In 6th and 8th grade I took 6 weeks of Industrial Tech, which is a lot like shop. It was my favorite elective in middle school, and wish I could’ve taken it all year round. Unfortunately we didn’t get to choose our electives, and they changed every 6 weeks, unless we were in chorus.
In 9th grade I took 6 weeks of Shop 1, then transferred to a school that didn’t have it. Instead I ended up in Agriculture, which covered some of the thing we did in Shop at the other school. Also took auto shop, which focused on repairing motors and vehicles. Stayed in autoshop until I dropped out in what would’ve been my junior year.
I took shop in high school way back in the '70s. The instructor was a great guy and during my junior and senior years I got to be shop class and crafts class teacher’s aide. These were 2 hour classes and I got 4 hours of straight A’s that helped me get a free ride to college. I said he was a great guy, he knew I couldn’t afford to go without help.
In shop class we used lathes and all the power tools. I made 3 cedar chests for members of my family from western red cedar, beautiful stuff. Made bookshelves out of Honduran mahogany, which I still have. Learned small engine repair by rebuilding lawn mower engines. Arc and Oxy-Acetylene welding. I’ve probably forgot a couple other things.
Crafts class was leather working, making purses and wallets. We did spin-casting to make jewelry using the ‘lost wax’ method. Gem polishing, other stuff.
And we only had to pay for materials. These classes have mostly fell under the budget axe and safety regulations, but when I was there it was fully funded. I still have many of the things I made sitting around here, almost 40 years later.
It was called Technology, and everyone took it in middle school. I don’t remember much about it except that part of the class time was spent using the machines and part was spent in the computer room. Our big class project was designing, then making wooden boats with little motors inside, then racing them.
We all had to take Home Ec. too. That had another updated name as well that I don’t recall at the moment.
7th grade, mandatory, gender-assigned. One semester was shop (or home ec), the other, art class. I hated both. At least home ec got to eat their creations. All we could do was burn (wood) or melt (plastic) ours.
Middle school, early 80s: All of us were required to take one semester of shop and one semester of home ec each year in middle school. Art, gym and music (band, orchestra, or choir) were also required.
In shop, we did three units, one of electronics, one of woodwork and one of metal work. I made a metal box, the fate of which escapes me. I made a wooden cat clock and a little train pencil holder. The clock I still have, somewhere. In electronics, I only remember learning how to rewire a lamp and how to rewire an outlet box.
Home Ec: Three units, cooking, sewing, and “life skills.” No idea what “life skills” was. For cooking, we made apple fritters, and tried to make pudding from scratch. In sewing, I made an apron and a pair of gym shorts.
The only notable thing to mention about either was I happened to be taking wood shop at the time the teacher lopped three fingers off on the table saw. He’d never let any students use the table saw, and I remember talking to the kid who claimed to have picked up the teacher’s fingers and gave them to the EMT. This was 8th grade. It did really happen though (but not in my class), because the shop teacher was out for the rest of the semester and came back with his fingers reattached and slightly worse for the wear. I’ve always wondered how often that sort of thing happened and if being the shop teacher was like the crappiest of crap teaching assignments. “Aw, hell, now I’m going to eventually lose a few fingers. Dang it. If only I’d called in sick less last year, I could at least get to teach Home Ec.”
I took shop class in grades 7 and 8. We had a wood shop and a metal shop, and I still have some of the things I made in them. Had a great time with the lathes, and I well remember learning welding and basic blacksmithing (we actually had a forge).
I graduated from a public high school in Connecticut in 1984. I took the mandatory shop class in high school (or possibly junior high school; the memories are fuzzy). We spent some weeks in woodworking (I made a letter rack like this one; it’s in my brother’s house now), and some in a metal shop where I made an etched bracelet. We also spent a few weeks learning basic cooking and another few weeks in a basic sewing class (for which I made a dolphin out of denim fabric that was stuffed to make a pillow). I’m fairly sure that even then both boys and girls took both the shop, cooking and sewing classes. And I think that is the way it should be as both men and women should have some basic sewing, cooking and woodworking skills.
When I switched schools, they were trying to match up new classes to approximate my old ones. Some bright person, and I think it was the counselor, said the following: “You took Graphic Arts? Well, we’ve got Industrial Arts, it’s kind of the same thing.” Yeah, switching gears like that mid-school-year, with a grouchy asshole of a ‘teacher’ that was no help at all, and oh, I’m VERY, VERY allergic to wood dust. Ten minutes into class, I’m doing little but sneeze and blow my nose, which ran like a friggin’ faucet. I, um, did not do well there.
They didn’t have my foreign language either. The counselor also once called me into his office to ask me if I cheated on the standardized tests. Really? I’d do poorly in class, but choose to cheat on the one test that counts for nothing? But I’m not bitter. . .
I had it in 8th grade and adored it! Also there was some sort of home ec where I learned to sew a seam and boil water (actually, we made something that required me to learn to cream the butter with the sugar) and, while I can’t say I enjoyed them, they have come in very useful. For a while in the later 70s and early 80s I got involved in building furniture and I enjoyed that too. Then I got my first computer in 82 and that ended that. I still think I would enjoy it.
I wasn’t in the class at the time, but we had one shop teacher that got mad about something one time and threw a C-clamp on the floor and it bounced up and hit him in the face. I saw the aftermath because he was my first period study hall teacher that year. It was pretty sweet justice because he was a major asshole.
How much of that stuff is still useful? I don’t do a lot of silk screening these days, I have little need to make rubber stamps, and does anyone do typesetting anymore?
I know someone with a press, actually, but he’s the exception I am sure.
I am thinking over the other things we learned. Sewing has come in handy ; a few of the “life skills” things like how to balance a check book, how to make a budget ; how to wire a lamp (for real!). Coming up blank on others right now.
What I wish they’d taught us: how to snake a drain ; how to paint a room ; how to trim hedges.
Me, in 7th, 8th and 9th grades. Wood in 7th, metal in 9th, and all 8th graders took Food and Home Ec in 8th grade. Far from resisting, it was a favorite shop of boys, since after the class we got to eat what was made.
Wood and metal shops were male only. I had a home room in the room used for Sewing, I don’t know what else girls took.
We had mandatory “life management skills.” There had been a big kerfuffle of news stories about how 80% of high school graduates couldn’t fill out a check or do a job application. So it was that type of stuff, a little bit of basic health stuff, and I think a bit of cooking and cleaning, then CPR training and the Hindlick Maneuver as we liked to call it. A real mishmash, and obviously taught to the lowest common denominator. Not sure if it still exists.
To be fair, the question was “Besides math, name a difficult high school subject.”
Just in case anyone jumps over there and answers incorrectly.
Anyway, yeah I took it in grades 7 and 8 and loved it! We got to go to another school (no buses back then so we rode our bikes). I used the lathe, and soldering irons, and chisels, and hammers, and saws and drill presses, and I can’t remember what else, but it was much better than sitting in class doing absolutely anything else, except maybe gym.
My close friend’s father owned a gas station. We almost lived there. This was a complete shop that did engine, transmission and differential work. We learned how to do everything and wood projects were done in the garage or driveway. We could have put on the shop class. I continue to have small shop inside my living room. I guess you could say I’m “into it.”
