The mood in Sydney Fox’s woodshop is always purposeful and productive as students in First Grade through Eighth Grade industriously invest in designing, constructing, and completing a range of projects from toolboxes to clocks to tables to doghouses, and more.

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Few classes develop every learner’s mind, body, and self-esteem quite like woodshop, one of our signature arts programs at Buckingham Friends School. 

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The principal outcomes of the woodshop curriculum at BFS include each student’s:

• acceptance of responsibility for their own work
• development of their intellectual abilities, physical skills, and emotional flexibility to solve problems and learn from mistakes
• belief in themselves and the understanding that true gratification from work comes from meeting goals that they have set for themselves and fully embraced
• acquisition of basic skills using a variety of hand and power tools
• capacity for collaboration and shared work
• respect for others and their physical and emotional safety

BFS’s woodshop is a laboratory for working and learning.  Features of the room include workbenches, tool walls, a lathe, and an array of hand and power tools.  Using real tools is essential in developing children’s minds, muscles, strength, and stamina.

And, this year, Sydney has done a great job adhering to our pandemic protocols – keeping windows open and circulating air, and creating work stations that permit students to maintain physical distancing while busy with their projects.

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