Stitch by Stitch, Row by Row
HOW HANDWORK SUPPORTS BRAIN DEVELOPMENT IN CHILDREN
We human beings use our hands regularly in our daily lives, often for activities that we don’t put much thought into, such as getting dressed and feeding ourselves. The Handwork curriculum not only develops needed fine motor skills through flexibility and dexterity, but it also builds hand-eye coordination, supports math skills (counting stitches/rows, patterning sequences, and skip counting), offers multi-step processing of instructions, and offers practice in the ability to follow directions thoroughly.
It can be said that Handwork trains the power of attention through concentration and focus. We often talk about “the three p’s” in Handwork, which are patience, persistence or perseverance, and pride. Between intellectual activity and movement, there is a balance between both sides of the brain that creates efficient pathways for doing, feeling, and thinking. What we teach in Handwork is backed by modern neuroscientific research. When we knit patterns of stitches, for example, our brain connections create corresponding patterns.
“It can be said that Handwork trains the power of attention through concentration and focus.”
Every stitch affects the ones before and after, so the rhythmic repetitive movements in our muscle memory make us skillful in general. Handwork projects are often practical items to be used and not simply displayed. The striving that comes from creating these objects and the joy of accomplishment builds self-confidence.
When children learn where the raw materials come from and how they can be transformed into something truly unique, there is reverence and value given to the final product. Care and respect for the material gifts of the earth, from plants and animals, enliven the senses. Making something useful for themselves and others connects the students to the social element of empathy.
“The striving that comes from creating these objects and the joy of accomplishment builds self-confidence.”
The Handwork curriculum covers a broad array of skills, crafts, and elements of design. Handwork begins in the Early Childhood classes, with activities like finger knitting and hand-sewing. This continues into the grades with students working on a variety of skills every year, yet each grade often has a dominant type of Handwork based on the students’ developmental and individual skills and needs.
First graders learn the basic knit stitch, which is bilateral and uses both hands and both sides of the brain, and they create projects based on squares and rectangles.
Second graders begin to expand their knitting skills into shaping their creations with increasing and decreasing stitches, as well as learning the purl stitch, which has a gesture backward from the knit stitch.
Crochet, which emphasizes the dominant hand used for writing, begins in third grade. There is an introduction to fibers, and the students might also card wool, spin it into yarn with drop spindles, and weave the yarn they created into something useful such as a pouch.
Embroidery and cross-stitch are paramount to fourth grade as the children become more aware of their individuality and begin crossing into adolescence. They work from spatial awareness into directional awareness, and mirrored designs and color explorations are created freely without tracing or patterns.
“What we teach in Handwork is backed by modern neuroscientific research.”
In fifth grade, three-dimensional knitting in the round is a further step towards the critical thinking that is approaching in Middle School when the students are much more independent and capable of holding pattern changes and mathematical progressions in their long-term memory.
Sixth and seventh-grade projects are based on hand sewing, which involves drafting patterns and using mathematical computations and proportions to create soft-sculpted animals or dolls.
The eighth graders work with sewing machines, integrating the study of the Industrial Revolution and mechanics through the progression from the non-electric treadle sewing machine, which is quite challenging, to current electric mechanical sewing machines, so they gain an appreciation of modern conveniences. They learn how to read commercial sewing patterns and make adjustments to create a garment for their measurements, as well as how to create quilted designs.
“They become resourceful and adept in problem-solving in their Handwork, which in turn carries over into academic and other endeavors.”
All these projects make real-life connections to the students’ surroundings, allowing them to gain knowledge of how things are made. They become resourceful and adept in problem-solving in their Handwork, which in turn carries over into academic and other endeavors. From the culmination of the Handwork curriculum in the grades, students often feel they have the tools to tackle just about any project on their own.
Wendy Ziegler, EWS Handwork Teacher