Keeping The Hands On Knowledge

I’m reading a very interesting book now entitled Shop Class As Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work by Matthew Crawford. The book is an exploration into the enduring value of the manual trades and it’s very fascinating to me. I am a huge fan of hands-on learning and this book speaks directly to the area of my brain that is always curious about how something works and how all the parts inside it synchronize to make something happen. The first chapter in the book is called A Brief Case for the Useful Arts and it begins with this introduction:


“In schools, we create artificial learning environments for our children that they know to be contrived and undeserving of their full attention and engagement…Without the opportunity to learn through the hands, the world remains abstract, and distant, and the passions for learning will not be engaged.”

Doug Stowe, Wisdom of the Hands (blog), October 16, 2006.


My uncle is a retired educator and guidance counselor with deep connections to the vocational education that once occurred in shop classes across America. I’ve heard him speak many times about the value of creating and repairing something with your own hands. I can attest to that myself! It feels great to fix something that was broken so that it remains useful. As the few remaining shop classes in our country fade away, what are we doing to address the intelligences of the students that would have filled those class rosters?