filled 5 gallon buckets with chunks of local clay and had
the kids process it and make things from it. They were messy as hell,
but not one parent complained. They told me their kids had a blast,
and one of them calls me whenever she sees them digging in front of
her house, to ask me if I need more clay.
You can see the kids processing that clay here...
http://www.macomb.k12.mi.us/utica/Schwarzkoff/art-archives/art-04-05/!art-p=
ages/art-making-clay.htm
Since we were using local clay, the kids made animals out of it that
live in our area. Their animals can be seen here...
http://www.macomb.k12.mi.us/utica/Schwarzkoff/art-archives/art-04-05/!art-p=
ages/!local-clay.htm
My son's chemistry teacher is another ditto pusher. I imagine how
many thousands of experiments took place to sort out the periodic
table and the nature of matter, and my kid hasn't done one meaningful
lab experiment all semester.
I had to teach him how to visualize atoms by drawing valence shells
and using bingo chips, dimes and nickels to fill the shells with
electrons and the nucleus with protons and neutrons. It wasn't hard
to take an abstract concept and make it a 3 dimensional learning
experience, but apparently this is beyond the grasp of his doofus
science teacher whose only goal is to "cover" a chapter a week. I
think of scientists like I think of artists, constantly trying to
visualize and understand something. Of course, my son's science
teacher is just trying to fill his head full of facts so he can fill
in the correct bubble on a test so the school district can report what
a great job they are doing to the local community. When I asked his
teacher about labs at parent teacher conferences, he said he didn't
have the resources or time. That's right, "we don't have the time to
teach the kids, we can only cover the stuff". I just shook my head.
Some paper plates to trace, bingo chips and coins, I think he could
scrounge those up, I did.
I have had 2nd grade students who have never seen an egg yolk. This
came out when we were making paintings of chickens telling each other
jokes. I was reading examples of the kind of dialogue you find in
chicken jokes to the class. One chicken said to another chicken, "What
do you call a joke book for chickens?" The second chicken replies, "A
yolk book". This one kid starts laughing at the joke, so I ask him to
explain why it is funny to the class and he couldn't. Then I asked
him if he knew what a yolk was, and he said he didn't. How do you get
to be 7 or 8 years old without seeing an egg or making cupcakes or
breakfast with your mom? But in our culture, when all of your food
comes from a restaurant, I guess it's possible not to know what a yolk
is. Not only do the kids not make things, their parents don't even
know how to either.
My wife works with a teacher who throws away her shirts when a button
pops off because she doesn't know how to sew one on. My wife who is
also an elementary art teacher, teaches all of her sixth grade
students how to sew. My wife invited this teacher to attend art class
with her students on sewing lesson days but she never came by.
I think the best teachers in my school are the ones who hated school
as a kid. These teachers do everything possible to bring the outside
world into school. I have a friend who is a second grade teacher who
has a zillion measuring cups, bottles, containers etc for a lesson she
teaches on metric volume. The kids get water everywhere, but they
gain a hands on understanding of volume. Some of the other 2nd grade
teachers won't teach this lesson because "it's too wet and messy."
That darn learning stuff, it's just too wet and messy.
Kids need to have ownership of their learning. Too often they don't
get that. I just finished up having my 6th grade students make tiles
for a clay mural. We do one every year. I needed a little creative
lesson for the kids who had their tiles already made in order to give
the rest of the kids time to complete theirs. I had the kids make
"snowmen with personalities". In first grade, the first 3-D sculpture
kids make is a snowman made out of 11 spheres and one cone. This
teaches them to score, slip and smooth and the vocabulary of some of
the basic 3-D forms. So in 6th grade I have them recall that lesson
but tell them they must now give their snowman a personality.
One kid made a Cookie Monster snowman serving a tray of warm cookies,
there were several artist snowmen with palettes and brushes, a Mexican
snowman with a sombrero, cape and cactus (yeah I know, a snowman in
the desert LOL), two snowmen with wings on their back and halos (angel
snowmen), a magician snowman with a wand and a rabbit coming out of a
hat on top of his head, basketball players, golfers, a snow mom
pushing a snow baby in a stroller. They had tons of ideas, each one
funnier than the next. One kid made a christmas tree next to his
snowman with strings of lights with real "handmade" bulbs.
Teaching little kids is a balancing act. If you don't give them
enough guidance, they don't develop any skills. If you give them too
much guidance they are just copying you. So you try to build up just
enough scaffolding so that they can get the creative juices flowing.
It's great if you can say yes to all of the creative ideas they have
all day long. If you tell them what the goal of the lesson is, and if
they can meet that goal, then they can make as many creative choices
as they'd like on their way to the goal.
If you let the kids schedule the amount of time they spent in each
class during the school day, it would look nothing like the schedule
we have now. There's no elementary kid I know who thinks 47 minutes
of music, gym and art is a enough each week. But we can't give them
any more, otherwise we wouldn't have time to cover all that stuff on
the Xerox handouts each week.
John Post
Sterling Heights, Michigan
:: cone 6 glaze website :: http://www.johnpost.us
:: elementary art website :: http://www.wemakeart.org
> children in this society are `starving to death`...a need to make
> things, anything. just make something and call it `mine`.
> take ownership of the process and let it belong to self.
>
> that is one of the major topics discussed at amaco. the death
> of clay in schools. people without any sense of `making things`.
>
> mental education. never the hands or eyes.
> of course they have just shut out about 70 percent of
> prime learning. and, those that do not read well are screwed.
