Slöjd - Learning through hands

On August 17-th and 18-th a “slöjd” conference took place in Linköping, Sweden. “Slöjd” is, among other things, a Swedish school discipline where students deal with handcraft with wood, metal and textile. In Norway the term “sløyd” is usually understood as woodwork and it is an integrated part of discipline “Arts and crafts”.

The conference was eleventh in the range of slöjd -conferences arranged each second year at the University of Linköping where people interested in slöjd: teachers, craftsmen, artists and researchers, gather to listen to the lectures, discuss at the workshops, view and experience at the exhibitions.

The theme of this year’s conference was “Slöjd – creating, keeping and extending boundaries”. Different types of boundaries were discussed, from preserving old techniques and design on one side, to dissolution of the boundaries of school-slöjd and merging with art, on the other; Here is the conference program: http://www.trippus.se/eventus/userfiles/17691.pdf . Marléne Johansson reminded us that slöjd is both ancient, modern and “cool”. Otto von Buch showed interesting examples of intersection between sköjd and contemporary arts. In his presentation, he focused on extension of aesthetic boundaries as for example in mutual influence between old techniques and modern design, while Lars-Erik Björklund spoke about tacit knowledge, the importance of experience, and relations between brain and embodied activities.

The participants at the conference were people who appreciated dealing with tools and materials: With their own hands they knew how valuable tacit knowledge was for them and their students. However, in a recent survey in Sweden, where students’ and their parents’ were asked to evaluate the importance of school disciplines, slöjd got almost the lowest ranking (Illum & Johansson, 2009). Teachers asked how this was possible when they frequently experience that their students enjoy the slöjd classes so much? I sensed the participants’ urge to convince school administrators, politicians and parents that human body is capable of learning in many different ways…. But what could they say? What should they say to explain and justify the importance of creating, crafting and experiencing with three-dimensional materials?

The fate of school-slöjd is in many ways dictated by contemporary educational philosophy, politics and values in the society. How much is learning by doing, learning through experience, senses and body valued in schools today? Possibilities for such learning are also bounded by teachers’, students’ and parents’ own expectations. Such expectations, which sometimes draw back to one’s own primary school education, can grow into harmful attitudes if one doesn’t start questioning them….

What can be done to raise the status of slöjd in the society? “We need more research!”, has been said many times during the conference.

Illum, B., & Johansson, M. (2009). Vad är tillräckligt mjukt? – kulturell socialisering och lärande i skolans slöjdpraktik. FORMakademisk, 2(1), 69-82. Retrieved from http://www.formakademisk.org/index.php/formakademisk/article/view/31/26