Hands On Books
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Jack McKee is a builder, designer, teacher and writer. He is semi retired now. He worked as a handyman, remodeled houses, built small boats, designed (and built) equipment used by children with special needs, schools, and children's museums. Jack worked at a Montessori school teaching "shop" to preschoolers, taught woodworking and science for the local parks department, had a traveling..
Hands On Books
5M ago
Back in the day one of my sons was not doing so well in school, I wanted to see what school was like for him, and see if there was anything I could do to help so I volunteered at his school. Although I didn’t realize it at the time, I wasn’t doing great ..read more
Hands On Books
2y ago
When my cousin Carl’s daughter was little he designed a 30 pound boat built from one sheet of 10 foot plywood and two 10 foot fir 1 X 4s. It was a clever design meant to get kids out on the water under their own power. I built two of these boats, one for each ..read more
Hands On Books
2y ago
When my grandson Lucas, was two years old he wanted to go out to my shop. It seemed to me like there wasn’t much for him to do out there but I took him out anyway. The last time I’d been in the shop I had been working on a set of Builder Boards so ..read more
Hands On Books
2y ago
"You can do some wonderful work if you know how to make people understand what you're doing and feel all right about it, and you can do some terrible work if you put them on the defense, which they are all at in the beginning. "You've got to take them off their defensive attitude and make them participate." Walker Evans ..read more
Hands On Books
2y ago
More skateboards carved by my brother. Here is a mockingbird. They are cruisers not boards for tricks. The wings fold in for riding. This is back side of a guitar skateboard. The Wheels in the center unclamp and the guitar plays. Doug says it’s a bit hard to tune. Its a Blue Mallard ..read more
Hands On Books
3y ago
Boards ready for notching. The pattern for 10 notch, 6 notch, and 4 notch boards are on top of the proper length boards ..read more
Hands On Books
3y ago
This is a video of the neighborhood kids using Builder Boards: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jKvfMxHUtS0 ..read more
Hands On Books
3y ago
I had never built a log building before, let alone with eighth graders, but my supervisor said, no problem and no one was more surprised than me that it worked so well. ..read more