Georges+Teacher+Enquiry

TEACHER ENQUIRY DESIGN AND TECHNOLOGY SPECIALIST NOVEMBER 2009 Georges St. Pierre   TEACHER ENQUIRY – DESIGN AND TECH SPECIALIST QUESTION How can I best prepare my advanced students for post-secondary apprenticeship and college training with regards to construction and woodworking and building. RATIONALE My own personal background is a journeyman carpenter. I also am a business owner in the sawmill and lumber yard industry. Most people call us construction workers. This is not really the correct term. There are many different kinds of trades people working in the construction industry and people in the trade know the difference between each of the trades. We consider a person to be a journeyman carpenter when he has a license issued by a certified body (i.e. Algonquin College, Ministry of Construction, ). He must be good at building and erecting and doing other basic tasks such as preparing lumber, planning, nailing, measuring, and basic backing. A person is considered to be a labourer when he follows the instructions from the carpenter. For example, the carpenter would mark out the plates and the labourer would nail the studs 16” apart, etc. The journeyman carpenter, can build a house or an industrial building based on a blueprint plan. He also has the ability to repair problems. Usually, one will become a labourer first so this is a given for any journeyman carpenter. House or commercial buildings has always been complicated because if you make one mistake, the building could collapse or cause other problems for other trades (i.e. plumbing, electrical, forced air and even insulation). You must have a good understanding of computer systems and other construction trades. Most companies today have standards to monitor and control the erection of the house or building and all buildings need to pass an inspection at various points of the building stage. There are also building codes, blueprint reading, land surveys, and land plots, environmental testing, inspection standards, knowledge of other trades, all important components to have a basic understanding in order to be a good journeyman carpenter. To be successful and at the top of the game as a journeyman carpenter, you must learn about all these trades and how they interact with each other to build a good house. The quality of a building, the heat efficiency and how long it will survive in the environment. So from above, you can see the difference between the labourer and the journeyman carpenter. In the working world, the carpenter is at the top of the pay scale and in the highest demand. The labourer may get minimum wage and may work only during peak periods. You are more in a position to dictate to your own employment terms when you have learned and mastered these types of carpentry skills. These days, there is a shortage of highly skilled licensed carpenters because many young people today have chosen to pursue careers in the computer and high tech industry. There is a demand for licensed carpenters today across Canada and the USA. I feel that I can give my students a head-start that will help them to move from labourer to something more desirable in a much shorter time-frame. They will also be better prepared when going to college for their training. I have seen apprenticeships struggle in the construction environment because of poor background training. The regular curriculum does not focus on this type of training. I have been asked to go inspect houses prior to someone making a purchase of a home or during the actual construction phase before the covering of electrical and plumbing and structural components. Also, I have been asked on numerous occasions to help friends build or renovate their homes. There is a government program that would send licensed technicians to your residence to check the heat efficiency of the house. I also have a lot of information for all kinds of houses including the R-value and windows and lumber quality. I have a policy in my construction, woodworking or computer class. If the student cannot understand the importance of safety or they are unable to complete a basic project using a measuring tape, or arrive in class on time, or use basic hand tools, I will not move them to the next level of apprenticeship or working with power tools. I see no value in teaching them beyond their capacity because someone might get hurt. I see the value in erecting a structure or a shed in the classroom so they can see the ongoing progression of a project over a short period of time. If I can successfully teach one or two of my seniors the basics of constructing a building then this is all worth it to me. As these young people grow older it would be useful for them to have the capacity to do simple household repairs or projects without hiring expensive help. We are having a hard time keeping people in the construction trade and I feel that I would be doing my little pat to help the trade. But mostly to have a positive and lasting effect for students who intend to pursue the trade beyond high school and their home. I always tell my students it is very important to know basic measurements, both inches and metric. CONTEXT I am focussing on six of my senior students that want to go into the trade beyond secondary school. The six that want to pursue this trade beyond secondary school, I will be teaching this material and training and practicing during class and for the remainder of the school year. I have already given them a lesson on basic construction practices, including measuring, metric and standard measurement. We move into the basic of carpentry which is measuring, erecting, digging, landscaping, the basic of land surveying, and the construction industry or the modern woodworking. In order to help students become familiar with designing construction projects, I have taught a few different programs in the classroom (i.e. cuisine-tech. auto-cad and google sketch seven). So far, the students find google sketch seven to be a lot of fun and user friendly. This is a computer program that is not specified to any manufacturer or construction company. The culminating task that will tell me how successful I was in teaching this material is when I ask a student or give a student a set of plans and he or she is able to deliver me a completed finished project. This will prove to me that they can build a building with all the major components (i.e. doors, windows, corners, walls, etc.). I have also been teaching the proper acronyms in the construction industry (i.e. safety side, ONIP???), The construction industry is like an octopus and there is all these alley ways (specialists in stair-building, cabinet making, window- making, truss-making, commercial and residential structures, finishing, flooring, painting, drywall, roofing, brick laying, and soffets, etc.). MATERIALS The materials that I am using are as follows: Modern Carpentry: Building Construction BY Willis H Wagner University Lawas, Cedo Falls Modern Carpentry: Resource Book BY Willis H Wagner, Howard Bud Smith University Lawas, Cedo Falls, Modern Carpentry: Instructors Manual BY Willis H Wagner University Lawas, Cedo Falls Modern Cabinet Making, William D. Unstatte,Charles W. Davis