March 19, 2011

Clay With ME!

I'm sure you've all started planning your end of the year art shows. Since I'm on maternity leave, I'm not going to have an all school art show. Honestly, it never seemed worth the 50 + hours I put into hanging all the art work then displaying it and returning it anyways. The kids and parents usually had more fun if I had an activity at the art show. So this year I'm going to have a "bring your parent to art class" night. We'll call it "CLAY WITH ME!"


Here's the idea. . .

Students will show their parents how to make a pinch pot and other forms based off of the pinch pot (pinch pot fish, people, vases etc). My only problem is I don't want to be responsible for firing and (more importantly) returning all the clay pieces! Is there an air dry clay that could work? Or do you have a great salt dough recipe (my salt dough is always too sticky no matter what I do!) Or do you have an easy way to organize the firing and take home process of the pieces?

Mrs. Hahn at Mini Matisse had a great idea to open up her arts and craft night to teachers and their kids. I am going to do the same! Not sure if Stella will come this year but I'm sure she will love it in the coming years.

Also, because the theme is spending quality time creating with your child, I wanted to know if anyone knows a beautiful poem or quote that could go with this theme?

Yes this is what I do on maternity leave. . .plan more projects! Thanks for your help and if you've done a parent and child craft night let me know what worked or leave a link to your blog post. I'm sure others would be interested too.

If you haven't checked out Lamamomma yet. . . it's my other blog, my mommy blog. I try to post about what's current in my life and right now that's being a mommy to Stella. So if you're interested you can hop on over by clicking here! 

12 comments:

HipWaldorf said...

Congratulations on your new baby girl!!!!

I bit the bullet and hosted my first Family Art Night in February and it was fantastic and flawless!!! I had one project for every cafeteria table. I recruited one(or more) teacher for each table and sent an email to all parents through Artsonia so it was an amazing turnout.

I have never been interested in hosting an art show because of the labor and I always wondered "What the heck do you do???" factor. I started our school Artsonia gallery to counter that.

I would be happy to share some info and photos with you via email???

Enjoy!

Unknown said...

Thank you! My e-mail is ericastinz@gmail.com.

I would love to see your ideas since you had such a good time! I feel the same way. Everyone ends up coming to the art show and they expect a "show" or performance! There is not too much too do besides look at the art work and talk so I've done a raffle and arts and crafts but it's been a ton of work to get the prizes donated, and all the tables set up. I don't have a big parent help turnout. So I was thinking clay might be good because it's 1 material and really high interest? I'd love to see what you did! Thanks for the offer.

erica

Anonymous said...

Maybe try Sculpey clay? They could take the projects home and bake them in their own ovens- a take and bake of sorts... Crayola also makes an air dry clay I've seen a t Micheals. I believe it is int eh Dick Blick catalog as well.
Congrats on your beautiful Stella!

Anonymous said...

“We shape clay into a pot, but it is the emptiness inside that holds whatever we want.”

“Your life is a piece of clay, don't let anyone else mold it for you.”

Just a couple of quotes. Didn't really find any poetry. I didn't look long though. If I see one I'll pass it along...

Unknown said...

Thanks Julie!

Wish I could afford those clays but I know they are out of my price range (and I can't charge.)

Love the clay quotes. Thanks!

e

Barbara's Thought of the Day said...

Barb's Tried and True Play Dough Recipe

2 Cups all purpose flour
1 Cups salt
2 Cups water
2 teaspoons cream of tartar
2 Tablespoons cooking oil
Food Coloring (optional)(add to water)
Glitter (optional)

Stir everything together in a big pot. Cook medium low while stirring and turning until it turns into play dough. Turn it out onto a counter and knead in glitter when cool enough.

This is a recipe that works for me. If your play dough is sticky I think that means you didn't cook it long enough. Cook it a little longer than you think, then a wee bit more than that. Break off a piece and squeeze to be sure.

I just bought 25lbs of air dry clay at Michaels for 20.00 ish. It works okay, but attachments seemed to fall off as the work dried. Would be okay for pinch pots though.

This year for art art night I'm thinking about a hat making station. "Hats off to Art". (Glue two pieces of newspaper or craft paper together, form on head, tie with string or ribbon, roll brim, decorate.)

Phyl said...

I use air dry clay at school, but the less expensive ones are definitely more fragile. For really good hardness, I like Stonex, but it is not cheap. You can even mix up some slip and it works real well.

We will have our first K-12 art show in YEARS this May. I'll be posting about it when it comes sooner, including WHY we stopped having one, and why we're bringing it back.

Kelly said...

What if the project was already made, and families decorated the outside with Acrylic paint and do dads like jewels, pompons, buttons, and found object.
OH idea popped into my head, you could make those textured clay cones that can be hung up. You could make them head and that night they could create flowers and such to fill them.
I have become so hooked on art ed blogs I have created one if you would like to look
http://itselementaryartmrsholmes.blogspot.com/
Thanks:)

Mrs. Art Teacher said...

give me a day to rest and then I'll post about a papermachie clay I learned how to make at the Conference. It doesn't need to be baked and it dries nice and hard like clay and I'm pretty sure if you make it thick enough you could use it to make pinch pots. If you do go the salt dough route I would fill ziplock bags with the supplies each family would need and have a bucket of water and measuring cut and some spoons and make them make their own salt dough and then use it....they learn something extra and you don't have to make 50lbs of salt dough at home

momma said...

agree w/ Mrs At teacher ...check it out!

Unknown said...

Yes incorporating the making would be cool and save me hours!!

Love it.

Unknown said...

I am in the process of planning my 3rd Family Art Night. I also used to do school-wide art shows but found that turnout was often pretty low, especially considering how many hours I spent organizing, mounting and hanging the artwork. We also have a district-wide art show and I publish art on Artsonia so I feel like that is sufficient!

For last year's and this year's art night, I have based the projects on a theme. Last year's theme was multicultural art, for which I chose projects that were derived from the art of many of the students' cultures. This year's theme is recycled art. There will be 5 art making stations--magazine coil bowls, packaging robots, cd mandalas, plastic water bottle flowers, and newspaper cityscapes. Each year, the turnout has gotten better. I try to promote it pretty heavily in the weeks leading up to the event-send a flyer home with a space at the bottom to fill out and return to school, morning announcements, and a display case with examples of the projects. To man the stations, I have volunteers from the high school service club, who always do a wonderful job.

I hope this helps! As for clay projects at these nights, I have used multicultural model magic to make "Pueblo coil pots" and Crayola airdry clay.