Let your thoughts be known.

We have been doing a number of workshops with the younger children. They sometimes blur together and often all I see is the clay project and not the bright little face behind it.  But as with the older ones, one little spark always stands out. We were with the Kinders yesterday and one little girl was very excited to see us.  She was all smiles, had lots of good questions and got right down to work.  We were making Dad and Me plaques that are just that, Dad and the child who is making it.  She was working on dad’s face and she told me that her dad had a beard. On another ball of clay I showed her how to draw on a beard. She told me she didn’t want to put a beard on dad, she didn’t like dad’s beard, and she was just telling me that dad had one.  She went on to say that she never put dad’s beard on his face when she drew or made a picture of her dad because she her thought dad should get rid of his beard.  I doubt very much dad will shave his beard for his pretty little girl, but he knows what she thinks.

Until next time.

Cindy Clarke
The Clay Teacher 

Feels like art to me.

As the year winds down so do the energy levels and we start to look forward to the summer.  At different times throughout the year, Christmas, Mother’s Day and Father’s Day, we do the same workshop day after day for weeks and they start to lose a bit of their spontaneity. We always have fun with the kids, but the workshops feel much like doing the same play over and over with the same lines and the same jokes.  Every now and then we have a day to mix that up.  Yesterday we worked with a group of grade eights and then grade seven and finished the day off with a grade five six split.  What a wonderful day, what a hoot. The students were really interested in what they were making and did a great job with excitement and energy.  The high school teacher was a little worried about so much energy, but it was all positive and enthusiastic. It was great! They did some very cool work.  

I helped one boy grade 7  boy out.  He was on the path to a very good vase. He was African and I wondered if his style was something he had seen before or something that was just a part of where he came from or perhaps just a coincidence that he came up with the shape. We used to run a gallery that had sculpture from Zimbabwe and his little vase looked a lot like what we used to carry, just made of clay and not stone.   I had fun helping all the students and there were many that made some nice little coil pots. Just once in a while one kid stands out or I connect more with than the others. We shared a moment and he did some nice work.

When I am working with kids and they make something that they are really happy with, I like to tell them to take a minute and feel what that pride and happiness feels like. When you do something that makes you feel like an artist, you can feel it your stomach.  It feels ….tingly for lack of anything else to call it. It feels like you are an artist.  It feels wonderful.  I like to make as many students aware of that feeling as I can. Many of them feel it and don’t ever notice.  Once they are aware of it, they can make it a point to feel it more often.  Make a point to do things that make them feel good about themselves and what they are doing.

I always thought I wanted to be an artist.  I have done a some work that has made me feel that tingly stomach feeling. If I had really wanted to be an artist I would have done it by now.  We talked to between 7,000 and 8,000 kids last year and about the same or more this year. I like to think that I have a made a lot of people aware of what it feels like to be an artist.  Perhaps that is something that they will take with them forever. Perhaps it could change their path.  So maybe it is one more mediocre artist in the world, or many little sparks lit. I like to think that we are making a difference.

Until next time.

Cindy Clarke

The Clay Teacher

Teaching students to fish.

There is an old saying "Give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man a fish and feed him for life." That is what we are trying to do. No, not teach students to fish, but with the DVDs we are giving them access to the knowledge of how to work with clay anytime, anywhere and as often as they like. When students work with clay freely and often, the focus of the workshop becomes education and not the finished project at the end. The fun is in the making and doing. The curriculum states forming clay is to be taught, but no one can learn anything with only one hour a year or less to practice. The curriculum doesn't say collect keepsakes. Clay is cheap as dirt....I wonder why..... a box of clay weighs about 20 kilograms or 44 pounds and costs about $20 here in Alberta. That is about fifty cents a a pound. Most projects will use only a pound or two, sometimes even less than that. One box is more than enough for one and most likely enough for two workshops. When the clay is dry, add water and use it again.

We did about 5,000 air dry projects last year. A lot of them were repeat customers. We do more air dry workshops than we do fired. We have gone to Sheldon Coates in Grande Cache and done air dry projects with the entire school three times so far and are going back this month for the forth.

We would really like to get clay in every classroom and have every child working with it as often as they like and make as many things as they want. Wouldn't it be wonderful if every day was Clay Day?

For more information on air drying clay and not "air dry" clay please read the last two posts. Thank you.

Until the next time.

Cindy

The Clay Teacher

Every day is Clay Day!

More about Air Dry Clay.

We are in our second year of offering Air Dry Workshops. Teachers that booked Air Dry workshops last year are doing the same again this year. We do more Air Dry workshops than the fired ones. Teachers that have booked us fired first then Air Dry, always rebook Air Dry. When we are at a trade show, everything in our booth is Air Dry and we never fire anything before painting. All sample pieces we do as The Clay Teacher are not fired. Houses are made from unfired clay. Entire towns are made out of unfired clay from the Adobes in the South West, to Africa, Israel and India

One such dwelling is the "Musgum clay house". Named after its creators, the Musgum, an ethnic group in the far north province in Cameroon. The house is created from compressed sun-dried clay.

San Miguel Chapel, Sante Fe, New Mexico is the oldest church structure in the US. Original adobe walls built in approximately 1610 AD.

When making projects with the Air Dry method, you have to be familiar with clay and know how to work with it in order to have success. If the projects are made properly, you will not have problems with them later. When you follow the instructions of The Clay Teacher and the DVDs all pieces are sturdy and will last as San Miguel Chapel, unless dropped of course, then all fired or unfired clay will break.

