Final Projects

 

Each year, I allow my students free reign (almost) to learn what they want to learn. They can look back on a favorite medium and pushing it further or taking it a different directions. They can think about something that we didn't learn about and design a project for themselves to learn it. Whatever their idea is, they need to write a proposal detailing the scope of the project. This includes the number of pieces, the medium, the size, the subject matter, and it also gives an narative on why this idea is meaningful. Occasionally I have to tell students their proposal is too ambitious or not ambitious enough, but generally, they get accepted, and students are able to devote a week to their own project.

This year, I had students who wanted to learn how to make some origami animals, Another wanted to learn how to draw useing 2 point perspective. One student wanted to make a hand puppet and another wanted to do watercolors using primary colors and geometric shapes. I have to do one-on-one instruction for the few who are learning entirely new skills, but thankfully there are enough woring independently while stretching prior knowledge, that I can to focus on one student at a time.

Making Clay Candlesticks

 Jack jumped over a candlestick. It wasn't a candle, it was the thing that holds the candle: a candlestick. It wasn't until about 15 years ago, that I realized, like everyone around me, that I was calling tapered candles, candlesticks, and calling candlesticks candlestick holders.

No matter what you call it, it's a fun ceramic project for people learning to work on the potter's wheel. I'd never made them before and thought I should l get a lot of practice in before teaching my students as a possible project or fundraiser. It's not to hard to make a cone with a little cup on top. There's a little trick in keeping that cup centered as you squeeze the rest of the clay up into a stick form or, if you want to be fancy, create some bulbs along the way, but it's doable. For me getting them all the same size took a little effort. I was using a wide handle to measure them, but the porcelein didn't strink as much as I thought and the ended up being a little too big.  This wasn't as problematic as the fact that all of them blew up in the kiln. 

Back to the drawing board. I realized that I needed to hallow out the base, even though none of the tutorial videos I watched, mentioned this step. Once the sticks were leather hard, I tried to trim them on the wheel, but they were far to tall and wobbly for this to work. I ended up just holding it with my hand and using carving tools to hollow out the underside, so that the walls were about the same size and gradually lead into the thinner part of the stick.

Success! Every one in the second batch survived the firing, and, since I used the actual candle to measure the size of the cup at the top of the candlestick, they fit. I'm glad I didn't wait to do this with my student.

Enchanted Forrest Prom

This year our school prom had an Enchanted Forrest theme, so the first thing I did was find last year's beach themed paintings to repurpose. I did a sketch on copy paper to trace onto plastic and then projected it onto the the old paintings for students to trace with chalk. I love the fact that a $5 roll of vynal wall paper could be used to decorate three proms. (If you were to flip it over, you'd see large black and white movie stars from our Hollywood prom.)

Next we did the underpainting. I have some students who can be trusted to paint large areas even with their visual impairments. And then came layers of bark, grass, and details like pink in the skies.

I freshened up the underside of the paper maché mushrooms from our Alice in Wonderland prom. The packing tape was hot glued along the stem and outter rim of the umbrella to look more fungal.

Our high school social studies teacher painted glasses and vases for stems, and hot glued class beads to bowls for mushroom tops.

And then I put battery operated candles inside the stems and viola! You have a mushroom lantern.

Woodland flower center pieces were made with details such as small animals, butterflies, pebble paths, and moss. When they were surrounded by tea lights, they felt even more enchanting.

Then came the big event, which for the first time in years, was off campus. The venue was beautiful and the senior lead out made me cry. Some of my students who are graduating high school have been my students since first grade. It is going to be extra hard to say goodbye to them.

 

Ceramic Carving Assignment

Making tactile images in my art class are a must. All of my students are visually impaired and half are totally blind. We draw with Wiki-stix, glue, string, puffy paint or by embossing foil. but clay tablets are another solution. This assignment worked really well for my students who normally don't like working with clay because they have tactile issues with anything gooey, slimy, or even sandy in texture. I used clay that was already starting to dry out a little before I cut off slices. Students ran the clay through the slab roller and then it felt more like a thick, heavy piece of fabric since it had the canvas texture pressed into it from the rolling process.

