One of the things I love doing is going into schools and sharing my passion for clay.
Last month I had the honour to attend a school in Leyland and work with Year 6 pupils to create Benin Bronzes inspired plaques. There were 19 children in the class, all of them a lot more confident than I was at that age. Very observant they noticed straight away the texture of the clay which was a heavily grogged sculptural crank clay, perfect for the task at hand.
We kept the size within a manageable limit so we could finish within the two hour timeframe. They came prepared with sketches which helped them and myself with their makes. After one or two pointers about using the clay, they soon got to grips with it.
Once construction was complete we moved to applying colour using underglazes. A few tried mixing the colours to create more variety of shades whilst others left the clay to be visible.
They are currently drying in my studio before firing in my kiln.
I was impressed how the teacher guided them at the end of class to share their learning from the session, expressing to each other how they may do things differently. We received some lovely feedback regarding how much they enjoyed themselves and I can’t wait to return their makes to them all fired.
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