Thanks to a $1,000 grant from the Bemidji 31 Education Foundation Fund, around three dozen Bemidji Middle Schools were able to learn the art of woodturning, each making their own duck call.
The grant, approved last fall, supported the purchase of a wood lathe, with which students learned to wood-turn their own duck call and, subsequently, how to use it.
Students in two BMS classes, as well as an after-school outdoors art club, each brought their duck call home.
“Students learned lifelong skills about working with tools safely, learned a new skill of woodturning and learned the basics of using a duck call and how they worked,” wrote art teacher Molly Wiste in the final grant report.
Further, the experience expanded students’ opportunities to connect with the outdoors and work a project by hand.
“Both … are very important to who we are as people, and are important to our mental health,” Wiste wrote.
Students who went home with their own handmade duck call were very proud that they had created something that both could be used and looked good, she wrote.
“Learning to make their own duck call rather than buying one showed them the possibilities with handmade things and art opportunities that there are in life,” she reported. “This can encourage them to find their own creative outlet, whether that be making duck calls, or something else.”
