The Claw by Jayson

The Claw by Jayson - June 2016 Scholarship Essay

I was excited when my teacher announced that the class project was a wooden claw. I immediately started creating an effective design. I drew parts of the claw with their appropriate measures. I chose the tools I was going to use. I even watched the teacher’s demonstrations of how to use these tools numerous times. Everything was going according to plan, until I started building it.

The first obstacle I faced was making parts. I used a hand drill to make a hole into each part. At least that’s what I wanted to happen. I ended up splitting the wood. I tried again, but got the same result. I thought that the third time’s a charm, but I was wrong. It split. My friend walked me through the process of using a hand drill. I finally succeeded. The next step was gluing the pieces together. At this point, I was sure that I could do this. After all, I have been using glue since kindergarten. I used wood glue to attach everything together. Time flies by and my claw is now together. I opened the claw, and the whole thing came crashing down. I concluded that glue was too weak to keep it together. The next adhesive in my possession was duct tape. I taped the parts together and tried to open the claw; it barely moved. At least it did not fall apart, but I knew I could not turn in a claw that did not move. This time I took it apart. It took hours to rip off the sticky tape. I tried using hot glue. That did not work either. I got so desperate that I used Elmer’s glue. That definitely did not work. I finally used an assortment of glues, tape, and rubber bands. It took about five hours of blood, sweat, and tears, but I finally built a successful wooden claw. The next day I put the claw in my locker, where my book fell on it. I was stressed for another five hours, but I fixed it.

Now it was time to test my creation. I had to use the claw to pick up and set down at least two chess pieces. I picked up a rook and set it down. I then picked up the knight. Suddenly, a malfunction occurred. My claw would not set the knight down. I thought I was going to go into panic mode, but I knew I could fix it after rebuilding it so many times. Unfortunately, I was not able to fix it. My teacher gave me full credit because she had never seen any student so determined to correct the project.

Although this claw drained me mentally and emotionally, I am actually happy to have experienced building it. This project taught me that failure can happen unexpectedly, but I have to be ready to fix it. Thanks to the faulty wooden claw, I truly know what it means to be motivated and determined.