Putting power tools in the hands of 5-year-olds

[Jilly_in_VA]

Penelope is spending the week at a day camp run by Construction Kids. The Brooklyn-based program offers building classes throughout the year for kids as young as 2 years old. It's one of a new and immensely popular wave of programs trying to shift kids away from computer screens toward actual, hands-on activities. Like building things from scratch.

With help from a team of adults, the children in this program will design and make their own game boards, foosball tables and models of cities. Even the Brooklyn Bridge.

Winsor began Construction Kids five years ago. She's a woodworker who came up with the idea after giving a lesson on building to her 4-year-old son's pre-K class.

Last year alone, she says, 12,000 kids signed up. Winsor thinks these programs offer an antidote to all the time kids spend on their screens.

https://www.npr.org/sections/ed/2014/08/11/336865912/putting-power-tools-in-the-hands-of-5-year-olds

My grandfather, a woodcarver, gave me a knife when I was maybe 5 and taught me to whittle, then carve. Other tools came along later, though he didn't have power tools. Recently my cousin reminded me of the summer we helped build a violin, something I'd forgotten.