Modern Cabinet Making, Workbook Modern Cabinet Marking Instructor Manual Wood Technology and Progresses, John C. Feirer, Mark D. Feirer Modern Woodworking, William H. Wagner Clois Kicklighter Modern Woodworking, Instruction Guide, William H. Wagner, Clois Kicklighter The Woodwork Book, John Marketpeace Woodworkers Manual, Albert Jackson, David Day by Simon Jennings Modern woodworking, modern carpentry, the edictions, ??? UNITS TO BE TAUGHT Modern Carpentry and Woodworking, Chapters 1-2-3. ??? Auto-cad- Cuisine-tech – Drafting – Google sketch 6 ACCOMMODATIONS AND MODIFICATIONS There is a number of accommodations that I am using for these students to help them along. This type of construction work will not be modified in college or in the real project situation. These students are fairly bright and I am trying to treat them and teach them as if they have no disabilities as much as possible, so they will not try to fall-back on them if not successful (as in the past). I am also trying not to modify so that I can stick close to the curriculum when possible. TIMEFRAME I will be teaching the required information starting in September and I will continue until the end of the school year and will have some results to be post by the end of this course. Near the start of the May, I will be doing summative type assignments with the students chosen to see what they have learned. I will be giving them structural plans with defects on them and I will have them find the error and correct it and repair the problem. From what I will observe, they should have no problem with this exercise. ASSESSMENT AND TOOLS Assessments will be done mostly through observation of students performing the final task and actually erecting a building. I will be able to assess their performance through these tasks. Everything that has been taught regarding structural buildings and repair will be used in this final task. They will have to read a set of plans and use the building codes. They will have to build this house/plan / blueprint drawing follow the proper measurements and charts and instructions given in the program to be able to erect this structure without any problems. If they find the problems, and solve it, this proves to me that they will be successful. If they do not find the problems or become lost at some point, then they need more training. STUDENTS PERFORMANCE The students are already learning the material faster than I thought they would. The hardest part was when they had to decipher a flat roof Mexican house. On this plan, there is a lot of measurements that are not correct and they were successful in telling me the errors and then we came to a collective agreement on how to make it work by adding or removing lengths that would not fit. They never gave up on this exercise and the were ager to find a solution. Once we got over this hump, they really enjoyed using the electrical tools to build this maquette. If we do not come to a collective agreement and do not have communication skills at school or on the construction site, the none-exact measurements will lead you where you do not want to be. We had a few mishaps in this way, but overall they learned to input proper information. One of these things that I had to stress over and over was patience. They had to go as fast as possible, this is a good way to make mistakes, which can be costly if working in a project situation. It can cost the customer or the company a lot of money for nothing but usually it is the contractor that looses. Patience before speed was an important lesson. Learning to read blue prints and follow specifications is very important. When they had to take the information that they had gathered from the blue prints and find a solution to the problem, it is no easy. Every house or industrial building is different. The biggest lesson is to have a successful final inspection. The students are able to learn how to diagnose fairly simple problems that I had created on the blueprints. I have created many challenges example one – is to have speakers in the house, electrical wires, alarm system, without seeing the wires. They were able to follow the steps right up to the end. I keep it fairly simple. And this way, they are able to solve the problems which is very encouraging for them. And I taught them how to use the electrical and gas equipment. We will continue to practice this type of building erection until the end of the year. I will also be making a summative activity for them throughout the year with many types of problems to solve. SUMMARY In conclusion, this is a very challenging project to attempt at OTLC. The students that I choose were up for the challenge. I believe that I have given them a really good head start in preparing them for life after secondary school. I remember what it was like working in the construction world. Every time we started a new project, we had a new set of specifications, new material and sometimes different material, new practices, and we always started a new project from scratch. We had to learn and teach co-workers as we went along. I find that many construction teachers go too much by the text book (more theory than practice). And when you are I the construction field, having a lot of experience is more important than having a lot of theory. This gives students a better idea of whether this type of work is for them. It also gives them a better chance of surviving and making it in the field. I believe I learned a lot about what works and what doesn’t work when teaching students with learning disabilities. You can never under-estimate them just because they do not learn the same way as the majority. I find that I learn the same way as most of them, by doing hands-on activities, visual activities and auditive activities. If you ask me in the past ten years, if I would teach this type of material to students in this school, I would have to say yes. When I started, I had said these students are the ones I wanted to help. These kids are just as intelligent as others. They are very street-smart and you only have to find a guinous in them. I find that they are very personable and real. They see things the same way as most of us. For them, the journey is just done in a different way. I feel that my students will find their place in society not as a burden to the economy of this country but as a contributing member of society. All in all, I must say I enjoyed the challenge that was presented to me. I always believe that if the student is capable of learning more, then as a teacher, it is my responsibility to give them more to learn. BIOGRAPHY Modern Woodworking Modern Woodworking Other Books
 * No lecture-type lessons
 * Extra time to do seat work
 * Visual lessons(using house plans to show components)
 * Power point when able
 * Video when able
 * Hand-out and written work
 * Large volume of work for this types of training
 * Simplified drawings and plans
 * Breaking up lessons into smaller chunks (15 minutes then onto live and hands-on demonstrations)
 * Walk them through the task until they are familiar
 * One on one instruction when possible\
 * Live erection of a pole shed or garage

CDs on construction Georges M. St.Pierre November 17, 2009 Draft