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As far back as I can remember I’ve always been interested in working with my hands. As a small child I would play with my dad’s tools in the basement, eventually making my own little workbench and collecting an assortment of tools. When I learned to write I created a sign and placed on the wall, it read “ANdys Woke Shop”. It was like something out of a cliche Sears commercial. In our basement my dad had purchased a brand new band saw that sat on his work bench. Being the great dad that he is he allowed me to use it with his supervision, even when I was so young that I needed a stool to see the cutting blade slice through anything in its way.
Where did all the building, problem solving, and sleuthing go? What’s happened to our use of the word workshop? Granted, there are still plenty of good things that happen in these so-called workshops, but I hunger to reclaim that word for something more significant than sitting and listening.
Conscience of safety he hid the bright yellow safety key used to lock the on/off button when he wasn’t home. But being an ever curious and sneaky child I’d sleuth around the workshop until I found it and continue experimenting with the saw and building an assortment of objects especially wooden swords, each one slightly better than the next. Somehow I managed despite being a young 6 year old to not slice of a wayward finger. These are the memories that come to mind when I hear the word workshop. A place where things are cut-in-half, pierced with nails, painted, screwed together, and fixed. Workshops are where things are built.
Although I spend less time building woke benches (I mean workbenches) and using the band saw today, the word workshop is still in my regular vocabulary. It’s been adopted by schools to describe almost any kind of meeting with colleagues to gather and learn. A noble idea, however, often instead of working together to build things its been reduced to a show and tell experience. Someone comes, shares an idea, people listen, leave, and maybe replicate.
Where did all the building, problem solving, and sleuthing go? What’s happened to our use of the word workshop? Granted, there are still plenty of good things that happen in these so-called workshops, but I hunger to reclaim that word for something more significant than sitting and listening. In this reclaimed workshop, like the one of my childhood, there are more questions than answers and a driving question that the workers have been gathered to solve. For me it was How do I make the best wooden sword? Today it might be How do we adjust our schedules to create time and physical space for learning that reflect what we know about age appropriate brain development? Both questions require tools, and people who are willing to iterate beyond a short after school professional development session.
I hope you finds these as valid points, but what “Can I do about it?” You might ask. Great question. Feel free to add suggestions in the comments sections. How about for starters, we start adjusting PD and other professional learning times around questions, not just demonstrations. Say goodbye to experts and a culture where polished prototypes are required for sharing, and instead promote experiments, pilots programs, and maybe even space for adult and child tinkering. Reclaim the modern workshop.
