8th grade Clay + Sound Lesson Plan

Miriam Light
Enduring Understanding: Critical & Creative Thinking: Students combine and apply artistic and
reasoning skills to imagine, create, realize and refine artworks in conventional and innovative ways.

Progress Point: Select, manipulate and refine arts concepts and processes to produce artworks that
visually communicate their experiences, ideas and viewpoints.

Central Focus: Students will be studying the relationships/ ways in which our senses interact. The
students will be studying these interactions through the focus of FORM and MOVEMENT, using the
medium of CLAY. As the students become more aware and are able to form abstract thinking skills as
well as organize schemas within their brain and plan things mentally (due to this age group entering the
final stage of Piaget’s theory of Cognitive Development- The formal Operations stage) I want to
challenge my students to experiment with an abstract concept and problem solve a way to fabricate
visual literacy from it. The students will be working with clay, but have the choice to illustrate sound (or
the lack of sound) in a way that seems interesting to them.

Learning Targets:
Perceiving/ Knowing: Develop awareness and articulate various functions of art.

Producing/ Reforming: Use critical thinking and visual literacy to communicate a specific idea.

Responding/ Reflecting: Explain and defend their artistic decisions using visual art vocabulary.

Performance-based assessment objectives:

1. Students will be able to develop awareness and articulate functions of art in their rough drafts.
2. Students will be able to think critically to create a ceramic piece that includes sound in some
capacity using form and movement.
3. Students will be able to execute visual literacy to communicate the idea of sound in their
ceramic piece using form and movement.
4. Students will be able to explain their artistic decisions using proper vocabulary in an artist
statement.
5. Students will be able to defend their artistic decisions in an artist statement using correct art
vocabulary.

Performance-based assessment strategies:

1. Students will be able to develop awareness and articulate functions of art by experimenting with
THREE rough draft options for this project, doing so by exemplifying one type of form and one
type of movement in each.
2. Students will be able to create ONE ceramic piece that clearly includes the idea of sound as a
theme or subject.
3. Students will be able to include ONE clear form and movement in their final project.
4. Students will be able to explain and defend their artistic decisions by writing me ONE artist
statement.
 5. Students will be able to use FIVE of the vocabulary terms for this lesson correctly in their artist
statement.

Vocabulary:
Slab- clay that has been made flat by rolling

Wedging- a kneading motion in which we remove air pockets from the clay

Coils- long strands of rolled clay that can be stacked on top of each other

Sgraffito- a technique where you put slip on first and then scratch your design on top, so that the raw
color of the clay is revealed.

Glaze- a coating material that adds color to the clay and is fired to create a glass-like surface.

Leather hard- the stage where the clay is damp. It is too dry/ hard to bend yet ideal for carving.

Bone dry- no visible moisture. The clay is ready to go in the Kiln.

Kiln- a furnace which reaches extremely high temperatures in which you can fire the ceramics.

Bisque- The clay has been fired once.

Slip- A thin liquified form of clay that is applied prior to firing and remains a uniform color.

Movement- a principle of design that explains the way our eyes move around the artwork, ways in
which the artist creates suggestions of movement within the piece.

Form- an element of art defined as a 3D shape, the overall physical nature of the piece

Materials:
1. Clay
2. Kiln (1)
3. Needle point tools (25)
4. Glaze (one bottle of each- red, orange, yellow, green, blue, purple, pink, brown, grey)
5. Slip (one large bucket)
6. Wooden board (25)
7. Rolling pin (5)
8. Buckets (5)
9. Paper (25)
10. Pencil (25)
11. Erasers (25)

