Sculpting a Black Lab from Polymer Clay

Click  for Tutorial: Video
The class has finished a dog head and a laying down dog. Now it's time for a  dog who's been told to "Sit!" and is waiting for his treat.  Since many of the kids have black labs as pets, we decided to do these.



We used Fimo III polymer clay, which says "soft" on the packaging. Usually "soft" Fimo III clay is only a tad softer than the other types, but the black has a tendancy to be very soft and sticky. You will not need to warm this black up in your hands to work with it. It was so sticky that I ended up making and baking the "toothpick heads"  in advance, and then letting the class build the body, insert the pre-baked head, and  put on the ears and eyes. That was still a challange for kindergartners, put they turned out awesome! These need to be baked at 225 for 15 minutes.

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Easy Irish Setter or Labrador Retriever in Clay

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I was teaching Kindergartners how to do clay sculptures, and I didn't realize their limitations on arranging shapes and sizes. I had to come up with a super-super easy dog that looked real.


This gives the students practice in arranging shapes, almost the same brain function as Tangrams.  So, build a Fimo Clay dog and call it Math!  A variety of colors could be used to make either an Irish Setter, a Black Lab, a Chocolate Lab, etc.Older kids, even high-schoolers,  will love this, too, and theirs will probably turn out even better!  Great first project in polymer clay.

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Clay Hound Dog

Click for tutorial: Video

The second dog in my clay dog series is the Long Eared Sporting Dog. Depending on the colors chosen these can be spaniels, basset hounds or coon dogs.



My video lesson gives a quick overview of these breeds and what they their physical characteristics are,plus it shows the step by step building of the head and body. This project definitely works better with the older elementary grades, the younger kids just get all these little shapes into a jumble.
One important hint I can give it to instruct the kids to warm the clay up for about 5 or 10 minutes before they start to work with it. This makes it much easier to manipulate. I hand them each their package of clay and tell them to put it in their pocket or sit on it while I show them the video tutorial.

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Boston Terrier in Clay

Click here for:  Video
My students love to use clay, and one of their favorite subjects is dogs. This is a good first project for clay dogs - just the head of a boston terrier. When they are finished baking I glue a magnet on the back to display on the side of the fridge.Warning - if they fall they will break, so don't put it on the refrigerator door, which slams a lot! You can tell by looking at the results of these that the kindergartners had a little trouble constructing the snout, but still good practice in spatial reasoning!

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kindergarten/1st boston terriers

However, by the time they are in second grade, students will show great improvement in their construction understanding.

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2nd grade boston terriers

Click here to view my video tutorial and fun facts about this breed. This could be shown to the class before they do their project so they would have a general idea of what they are doing.

Clay Boston Terrier Tutorial Video

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Easter Painting for Kids - Tells the story of Easter with Paint!

VIDEO:
Easter Painting for Kids - Tells the story of Easter with paint

Here's how this video came about.... I was asked to paint a mural during Good Friday and Easter Services for my church.
I did this video to practice and show the worship leader what I was thinking and the kinds of music that would go along with it. It ended up being a nice little video to show the whole story of Easter, and I thought it might me a different way to tell the story to children.

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Doodle Bible

Click here: Doodle Bible Video

This is a video I put together using a compilation of all my students sketches after many weeks of teaching. It was a fun way to teach  and remember those Bible facts!

Several years ago I took on the task of teaching 3rd and 4th graders in Christian Education.



I found a great way to do this was to give each student a sketchbook to keep "doodle-notes" in. They helped me divide the sketchbook into the major sections of the Bible - Law... History... Poetry...Prophecy... Gospels...Letters... Then, each week I'd read or tell them a Bible story, and I would show them how to do a simple doodle to go along with the story. We skipped around, whatever good story I could find at the last minute.

Believe it or not, they remember the main points of the stories from this, and they know what section of the Bible it came from. Even weeks later. At the end of the year they have their sketchbook to take home... a permanent record of what they learned.

While this may sound a bit odd at first, in reality, the idea has been a hit! Using the doodles in the class seems fun, artsy and laid back…yet the basic study is very chronological and structured. I must say the use of sketching in the lessons really helps my students move into a right brain, active learning mode. The little "interrupters" usually zip up their lips when they are drawing.

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