Submitted
Amazing energy and enthusiasm, increased anxiety, tougher academic demands, self-exploration and a social network that takes center stage — all contributing factors that make Grade 7 a pivotal year for so many students.
It is also the year some Kootenay Lake School District students will discover what a future in the trades might look like! Since January, Brent Firkser, district teacher with the SD8 department of Innovative Learning has been delivering Discover the Trades workshops to this industrious and curious demographic, and they are loving it.
The series offers four separate units: Carpentry, Metal Work, Chef Training and Electrical. The goal with each session is to literally put the tools into their hands, teach applied skills and deliver the message that a career in the trades can be both rewarding and engaging.
“I really love being able to help them engage in a different way of learning,” says Firkser. “And this particular age group is full of concrete thinkers that appreciate learning by doing.”
In the Carpentry unit, students set out to build a diddley bow instrument, laying out and cutting pieces of wood and installing wire and a zither pin before testing out their one-stringed musical tool. In Metal Work they utilize simple hand tools such as vice grips and wire benders to problem solve a specific design challenge they’ve been presented with. Safe kitchen skills are the focus of the Chef Training unit and the result is a healthy salad that the participants have cut up and assembled. The kids then learn to strip wires and install a switch in the Electrical unit, ensuring they know what a proper connection looks like when the light bulb goes on!
Without regular access to a shop class, Wildflower teacher Janet Cook described how her Grade 7-8 class has especially benefitted from these workshops this year. Cook was most impressed and grateful for Firkser’s organized hands-on teaching approach.
“With a group of 27 students, you’d think there could have been chaos, but there never was!”
Cook also shared the unexpected positive story of one of her students going home after the workshop and found herself able to fix a nuisance kitchen light that had never worked in her house.
“One of the greatest things about this program is giving people real life skills. If I can help them understand how a switch actually works, I feel confident I’ve taught them something useful,” says Firkser.
Firkser is also responsible for helping older students in the district engage in trades programming. High school students can select elective courses through the Work in Trades program or the Youth Train in Trades program that earn them dual credit towards their graduation requirements and college foundation courses.