Thread: woodworking projects for child

I had my grandson doing the "apprentice' thing once a week every Friday for some 2 hours yet he was 6 not 3. We made his tool box, a small table for his sister, a Lego table...(small sort of coffee table with folding legs and an edge around to keep the pieces from falling, and some other little things. the experience lasted for a year or so.
With that experience in mind, plus 4 daughters before him I would say the following:
3 years old? Forget it! All you can do is play with him. May be you can get him to glue bits together that you cut for him. Having said that, kids some kids are interested in simple mechanism. I was told that at age 1 I fixed a toy that had lost a wheel by replacing it with a rubber cup off a medicine bottle and punching the shaft through the rubber and that it worked again. Wood work even at elementary stage requires cutting with sharp tools. My 6 YO used a hand Mitre saw, hand saw, coper saw, nails and hammer, glue, screws and screwdriver, assorted clamps etc and got to hold my smallest cordless driver with both hands whilst I held it steady with my own hand. No powertools of any sort, chisel only by holding it in his hand and my hand over his, and he got to hammer on it and on my hand of course too.
The amount of stress that this caused me even for those two hours was phenomenal. A shed is not a place for kids yet I don't regret it and I miss it now that he is 8 yet has moved 2 hours away.
There are ways and things that can be done safely but it is very limited, and clearly there will be a lot of stuff you must do yourself. The most important thing of all is that you never leave a kid alone working in your shed, not at 3 not at 6 not at 9 not at 12...

three year-olds: it's not too early for a child to assemble and finish things. They can help mark pieces, they can glue them, sand them, and they can paint/finish them. If the child displays an interest, this could introduce them to a life-long interest.

Thankyou all for your replies and suggestions, they are all appreciated. To dispell a few fears, I have no intention of letting my son use tools alone any time soon, and definitely not until he shows proficiency and safe use (my view is that when he's 18, he can make his own decisions as an adult, but until then it's my job to keep him safe, and teach him how to keep himself safe). Nor do I intend to push him in any way, shape or form, never have, never will. We won't be using power tools, either.

The suggestion to work on a project as my own, and let him join in where he's able, is a good one, and seems the best way to approach it. He learns best by observing how tasks are done, so it makes sense to do this that way too.

We've done the toy tools (he has a few little trucks that can be taken apart using screwdrivers, spanners, etc, as well as a full plastic tool set). He has plenty of toys and books, but will always drop them if there's a "real" job going, whether it's sewing, doing the washing, picking up screws on a building site, digging a garden, or whatever.

Anyway, we'll head off to Bunnings sometime in the next couple of days, and pick up some wood, and see what hand tools they have, and go from there. I have a few things in mind that I'd like to make, so I'll go at it with those in mind.

Thankyou all, again,

Kae

There is an old book inexpensively reprinted by Lee Valley that may help: 'Coping Saw Work', by Edward Worst. It is a teacher's guide from when grade-school children were taught manual arts. The major tool used is the coping saw (not sure what it's call in OZ). There are two advantages to this: it's not expensive, and it's one of the first tools a child can use safely. As a bonus, most of the projects are toys; he who builds, gets to play.

Welp,

I've really enjoyed the comments and points of view. Have not posted in a while, thought I'd ad just a bit from what we do here for the girls.

From the time they have been chasing at my heels, my two daughters have been in the shop, they started sanding anything, then they'd want to "make it pretty" (finish).

We are now down the road a bit, they earn dedicated shop time "points" through the chores we all need to do, two times per week I turn the world completely off and we have some fun in the shop. I've shown some of their first efforts here (Made Some Mallets), lots of chips since then.

Due to ongoing respiratory issues, I'm a stickler for their awareness of the dust and general safety. One of the biggest challenges was finding dust masks small enough to properly fit them (Safe-T-Fit Plus by Wilson). Before finding the proper masks, I tried to get them to use the Triton fresh air hood, they both hated it, and with its shroud, nearly swallowed them up. Adjustable child frame safety glasses are easily available now, disposable foamies for the ears.

Once they are all suited up, hair up in a high pony, away we go. I'm always standing behind them when they're at their lathe station, sometimes I ask if they need help, other times I just watch them chase the line, the stream of wood easily peeled from its host.

I know a lathe and chisels can be a bit of the green, and before going down that path, they'd been with me on numerous shop visits, galleries, shows, seeing some talented turners at their work, though the results were "wow" and "awesome" (I'm not a turner). Don't know, but maybe see if you could take your tykes to watch someone at it, see if they like the idea, let them touch and see some finished work.

A small lathe can be set up nearly anywhere, easy to manage, used ones can be had for not too much, and, the kids can see some fairly quick results from their time, which (at least here), helps in their personal gratification department, something beneficial to all of us, even more so with young people, big confidence booster too.

They have become a bit more mature in their need to share their lathe with each other, but, truth be known, the second one will be here for this next Christmas, new gouges and chisels too. They showed some of their work to a gent that happens to own a Woodcraft over here, next thing I know FedEx is at the door, generous delivery X 2, thank you Woodcraft. More for me to hone, but, I'm ok with that.

I'm a firm believer that if you teach a child either how to fish or work with wood, or both, they'll make choices that don't include the idiot box or useless internet junk. At the end of the day they've got something on top of their shoulders besides a hat rack, and could teach or show someone else "how to" if asked.

Good luck with it, way to go.

Cheers,

WN-

a basic hat/coat rack.
coupla lengths of dowel into a backboard
you can predrill it for him if you dont want him to use the drill
he can glue it all together
and unlike this one, let him go wild with different bright coloured paints for each 'hook'
he can put it in his bedroom

Kaeita,

how about something like the workbench below. I knocked it together for my 2 year old. The sizes were mainly derived from the timber sizes. I used pine shorts from bunnings. The height was taken from the height of most commercially available play tables (About 50 - 55 cm) Shouldn't be too hard and it used simple but joints.

I made two cuts to make it, and those were for the from legs (The offcuts were used as sides). The bonus of this is it gives the child somewhere to build their next project

ok Kaeita, the reactions have been mixed and with good cause, the problem with such a young child is not in the supervision of putting a project together, thats the easy part, children at that age are very impressionable, and curious, despite showing a keen interest in building something, you have to ask yourself what would happen if suddenly your child got up in the middle of the night and "experimented" by themselves ....its been known to happen, and with disasterous results ...children believe they are invincable ....if superman can do it ....so can I !.....

so my advice is .....dont show them anything that could be potentially dangerous should they want to try it on their own.
keep all tools locked up and out of reach ...even sharp knives
you can buy many projects in kit form from places like bunnings, I would do those first ...as most only require putting in the screws, which is pretty harmless done by hand, use waterbased paints if needed .....and even sandpaper wrapped around an offcut is pretty harmless ...seriously I would wait a while until you get adventurous, children at that age dont comprehend the word no, or dont touch if I am not here .....

Notice how a kiddie will say that they helped make something even though they only did the tiniest thing (like put one nail in).

And they'll say it very proudly!