I'm back! with a bug lesson

Ok I'm back in my classroom in two weeks and have our first lesson of the new term ready to go. I always like starting the term with a lesson that requires very few materials and let's me assess student's ability to follow multi-step directions. We had a lot of success with our pattern letters at the start of the year and my sub did a great job repeating the lesson while I was on leave. But it's a new year and time for a new first lesson.

This lesson comes from Monument Valley Regional Middle School...a blog I have been following a while that has great photos of middle school lessons. I have seen her post images of this lesson several times but she doesn't give directions on her blog so I had to break it down for myself. Out of respect for the owner of the original lesson I am not going to post the steps here. I will put a link to the google doc that has my step by step directions and pictures when I post student samples.

But here is my sample:
looks like blogger is rotating images today
I think this is a fun way to think about positive/negative space and use those problem solving skills. I predict this lesson will take 5-7 class sessions if done well. For my class that meets every day I want to extend this lesson a bit further and got to thinking how we could add a 3-D element. I decided this would be a good time to use the box of polymer clay that was left by the last art teacher.
Each student will need to make a copy of their insect in polymer clay and then they have two choices. They can either use their black and white design on it and then "hide" it their 2-D work. OR
They can use color to decorate their insect and make a paper origami box to put the insect in like a collectors specimen and display the clay insect alongside the 2-D artwork. I need to get little pins to put through the clay before we bake it so it looks like we have pinned the insect into the specimen box and a little label with the name of the insect.

How we will make the clay insect:
Here is my template for the 2-D lesson. We will use it for the clay insect (ignore the triangle)

trace around the insect template onto a square of wax or parchment paper

now using polymer clay (I really like Bake Shop by Sculpty ...its less expensive, is soft and doesn't crumble) start building your insect by adding clay inside the template shape. Smooth the pieces add you add them together.

keep building till you have your completed insect. Originally I carved the design into the soft clay
but this ended up being a BAD idea. Just leave the insect blank and smooth. Have the kids put their name on the parchment or wax paper and pop the whole thing in the oven to bake.
YES NO
When I carved the design into the clay it was way to hard to color/paint it after baking.
Here is my version colored with sharpie
blogger arrgggg!!!!
and the clay insect "hidden" in the 2-D artwork


ok and now the color version:
a new smooth version
draw your design with sharpie and start to paint
painted
and outlined with sharpie when dry...now to make the box to put the little bug in and decided if some puffy paint is called for. I look forward to seeing what the students do with this lesson. More to come later.

Bird Houses and 150 readers!

Wow I hit and passed 150 followers at some point in the last few days! I can't really wrap my mind around it so all I can say is thanks for reading:) I wish I had a stockpile of cool books to share in a celebration drawing like Phyl did . However, I don't. Instead maybe I need to put one of the onesie I make into a drawing...seems like lots of people have little ones.....let me know if anyone would be interested.

Anyway, a few weeks ago I showed photo's from my clay class (the clay heads) and I have another fun project to share today. Clay birdhouses. But first a memorial....
Alas poor kiln, I knew him well. The "district" has decide my kiln is beyond repair and even if I came up with the money to buy a new one they will not install it because the ventilation in the room that held the old kiln is no longer up to code.

Since I can't afford enough air dry clay to do this lesson I really hope someone else can use it because it is so simple, fun and cute cute cute!

My sample is about a foot and half tall and made around a section of tube that I think came from a carpet store. The teacher suggested making smaller scale bird houses using coffee cans or Pringles cans. I think using Pringles cans, and the basic technique in this project, that you could make amazing individual totem poles.

So we started with slabs of clay that were about 2ft by 2ft (remember you could make these smaller)



Our teacher had rubber texture mats that we pushed into the clay with hand rollers. The most popular textures were wood and stone. I choose wood. The mat was about 10 inches tall and 14 or 16 inches wide. This is the size slab we cut to make the birdhouse.


I cut out the textured part of the slab and made the photo really dark so you can see the texture if you click to enlarge the photo
you can also see the cardboard tube we will use to make the birdhouse, a hand roller and a tool for scoring.

**** I forgot to photograph an important step here. You need to wrap the tube in a sheet of newspaper and tuck the ends into the tube. You MUST do this step. You can see the end result in the next photo*****

Here I am wrapping the slab of clay around the newspaper wrapped tube.


And now I've scratched the edges that I want to join and have brushed some water on. I'm sealing the edges of the clay with a hand roller.


Ok now I have placed the tube upright and cut a circle of clay by cutting around a yogurt container lid that is a little wider than the base of the tube. Then I put the tube on top of the circle and do a little slip and score and seal the circle edges up onto the clay tube.