Instructions:
DAY ONE

timing instruction materials

0-5 Welcome students into classroom, go over daily Daily agenda written out on board
minutes agenda (introducing ceramics lesson, showing
 examples, drawing sketches, check with me, start
working with clay if time allows.)
5-15 Introduce the lesson by asking students what the https://www.youtube.com/watch?
minutes first thing that comes to their mind is when they v=9BVOvLvJCMY&feature=emb_titl
think of sound, how can we make a visual e
representation of sound? Discuss with a neighbor. https://nonagon.style/sound-
Look at artist who use sound. (Liat Segal and Roy ceramics-plate-recorder-liat-segal-
Maayan, Israeli artist who combines ceramics with roy-maayan/
sound by making plates on the wheel and then
sgraffito sound vibrations on top as decorations.
Watch video.) Review what FORM and
MOVEMENT are in art terms.
15-20 Look at teacher examples of sketches and get the Dry- erase marker
minutes kids thinking about things they might want to do. Teacher example of sketches
Make a list on the board (teacher or student will (Attached)
write depending on preference) of ideas of things
that we can make that connect sound and clay.
20-40ish Students should be working on drawing out three Pencil
minutes sketches of ideas they can make. EMPASHIZE THEY Paper
NEED THREE. Students are welcome to talk/ listen Eraser
to music while working.
35-43 Students should come conference with me when
minutes they are done so I can offer feedback and we can
decide together on one ceramic piece to build.
Important question to ask- How does this pertain
to sound? What is the best way to sculpt this
piece? What is the function?
43-45 Students should clean up by placing pencils and
minutes erasers back in baskets and putting their drafts in
their portfolios and stacking them neatly on the
correct shelf. Students can wait by the door after
clean up is complete.
DAY TWO

Timing instructions Materials

0-5 minutes Welcome students into class, go Written agenda on the board
over daily agenda (Finish up
rough drafts, conference with
me, start working with clay)
5-15 minutes DEMONSTRATION- I will spend Paper
the first five minutes showing Pencils
students how to wedge clay. I Eraser
will explain to them that we Clay
make an upward flicking Needle tools
movement with our wrists as Rolling pins
we push down on the clay using Wooden boards
the palm of our hand. We Wire
continue to fold over the clay Ceramic tool kits (one per table)
 and repeat this motion for (demonstration for the clay
about 30 seconds or so. If any should be prepared prior to the
students are into baking, it is beginning of class)
the same as kneading dough or
fondant. Students should be
finishing up their rough drafts
and coming to conference with
me when they are done. If
completed, students should
begin work on clay.
14-38 minutes WORK TIME Clay
Needle tools
Rolling pins
Wooden boards
Wire
Ceramic tool kits (one per table)
38-45 minutes CLEAN UP! Students should
wash out all clay tools in the
sink, but on drying rack, cover
projects with water then in
plastic, put on proper shelf, and
wipe down tables. When they
are done, they can stand at the
door and wait for bell to ring.
DAY THREE-SEVEN (a week and a half to build)

WORK DAY- begin clean up at 38 minutes

DAY EIGHT

WORK DAY- last wet clay day, students should be almost done/ painting (begin clean up at 38 minutes)

DAY NINE

WORK DAY- students should be applying underglaze/ slip and adding details, I will fire in Kiln tonight
(begin clean up at 38 minutes)

DAY TEN

WORK DAY- project will have been fired in the bisque kiln over the weekend, today the students can
glaze before going into glaze kiln, if students finish early, they can work on homework

DAY ELEVEN- TWELVE

WORK DAY- introduce new unit while we are waiting for glaze kiln to fire

DAY THIRTEEN

LAST DAY OF THE UNIT! Students work should be cooled out and out of the kiln, students should write
their artist statement (template below) and turn in project!! 😊
ARTIST STATEMENT NAME

An artist statement is a way in which we reflect on our project. Using the space below, please
tell me the process/ techniques you used while making your project (coiling, slab, sgraffito, etc.) Please
make sure then while doing this, you use at least FIVE (5) vocabulary terms from this unit (found below.)

SLAB COILS SGRAFFITO GLAZE LEATHER HARD BONE-DRY KILN BISQUE SLIP
WEDGING

Please make sure your artist statement answers ALL OF THE FOLLOWING using complete sentences.

a) How did you make your project?

b) What is your project/ why did you choose it?
c) What is the function of your artwork?
d) What is your favorite thing about your artwork?
e) What was the hardest part about making this?
f) If you could do this project again, what would you do differently?
g) How did you demonstrate movement in your artwork?
h) What is the form of piece?
i) Did you include at least 5 of the vocabulary terms listed above in your explanation?

_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
_____________________________________________________________________________________
__________________________________________________________________________________.