Clay Trees – Finished!

Fifth Graders are adding the final details to their fun clay trees.  They are enjoying digging through a big pile of sticks for just the right “arms”, and adding brown and black watercolor for additional tree color.  We have also discovered that oil pastel, rubbed in with a blending stump, adds a great bit of color to the tree “bark”.

Selecting sticks Choosing Sticks

Stick ArmsTrees

Trees Trees Trees

Clay Projects in Progress

My 3rd through 5th grades have been excitedly working on their clay projects this month.  Their pieces have been air drying and we’ve just begun the firing process – glazing next week!  Here’s what we’ve been creating:

Fifth Grade Trees Fifth Grade Clay Trees Fifth Grade Clay Trees – we made holes to add real twigs for branches after firing them.  This project is from Craig Hinshaw’s awesome book, “Clay Connections”

Fifth Grade Clay Trees Pressing texture into clay using tree bark pieces

Fifth Grade Clay Trees Rolling clay slab around pvc tube and sealing the back

Fourth Graders are making wall pockets – they are very excited to work on a clay piece that they can hang on the wall.

Fourth Grade Clay Wall Pocket “Throwing” a clay slab to create a pancake circle

Fourth Grade Clay Wall Pocket Forming and decorating the wall pocket.

Third graders reinforced their “slip-n-score” skills as they built a coil pot.

Third Grade coil pot Third grade coil pot