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Teaching Wood Carving to 7th & 8th Graders

October 5, 2011 / Mary May / Wood Carving Education

Today I spent the morning teaching 7th & 8th graders how to carve a relief scene into a board. Stefani Timmerman, the art teacher from Thomas C. Cario Middle School in Mt. Pleasant, invited me out to get her students started on a carving project.

Fortunately one of the parents thought to bring leather gloves because if they weren’t wearing them, I’m pretty confident they would have needed quite a few bandaids.

It was really fascinating seeing these young people just dive right in to carving – there is no fear, nothing tentative. Once they figured out how to hold the chisels and mallet, there was no stopping them. They really caught on well with the whole concept of overlapping elements and layering.

What is funny is that normally I am very particular in getting the gouges really sharp. Well, I dug out some gouges – (v-chisels especially) that I haven’t seen in years, and some needed some real help in getting them sharp. I didn’t have a chance to sharpen them, but I brought them anyway. Bill Cox (my 95 year old apprentice) assisted me with the teaching and he also brough several of his own gouges for them to use. Well, if you have enough determination, and enough mallet power, the v-chisels WILL cut wood. No matter what shape they are in. Do NOT try this at home!

One comment on “Teaching Wood Carving to 7th & 8th Graders”

  1. Stefani Timmerman says:
    October 12, 2011 at 8:23 pm

    Mary you are amazing. Thank you for all the skill you and Mr. Cox helped build with the students. Check our website. Nice pics of you both. Plus you are mentioned on the school website and will be in two newspapers!

    I have still not had one cut finger yet. And they are doing an amazing job. We kind of adopted some wood working kids outside the art room. Now the kids you taught are teaching others! If we can get it finished it is going to be the bomb! 🙂 Talk to you soon.And thanks again! 🙂 Stefani

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