When students make something out of clay and paint it, it is notpottery, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pottery it is only decorative or sculpture,

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sculpture. The pieces are not intended to be used in the kitchen as pottery, so there is no reason to finish them as a piece of pottery. However, the Air Dry method creates a very sturdy project.

Here is a little dish we put through the rinse cycle in the dishwasher. We sure do NOT recommend dishwasher safe, but it certainly survived and we still have it.

Taking the kiln out of the picture opens up clay to anyone, anytime, anywhere.

Every day is Clay Day!

Until the next time.

Cindy

What is Air Dry Clay

I have been playing around with different clay bodies to see what ones work best with the air dry method and painting with acrylic paint. We use Plainsman Clay and in the class room we always use Buffstone. It is very good clay for schools. It has a low shrinkage rate, it’s economical and the light grey colour doesn't stain hands or clothes. Buffstone dries very hard and it is easy to work with. I made a sample project with M370 and the M390. Those clays shrink a lot more when they dry and are not as forgiving as the Buffstone in the drying process, but after all the samples were painted, you can't tell one from the other in look or feel.

I will continue to use other clay bodies, but I really don't think it matters what clay you use. Laguna has one that sounds like it would work like Buffstone. Next time we are at Plainsman we will pick up a box and I will let you know. I will get some pictures of the samples and put them up here.

Everyone thinks that clay has to be fired. Everything that you make out of clay has to be put into a kiln and kept forever. I hear all the time that someone made a little something in school out of clay and their mom still has it or they still have it. Clay is seen as this mystery substance that you get to work with once or twice in your childhood, the firing process, well that certainly is not for the faint of heart. Everything that is made is priceless and must be kept forever.

How many pictures does a child draw in their school years? How many cut and paste “somethings” are made and as soon as they are off the wall they go into the recycle? It is making the piece, learning to use the pencil, the glue, and the crayons, that is the fun. Like everything else, the more work they do, the better the work gets. If clay gets into the classroom and is used like cut and paste, or pencil crayons, just think what the kids could do after years of clay experience in school. If all the focus goes off the end project and goes to learning how to work with the medium, clay looses it mystic and awe and gets back into the hands of children where it should be. For about a dollar, a student can have enough clay to make just about any project they like. If they don’t like it, roll it up and start over. If the clay gets dry, add water and use it again.

No, a piece of clay that is not fired is not a sturdy as a fired piece. However, both are very hard. If you drop either one, they will break, and both will last for years as a decoration. The big difference between fired student work and air dried student work, is that with air dry, all you need is a ball of clay and a willing student. The fired piece is a bit more of a challenge.

So what is “Air Dry Clay”……….. clay that is not wet anymore.

Until the next time.

Cindy

The Clay Teacher has left the building.

Wow.. what a run. Today was our last workshop for this term. We were at Grandin. A beautiful old school built in 1915. Another school that we have been at a number of times over the last two years. Great school and great bunch of kids, but I do wish the school had an elevator. Everything goes up, and down, three flights of stairs. We finished off with Big Mouth Frogs. The kids had a hoot and made some wonderful frogs. There is nothing like mid June, Friday afternoon energy in a classroom. Add to that, our last workshop energy and it was fun..... rule number one....Always have fun.

We had a few things to do after work and were driving in the city. Stopped at a crosswalk for a mom and her son to cross the street. The boy looked at us, gave us a big smile, pointed, waved and showed us to his mom. We had him in a classroom sometime, somewhere and he recognized " Mr and Mrs Clay". It was cool. After 9,000 plus faces, we didn't recognize him, but waved anyway.

It feels good to be off duty....... we are never really off duty, but now we have no time frames, no schedule to stick to. ...... Summer time, and the livin' is easy........

Until the next time.

Cindy

I moved back.

I quit blogging and moved to Facebook for a few reasons . The main one was that no one was reading this. Jim does all The Clay Teacher Facebook, and it is easier for me if he does it. Facebook is great, but it does't give you much chance to really talk about what you are doing. A blog has more freedom. For whatever reason, people have been stopping in to read this blog, only to see that it isn't here anymore. So.... I have started again. A lot has happened since I last wrote. I am not sure where to start, but I will have material for the summer.

The video is done, well not actually done done. We are waiting for the glass masters and then printing. It should be done...done.... in a couple of weeks. Just in time for school to be out. The timing is not the best, but hey... we did it. It is the only thing like that out there. We are very excited to see how it will be received.

We had a wonderful year as The Clay Teacher. We worked with about 115 schools and 9,000 students. As it comes to an end, only three workshops left, I can't help but feel a little relieved. Like all teachers, we are glad to see June roll around. Also, like most teachers, we look forward to next year. This year was awesome, to use the language of most of the students we worked with. We call ourselves Mrs. and Mr. Clay, after we tell them our real names. Mrs Clay is name everyone remembers. We get almost rock star status when we have been to a school. It is really cool with the high fives and hugs. We have such a positive and rewarding job. We bring clay to the classroom, something everyone wants to work with, teach something everyone wants to learn in a simple way so everyone a project and is proud of their work. All the time they treat you like a rock star. Not a bad gig!

Today we go to St. Mathew's for the third year in a row with the same grade two teacher. It is a good feeling to have clients repeat like that. We went to one grade two teacher at Windsor Park three times this year alone. The kids are experts now. I hope to have them again next year and look forward giving them more and more advanced work. .... So do they....

That is what we want to do with the DVD series, make it so kids don't only get to use clay once or twice a year, but once or twice a week, or a month. Ideally "Every day is Clay Day!"

Until next time.

Cindy