I am interested in setting up an after-school woodturning program at my son's school. Does anyone have any experience teaching kids directly. I know Jack Grube is sometimes out there. Any assistance and reccomendations on outfitting to curicculum to finding small sized safety equipment would be helpful.
Thanks,
Paul Marks
I don't know about teaching kids, but my 10 yr old daughter spent a day teaching adults at our last symposium...
Most important thing I've found is to get a platform or two to get them properly vertically positioned at the lathe. Glasses are easily obtained, dust extraction is standard, and the tools should have smaller diameter handles to accommodate smaller hands.
Other than that, keep the lathe at its slowest and watch 'em carefully, as they have a tendency to put their chins over the end of the tool - vulnerable position - if you don't keep reminding them.
Soft maple, bass or cherry seem to be the right woods to use. If you live where alder is available, it'd be good, as none are too hard or stringy.
Speaking of that - McFeely's has kid-sized glasses and goggles.
Peter Teubel Milford, MA
Very cool! I just showed the picture of her demonstrating to my 10-year old daughter. Her comment, "Oh my gosh! Very scary!" Give her my congratulations both on turrning and on demonstrating. What a great start on a lifetime of fun!
Ron Williams Minn-Dak Woodturners Moorhead, MN
Hi Paul:
I'd gladly help in any way I can. I think a phone call might be the best way to start. Send my your # and I will give you a call.
Jack Grube
DJ Delorie wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@delorie.com:
What a great set of photos of the little one doing the turning. My granddaughter is 6 and I am looking forward to getting her started in a year or so.
Can I offer a suggestion. The photos are great, but they are way too big. I checked a couple of them and they are close to a megabyte in size. You ought to reduce them in size to 1024 x 768 pixels in size and compress them to something around 100,000 bytes. I have a very fast connection, and they still were slow to load. Someone on a dial-up would probably not wait for them. Also, they are taking up a huge amount of space on your server's hard drive.
You are probably taking them straight from the camera to the website. The full size has no viewing benefit over a compressed picture - it only produces a higher quality print if you want to print it.
If you have any questions about what I am saying, email me and I will try to help.
Herm snipped-for-privacy@hdv.net
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