Best Books on Practical Skills 2.0

Your favorite books and links
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Lucas
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Best Books on Practical Skills 2.0

Post by Lucas »

In his Cool Tools, Kevin Kelly quotes what a certain Ronald Fuller had to say about a book:
This old-school government manual for flight instructors is the best how-to guide I have come across for teaching, learning, communication and professionalism about any subject. It says almost nothing about aviation, and everything about how to teach. It's called The Aviation Instructor's Handbook.
Kelly himself added this:
[...] Short of signing up for a teacher's degree, I haven't seen anything else as thorough, explicit and succinct on how to teach teaching.
Do those descriptions remind you of any book? One that, you felt, went "beyond the call of duty" of teaching you a specific skill, as it were, and provided further value? One that you are particularly fond of for some reason?

Please look at your bookshelf, at whatever section (from crafts to fiction, it does not matter) — is there something you have considered particularly useful?

Reading Ender's Book has served me well in the jungle, for instance.

Do you have anything you would like to recommend?

Thank you very much.
Last edited by Lucas on Thu Jun 01, 2017 10:19 am, edited 1 time in total.

halfmoon
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by halfmoon »

This is going to show my age, but my favorite general overview of practical (homesteading-type) skills is Back to Basics: How to Learn and Enjoy Traditional American Skills. This was published by Reader's Digest in 1981, and obviously some sections such as alternative energy will be dated, but it's an excellent overview of a number of topics/skills from beekeeping to building to blacksmithing with lots of great drawings. We used it to pique our interest, then researched chosen subjects in greater depth.

https://www.amazon.com/Back-Basics-Trad ... 0895770865

OTCW
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by OTCW »

The Foxfire books are a good starting point on a lot of topics.

lente
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by lente »

Flicking through some digitized old books on project gutenberg is an interesting experience. Might pick up on something, and they can be entertaining as time bubble references too. Unfortunately i don't need a chicken coop, saw the designs on a pretty cool one in a digitized craft book: https://www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Crafts_(Bookshelf)

It's free. Nothing lost, nothing gained (except for some time)
Last edited by lente on Sat May 13, 2017 4:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.

halfmoon
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by halfmoon »

lente wrote:
Sat May 13, 2017 2:29 pm
Flicking through some digitized old books on project gutenberg is an interesting experience.
Curses on you for sharing this link... :lol: I just lost a few hours reading about practical ostrich feather dyeing*, the art of making more whiskey from the same amount of grain (who wouldn't want that?), and plans for a miniature gasworks. Must get DH on this right away, as we've been needing a gasworks.

*Includes a diatribe on the French, 'the most egotistical mortals'.

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jennypenny
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by jennypenny »

The ERE wiki has a practical skills book list. I also like survivor library. He's putting old how-to books up in PDF format.

George the original one
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by George the original one »

Commonsense Handicapping: The Logical, Left-Brained Approach to Winning at the Races
Commonsense Betting
- both by Dick Mitchell

The application of the techniques used go beyond handicapping horse races.

Farm_or
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by Farm_or »

I have "back to basics" on my book shelf too. Probably the one that I use most is sunset home repair. Always forget the details about plumbing and the furnace

DSKla
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by DSKla »

I'm currently reading Whittling and Woodcarving (Tangerman 1936) with a mind to making use of my pocketknife. It's fantastic. Tables of wood properties, breakdowns of blade types, other tools, and examples of how to whittle and carve in a wide variety of styles, with example projects from each. Far more than I'll ever be able to do. I'll be happy to make a cool chess set and a few spoons. Already mapping out which pieces I want to assign where for Trojans vs. Achaeans.

Farm_or
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Re: What are your favorite books on practical skills?

Post by Farm_or »

Great ideas. Reminds me that I have always wanted to make a life size chess board. Like so many that I saw in the parks in Switzerland. Except mine will be made outta metal.

Lucas
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Re: Best Books on Practical Skills 2.0

Post by Lucas »

Thank you all for your contributions, and sorry about taking long to get back to you — I have been working on some projects. I did not have the time to be much clear when I first wrote this thread, so I decided to update it a little bit now. I have perused many lists of recommended books (included those found in the ERE wiki and the blog), but, when it comes to practical books, I am looking for suggestions of works you consider particularly significant. I have thus expanded the first post (as also follows).
-----------

In his Cool Tools, Kevin Kelly quotes what a certain Ronald Fuller had to say about a book:
This old-school government manual for flight instructors is the best how-to guide I have come across for teaching, learning, communication and professionalism about any subject. It says almost nothing about aviation, and everything about how to teach. It's called The Aviation Instructor's Handbook.
Kelly himself added this:
[...] Short of signing up for a teacher's degree, I haven't seen anything else as thorough, explicit and succinct on how to teach teaching.
Do those descriptions remind you of any book? One that, you felt, went "beyond the call of duty" of teaching you a specific skill, as it were, and provided further value? One that you are particularly fond of for some reason?

Please look at your bookshelf, at whatever section (from crafts to fiction, it does not matter) — is there something you have considered particularly useful?

Reading Ender's Book has served me well in the jungle, for instance.

Do you have anything you would like to recommend?

Thank you very much.

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