Hand Building a Bright School Year

 I ran into a ceramicist at a Bastille Day party this summer who told me about meeting a blind girl. "I just wanted to make her a trophy!" she said. Clay trophies. Sounded like a fun project to kick off the school year.

The assignment began by discussing the purpose of education with my high school students. If they leave at the end of the year, the same people they are at the beginning of the year, than what's the point? Education is about learning, growing and becoming better humans. This led to a discussion about what they felt it meant to be a good person and what kind of attributes they wished to achieve.

Each student made a trophy that to give themselves at the end of the year after working for the next 10 months improving in their area of weakness. Two students want to be more outgoing and another more care free. Some students want to be more organized, empathetic, helpful, generous, or kind. We talked about what kind of symbols would embody those abstract traits before they hand built their clay trophies.

Character education can be taught through art, and you can bet I'll do my best to follow up with students on how they're doing on their goal, so that we get closer to the best possible versions of ourselves.

Leaf Bowls

 

This is an easy and fun project the yields great results. My elementary school students went on a nature walk around campus with me. We felt bark, smelled pine needles, and picked a few large leaves off of the trees or the ground. Then we pressed the backs (veiny side) of the leaves into slabs of clay and traced them with a ceramic needle or knife. The leaf shapes were then placed on upside down metal mixing bowls to help them curve, and we used the score and slip technique to make a foot (either a coil in a ring, or three balls are the easiest). This lifts the leaf bowl off the surface and gives it a little shadow. These can be used for holding soap, earrings, keys, ear buds, or just as a stand alone decoration. I love how in just 30 minutes, my students are getting an interdisciplinary lesson that teaches them about autumn and types of trees, as well as techniques such as rolling a slab and correctly attaching pieces of clay.