Blooming Clay Flowers

I LOVE teaching clay.  As a personal artist, I'd consider myself to be a painter and don't get me wrong I love teaching painting lessons, in fact we do it a lot, but there's something magical about clay.  I'm excited about it, the kids are excited about it...life is good.  There's a different type of creating and learning that happens when students have clay in front of them.  An application of building and a different type of thinking is certainly evident when students are hard at work.  Isn't it amazing how much better they listen when that clay project is on the line?  There's always an exception, but most students LOVE clay.  

I still have all of my clay pieces (as well as all my other artwork) from when I was in grade school even my squished, freaky little dinosaur in kindergarten to my first time throwing on the wheel in 6th grade.  These past three years I've been kiln-less.  At times it's a total bummer, because let's face it air dry clay just isn't the same.  As a child, seeing how glazes work is one of the most magical things EVER! I've worked really hard these last 3 years to find ways to make air dry clay more like the real thing.  I've definitely learned a thing or two.  If you find yourself struggling because you're living in a kiln-less world (say that as if your singing Don't Stop Beilievin') sign up for the AOE Summer 2015 Conference, I'll be sharing some air dry clay magic! 

In the mean time, look at the shine on these beautifully created flowers by 4th graders that were made for Mother's Day.  Aren't they just awesome?  I vote for more clay gardens--think of all the time we'd have (cough, cough, MOM)! 

But then again, fresh tulips are always nice.  

Happy Mother's Day!

Here are some fabulous clay projects 4th graders worked on very hard to give as Mother's Day gifts.  The inspiration for this lesson came from here and here.  Because students knew they'd be giving them as a gift, they took so much pride in making them, which is always fun to see.  These were actually so simple to make.  We spent one day working with the wet clay and the next to paint.

We used acrylic paint and I added in a pearl medium mix in color that left a nice finish.  Students could choose to paint the heart whatever color they liked, but most chose to do the metallic gold or silver.  Using stamps I had from when I was in a big homemade card making phase of my life (about the 5th grade…those things are vintage) students pressed in images, quotes, and sayings of their  choice.  Most of them used something like "For A Special Mother."

I took them outside sprayed them with a little glitter spray and a clear gloss enamel….

and ta-da we had some pretty beautiful things.

Here are some detailed images.  Naturally, they don't photograph as AWESOME as they actually are.

Happy Mother's Day to all those Mom's out there!  If you haven't seen this video it's a must see, might even make you a little teary eyed.

Thanks Mom's!

Shout out to my mom:

Thanks for making the 90's awesome.