While the clay was still malable, students pressed the ends of pencils or paint brushes to make repeated patterns for boarders. Than they lightly drew an image into the center before carving away the background with ceramic tools. Some students used stencils to get the design that they wanted.

Once the clay was fired, Students were able to feel where to paint (acrylic) each color. Students who were totally blind usually opted to paint the entire thing one color before dry brushing across (perpendicularly) the surface of lines so that only the foreground would get the second color.

Many of these were made as trivets, to set hot pots on. Others had holes made before firing to string twine or ribbon through and make it into a wall hanging. They were the perfect gift for Mother's Day and 

 

Clay Balloon Bowl Assignment

Slab bowls are easy to make for beginning art students. For this assignment we used balloons (taped to cups for stability) as a structure. We rolled out slabs of clay on the slab roller, but a rolling pin works as well. Then we cut the clay in to circular or oval shapes and draped it over the balloons. Some students created texture by stamping or rolling wooden tools over the surface before forming it into a bowl.

 

Students decided if they wanted the form to be crinkled and organic, like draped fabric, or more smooth with the excess trimmed away. 

Then they added a foot using a score and slip technique. They had the choice of creating a coil to make a circular foot, or rolling three small balls to make legs, some of which were formed into pyramids or cylinders after attaching to the bottom of the bowl. The balloon doesn't create very much resistance so it was a challenge, but only one student ended up popping their balloon while scoring the clay with a ceramic needle.  Once the clay is leather hard, they can be set right-side up, and the balloon can be popped or just allowed to shrivel up, while the clay dries completely. We did a bisque firing in the kiln at cone 06, and then glazed the inside. Some students glazed the inside and the outside, but it's important to keep the glaze off the feet so the bowl doesn't glue itself to the kiln shelf. It is a simple project that yields great results when it comes to the basics of working with clay.

Tactile Screen Prints for the Visually Impaired

For years a partnership with Georgia College and State University has blessed the lives of my students at the Academy for the Blind. College students have learned service learning and community outreach skills, and my students have benefited from art workshops. This year, Matt Forrest, professor and friend, came to make some tactile prints with my students.

First they screen printed flowers onto good printmaking paper (BFK). While the ink was still wet, students sprinkled the image with a a dusting of plastic. The paper was shaken for an even coverage and excess flocking was funneled back into the jar for the next student's print.

A heat gun was used to melt the plastic, which made a raised surface wherever there was ink.

Making the image tactile, helped visually impaired students color in the lines. They used watercolor crayons and colored pencils, which allowed them to use several colors on a single flower before blending the colors with a paintbrush of water. Everyone was so excited about the outcome. 

Even students with no vision and little hand control could color the entire background with several colors and make washes from applying water. Many of these art pieces went home just in time for Mother's Day. 

 

State Teacher Advisory Council

We have about 120,000 teachers in 185 districts in the state of Georgia. About 40 teachers are invited to serve on the Teacher Advisory Council, meeting several times a year.  

We look at education legislature and discuss it with state congress members. We give feedback about teacher recruitment and retention, school climate surveys, websites. We learn about new Math and English standards, about challenges of rural and inner city schools, about what's happening in special education, transportation, and school nutrition.

It's been a treat to work in small groups to brainstorm ideas to improve teaching. It's important to know what is happening in other schools and learn from what is working and what isn't working from other teachers. I am inspired by their stories and amazed at the good that is happening in our state.

Superintendent Richard Woods May 2019

Georgia Superintendent Richard Woods March 2025

Truly, my favorite part of being a finalist for Georgia Teacher of the year has been getting to serve on the Teacher Advisory Council these last six years. I ended my term last month along with three people who served the normal four year term.  I almost started to cry when the supervisor used the phrase  "powerful voice for education" as she handed me a merit coin.