> there is always lip service to `hands on, brain on`.
> all the data is in place, all the learning style data is in place.
> they ignore it.
gary navarre on fri 18 dec 09
Odd that you said that about kids and fire David,
I had a local ask for some clay for these kids in a summer art camp projec=
t and I said I'd even help with showing them how to fire the results in a c=
ampfire. He said, "Probably not... because of the liability." Who knows, ma=
ybe one of the kids goes off his meds and sets the camp on fire. Heck of a =
time to be passed out in your tent eh.!
I wonder if I'll still be able to give my grandson his first pocket knife =
when he turns 10 or 12. I gave my daughter an Old Timer pen knife and the l=
ast time she saw it it was on the night stand at her grandparents house bef=
ore she went to sleep. No wonder I got pissed when I got pissed, those folk=
s would drive anyone to drink. I think my son-by-law would show Brody prope=
r use, when needed, because he was in the Guard, has done some deer hunting=
, and should know the manly arts worm hooking, tool sharpening, and mumbley=
peg.
When I was a kid Mom let me play with fire in the outside part of our chim=
ney at the Farm...
http://public.fotki.com/GindaUP/ca/my_teacher/fs.html
... guess it's all her fault eh!
Gary Navarre
Navarre Pottery
Navarre Enterprises
Norway, Michigan, USA
http://www.youtube.com/GindaUP
http://public.fotki.com/GindaUP/
--- On Thu, 12/17/09, David Hendley wrote:
> From: David Hendley
> Subject: Re: [Clayart] looking into a bon-fire/story
> To: Clayart@LSV.CERAMICS.ORG
> Date: Thursday, December 17, 2009, 2:22 PM
> Excellent story and analysis Mel.
>
> Just attend a campout with Cub Scouts or Boy Scouts and
> you will find that the highlight of the weekend is the
> campfire.
> It is downright impossible for a 10-year-old boy to be
> near a fire and not pick up a smoldering stick and wave it
> around.
>
> Are campfires and catapults dangerous? Heck yeah, but
> that's reason to teach responsibility instead of
> substituting a
> virtual 'knights in shining armor' video game for the real
> experience. Kids know when they are involved with 'real'
> things.
>
> David Hendley
> david@farmpots.com
> http://www.farmpots.com
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> > you don't have to teach people to watch, look and be
> > a part of a fire.
> > it is in our dna, it is our primal self.
> >
> > to make things, anything, is in our dna, potters, clay
> makers have
> > that same dna, but with an X factor of 100.
>
logan johnson on fri 18 dec 09
>There are so many things that are incredibly fun
>but a little bit dangerous, and if you "protect" kids from those things,
>then will often end up doing them behind your back and without your >teach=
ing
>and supervision.
> Vince
Amen to that Vince ! That's how I learned : to make candles , how not to h=
eat the wax too much AND put out a small wax fire in a melting pan without =
burning down the house! (as well as other candle making do's & don'ts)
Some people just NEED to make things no matter what age.
Heck, My Hubby is convinced after 28 yrs. of marriage I am incapable of si=
tting still without doing something with my hands.
Just my $.02
Gingerbread cookies for everybody !!!
Logan
Logan Johnson
Yakima Valley Pottery & Supply
719 W Nob Hill Blvd. Ste C
Yakima, WA 98902
509.469.6966
www.audeostudios.com
"Carpe Argillam!!"
Kathy Forer on sat 19 dec 09
On Dec 17, 2009, at 9:06 PM, John Post wrote:
> If you let the kids schedule the amount of time they spent in each
> class during the school day, it would look nothing like the schedule
> we have now.
That should be how education works!=3D20
Provide structure and guidance but let the kids set their own schedule. =3D
You'd have kids excelling in all areas from woodshop to arithmetic, =3D
reading and zoology. They'd be required to do it all, there are limits =3D
and requirements after all, but they can focus when and where they're =3D
interested and not be regimented or medicated into state-regulated =3D
imbibing and regurgitating.=3D20
My kindergarten, a funded experiment by three education grads, was like =3D
this. It was an open-plan, one-room marble-floored schoolhouse with =3D
tadpoles and frogs, a woodworking and painting area near a kitchen, a =3D
nap and story place and tables and chairs. Also a garden. The teacher =3D
kept all the books and you'd go to her when you were done with one and =3D
she'd go over it with you and then you'd chose the next one, that series =
=3D
and subject or any other, or run off to paint. How simple can it get!=3D20
Kathy Forer
marci and rex on sun 20 dec 09
>On Dec 17, 2009, at 9:06 PM, John Post wrote:
>
> > If you let the kids schedule the amount of time they spent in each
> > class during the school day, it would look nothing like the schedule
> > we have now.
If we had more teachers who were passionate about the subjects
they taught , that would be a big help... I remember
HATING history in school because every teacher I had , it was "
memorize this date" ... dry ...........UGH!!!... Yet, I used
to pick at a coffeehouse back in the 70's and the guy
who owned it was a real WWII buff... and on slow nights,
we would sit around and listen to him
talk about different aspects ... and it was riveting... But he
LOVED it.. was passionate about it... and made it come alive...
I hated Chemistry as well... but loved chem lab... getting to
actually do things and see what happened...
Learning shouldnt be " memorize this and forget it as soon as
the test is done " ...
Problem is teachers arent judged by their passion ... and people
who have hands on experience that would
be beneficial cant teach in schools because they dont have "
THE DEGREE" .....
marci
| |
|
