I've always had a mixed reaction of gushing at cuteness and cringing at uniformity when seeing the crafts that my nieces have brought home from preschool. I remember making similar things myself--tracing my hand and then coloring in the fingers as feathers to make a turkey for Thanksgiving, or filling in all sorts of pre-cut shapes with cotton balls or other objects. Once I made a paper plate mobile, with a lion on one side and a lamb on the other, because in the Northeastern United States, the month of "March comes in like a lion and out like a lamb," (or, in some years, vice versa). Crafts like these often fill up a bulletin board, or appear in the school's social media feed. Then, if lucky, they are taken home and proudly displayed on refrigerators. After some time, they might be stored with similar projects, but most likely they'll eventually fall apart and get thrown out.
School crafts are almost-always product-focused, based off of a design that someone else came up with. They might involve a lot of work on the part of the teacher, pre-cutting the needed shapes that students will assemble. While these activities are excellent for building fine motor skills and confidence as kids see that they, too can create the thing, it is doubtful that they are helping young people develop creativity. I've done and taught plenty of crafts in my day, and I'm not here to bash the practice. However, I'd like to consider how the maker movement is different from "arts and crafts," in that it focuses on the process, and not the product.
Sometimes students (and teachers, too), engaging in a mini maker challenge, such as a tower or a space lander, ask if there is a formula to follow, and I always tell them that it's up to them to come up with the design. This might feel daunting at first, and there are always the few first moments when groups are unsure of what to do and seem frozen. But, inevitably, someone suggests something, and groups start making. As they do, problems arise, and they figure out how to solve them, adapting their design as needed. This, to me, is the most important part of a maker activity in a classroom. In an English language classroom, students are ideally solving these problems in English, using strategies that they've already learned, and, perhaps, some that the teacher has suggested before the making takes place. But also, students are bringing into existence something that wasn't there before, something related to the context of the lesson, pursuing something meaningful. Challenges that came up in the making, and the ideas and language connected to them are optimal places to connect the experience to the lesson, and so much more meaningful after students have lived through the experience. And thus, making can serve as contextualization for target language such as grammar, or a lead-in or follow-up to a reading or writing.
The things made in my classroom are almost always disassembled and re-used in other ways after the making. There certainly are times to invest in projects where students make a product that they are proud of, sometimes after investing a lot of time and effort, but I haven't found these to be the majority. (In my dream world, though, student-initiated projects that guide learning would be the norm, and I believe in making this happen, but that's another class, and another blog post.) For now, in classes where teachers follow course books and a set syllabus in a limited amount of time, the making I love to see happen is often a quick prototyping that results in meaningful moments to be connected to language points, and not necessarily a polished final product to take home. It's the problem-solving skills, the creative process, the collaboration with peers and the use of English to communicate and understand other points of view that I value over STEAM (science, technology, engineering, arts, math) skills--skills I don't really teach, but may introduce some basic principles of.
Does this mean I never show my students a model to get ideas from? No--models can be extremely helpful, especially when the challenge is hard to understand in a foreign language. But I make sure to show more than one, and to let students know that there is no right or wrong way to go about the task. Is all making completely free-form? Definitely not. There are sometimes certain skills to be learned, like how to make a circuit, or the amount of ingredients to mix to make a the right chemical reaction for slime, play dough, or cookies.
The maker movement has walked side by side with crafters and traditional trades for a long time, and this will continue. What's different is that not everyone's product will look the same. In a craft lesson, perhaps students will make their own carnival mask or festival lantern, choosing the colors. In a maker activity, however, things are much more open-ended. They might make any object at all that represents a holiday or a celebration that they enjoy. There may be constraints, such as using particular materials, or making something that must be worn, or something that lights up, but it is still open-ended. If a student chooses to make a mask, they might research how masks are made, seeking a model to follow and build off of. But the process is up to them, and the resulting product is something not previously planned or envisioned.
I've seen the proud faces of students--ranging from children to adults--who have put together something completely new from random bits and pieces I've saved and provided them with. Sometimes they'll need an initial prompting to see what can be done with the materials, or how things can be connected. It's often the folks who are most doubtful in their own abilities that end up completing the challenge most successfully. This often comes through the power of peers and a little coaching from the teacher. But the process of making itself is a powerful thing, and I'd encourage you to explore how it can transform your classroom or your reality.
I'll leave you with a photo of a model giraffe in an animal reserve that a student made. It was a lead-in to a writing activity, in which students had to write about caring for someone, likely an animal. Not everyone has a pet, and so, the imagination has to be sparked for an activity like this. The real product the student walked away with at the end of the day was the writing, though the giraffe is still in my classroom. (I gave her a choice, and she gave permission for it to eventually be disassembled and reused.) The skills developed during the making, and the language produced surrounding it, however, are the gems that gleam brightly from that lesson.
Are you a product or a process maker? What has been your experience with arts and crafts? What have been some of your proudest making moments, from tech to craft to cooking, and how did you get there?
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