Remember when I said you need to wrap the cardboard tube with newspaper. Now you will see why. Un-stuff the top edge of the newspaper from the cardboard tube and lift the cardboard tube out. If you need to do this project over two classes stop now. Put the tube in a large ziplock bag. Even if you keep the clay nice and moist it is going to start to shrink so you need that cardboard tube out so it doesn't crack. If we are going to keep working on the lesson go ahead and take the newspaper out of the clay also.
the house of our birdhouse

Now for the roof. Cut a 8" circle and lightly draw on it to divided into fourths. Cut out one fourth of the circle. This is going to make the lid for the birdhouse. Slip, score and join to make a cone.


I smoothed the joint and pressed texture into the roof to make it look nice. Then I cut a hole in the house part for the bird (not on the joint) and popped the lid on to see how it looked.


and I decorated it with a tree branch and apple or cherry blossoms. If I wanted to hang my birdhouse from a tree I would need to make two holes in the bottom and two holes in the lid and add wire to hang after it had been fired and glazed.
Yippie yet sigh. I really like mine and wish I could fire and glaze it.

Only a few ladies showed up to class this month so I have less examples but here is three more

clay faces

On MLK Day I went to the first of 3 free clay classes offered at our local clay store. I'm really excited I got a spot in the class as I have been on the waiting list for 3 years! 9 other ladies, all in art education, and I spent the morning learning how to make clay heads and the afternoon perfecting our kiln firing technique and knowledge. (P.S. I learned why it is really not a good idea to glaze before you bisque fire even if it is more convenient)
With permission I documented the process of making my clay head. I had a hard time with this project. Some of ladies also struggled and some had no problem. This was introduced as a beginning project but I question that. It took all of us a good 2 to 3 hours to complete our heads. One step has you push a hole into the head from the neck area to hollow it out and help form the face. I had a hard time with this step, my finger were too short and I have normal size adult hands.
So I would save this one for students who have either more time to work, or more clay experience or maybe are on the older side.
Enjoy laughing at the photos of my attempts!
start with 2 one pound blocks of clay

make one into a ball

use your thumbs to press indents for the eyes and push clay up to make the nose. Use your nail or a pencil to draw a smile.

make the eyeballs to go into the eye sockets (about marble sized)

put a coil of clay across the top and bottom of the eyeball to make the eye lids, smooth them on but leave a strong "brow" bone. Use your finger to start pulling the lips apart

add coils for the lips and try to smooth into the face and keep a natural smile look (ummm....that is way easier said than done I found)

ok now we took the 2nd piece of clay and made it like a hollowed out boat. Flip it over. Attach the head to the upside down boat and pull clay from the back of the head and under the chin to create a neck . This is the only part I feel I did really well. Lots of people's heads tipped backwards but mine was looking straight ahead. Oh and you have to push your pointer finger up into the head to hollow it out a bit. You are supposed to push the cheeks from the inside out but my fingers were not strong enough to accomplish that goal so I had to build mine up with clay.

an hour has passed since the last photo. I got so involved trying to get done before time was up that I stopped taking photos. I used a pen to make the nostril holes and the pupils. It took me about 15 min to deal with the mouth but I still am so so on it. Then I added the hair with the garlic press. She had kind of snotty/judgmental look on her face so I decided to make her a high society lady and give her a little mink around her neck. That is my favorite part and was super fast to make compared to the face. The mink is also helping support her head.

And now for my classmates people (photos taken with their permission!)
my table-mates project

she did a great job with the hair and neck and shirt

look at the character she created! His ears and hat are amazing!

love the baseball hat!

and then we all saw hers and felt like a big bunch of losers. Can you tell she is a professional artist that does art classes on the side. I just love the mask. She reminds me of something from a Midsummer Nights dream.

aboriginal dot animals

Several months ago I wrote about this lesson and about a month ago I did it with my 4-8th graders as part of their unit on Australian art. I now have some photos of 6th-8th grade samples.
I did a demo on making a snake, lizard or turtle shape using model magic. Students used a golf ball size of clay and choose their own animal. We let them dry over the weekend, then gave them a solid coat of acrylic craft paint, let dry overnight and then dot painted them with toothpicks. The results were very nice all around. I did ask students to dot in either a star, cross, horizontal, parallel or concentric circle pattern. This guideline helped produce a better finished project. Students were allowed to use any color of their choosing, however I have noticed this year they are starting to think about complementary and analogous color themes. Score one for me.



not sure why this keeps loading as a sideways image.

one of my advanced students

a "ridge back lizard" according to the 6th grade artist


darn you blogger! The "sister" turtles

done by one of my students with Auspburgers (sp) who really latched onto the Australian aboriginal symbology and did a lot of out of class research. I was very proud of him.

named "speedy" due to his racing stripes on his back.

Model magic made this a high success rate project. I've become a convert to the stuff. When working with the large number of 4th and 5th grade students model magic was a life saver. I no longer have to fire and glaze and fire the work. If a leg falls off you just glue it back on with Elmer's. Have a kid who is behind? Have them make it and paint it in just one sitting. At first I thought it was pricey, but when I figure in the cost of glaze and electricity for firing I think it works out to cost about the same as traditional clay projects. At least for smaller projects that is.