Sloyd

^{Header image: Otto Saloman, 1891: The teacher’s handbook of slöjd}

(Dec 9, 2016) Sloyd Education Theory: Making Things With Your Hands Makes You Smarter
https://www.core77.com/posts/58789/Sloyd-Education-Theory-Making-Things-With-Your-Hands-Makes-You-Smarter

I love learning, and I hated school.

A child has a desire for both knowledge and activity. These needs are met when manual work is introduced into the conventional school curriculum.

• Salomon’s concept was that there was a connection between creating things with your hands and cognitive development, that each would help improve the other.

Salomon was intrigued by the idea of making physical work an element in general education. He considered any person who did not have a sound training in general dexterity as only half-educated. We learn most effectively by activity—by doing things with our hands—and this knowledge should be acquired through self-education. Manual labour at school should provide an all-round education to everybody.

• The items Salomon’s curriculum called for pupils to make were not birdhouses and toys, but practical items: “Rakes, hammer handles, benches, tables, spoons, etc.—appliances needed in everyday household and farm activities.”
  • KF: Modern equivalent?
• Which is not to say that children were meant to be turned into hardware stores; it was their development that was the goal, with functional objects produced during this development a mere fringe benefit. “The teacher must pay attention to the child’s reactions, behaviour and development. The child must be the focus of attention, and not the tools, the techniques or the products. What is happening to the child during the work process should be the principal interest.”

Ten-point list of aims of a slöjd education

1. To instill a taste for and an appreciation of work in general.
2. To create a respect for hard, honest, physical labour.
3. To develop independence and self-reliance.
4. To provide training in the habits of order, accuracy, cleanliness and neatness.
5. To train the eye to see accurately and to appreciate the sense of beauty in form.
6. To develop the sense of touch and to give general dexterity to the hands.
7. To inculcate the habits of attention, industry, perseverance and patience.
8. To promote the development of the body’s physical powers.
9. To acquire dexterity in the use of tools.
10. To execute precise work and to produce useful products.