برچسب: creative

Skip the Bisque: 4 Creative Project Ideas for Single-Fire Pottery Success!
Clay projects are magical! However, managing clay is one of the more labor-intensive tasks in the art room. You have to prepare the clay and slip, shift projects around as they dry, load the kiln, bump the temperature, cool it down, unload the kiln—and repeat. The process is beautiful but it demands time and effort. If you only have one day and a classroom full of energetic students, try single-fire pottery! This time-saving technique skips the bisque stage and lets you build and glaze in one class period. Bring the joy of clay to your students without sacrificing creativity or quality.

Let’s explore how single-fire pottery can turn your art room into a hub of stress-free creativity!

What is single-fire pottery and how does it work?

Single-fire pottery lets students build and glaze clay pieces on the same day. This saves time and uses the glaze’s adhesive properties to your advantage. Normally, you probably warn students not to glaze the bottoms of their pieces to prevent sticking to the kiln. While you still want to do this, with single-fire pottery, use that stickiness to your strategic advantage and streamline the process! Glazing wet clay ensures pieces stay securely attached during firing.

Important Tip:

It’s crucial to match the cone of the clay with the cone of the glaze to ensure a successful single-fire process. If you’re using a low-fire (05) clay, pair it with a low-fire (05) glaze. Mismatched clay and glaze cones can lead to underfiring, glaze defects, or incomplete bonding. Always double-check your clay and glaze compatibility to prevent issues and achieve optimal results!

Why try single-fire pottery?

Single-fire pottery isn’t just about saving time. It can transform how you and your students experience clay and how you steward your budget and resources.

Here are four reasons to embrace this innovative approach:
1. Conserve Energy
  Firing once per project uses less energy, making this method more sustainable and environmentally friendly.
2. Reduce Material Loss
  Because you handle pieces less often, single-firing minimizes the risk of breakage.
3. Encourage Experimentation
  The wet glazing process introduces students to new techniques they can’t achieve with bisque-fired pieces.
4. Simplify Planning
  With fewer steps, you can focus more on the creative process and less on logistics.
How do I tell when it’s ready to fire?

Drying single-fire pottery can be tricky without the color changes in the clay to guide you. For a reliable method, try the temperature test. Simply feel the clay with the back of your hand. If it feels cooler than your skin, it still contains moisture and isn’t ready for the kiln. When the clay matches your skin temperature, it’s ready to fire! When in doubt, it’s always better to give it more time. Waiting four weeks, even in humid conditions, is usually enough to ensure your clay is thoroughly dry and ready for the kiln!

Are you ready to jump on the bandwagon? Here are four one-day projects to get you started!

1. Textured Landscape Tiles

Create clay landscape tiles that combine texture, layering, and glaze in one project. Start with a clay slab, trace a frame, sketch a landscape, and add texture. Glaze before adding elements like clouds, trees, and other small features. The glaze acts as the adhesive, eliminating the need for scoring and slipping. Glaze all the details and you’re done! Allow the tile to dry completely before firing for a vibrant, single-fired ceramic masterpiece.

For a breakdown of this lesson, including a planning guide and process photos, check out the Ceramic Landscape Lesson in FLEX Curriculum.

2. Coil Pots

How many times have you pulled coil pots from the kiln only to find separated coils? Avoid this heartbreak by having students build their coil vessels and apply glaze immediately. Follow your basic coil lesson. Scoring and slipping between coils is optional but recommended for added security. Once students construct their pots, glaze immediately. The glaze acts as an adhesive, helping the coils stick together and stay intact through the firing process. No more half-ruined pots lingering in your kiln!

If you don’t have a go-to coil pot lesson, no problem! FLEX Curriulum’s Coil Pottery Lesson is jam-packed with student-facing resources to ensure coil success.

3. Trinket Dishes

Put a creative spin on your coil lesson by building out instead of up! Students start by outlining a dish shape on paper and then build outward from the center with coils, shaping and curling as they go. Roll one long coil and wrap it around the perimeter to keep everything contained. Smooth the bottom side of the dish, flip it over, and immediately apply glaze to the top. Glazing immediately prevents smaller coils from shifting during firing.

Check out the Trinket Treasure Dish Lesson in FLEX Curriculum for step-by-step instructions and coil technique anchor charts!

4. Pet Pinch Pots

Start with a basic pinch pot. Let students’ creativity transform it into a unique animal! Add features like legs, heads, tails, fins, or eyes to bring their animals to life. Glaze immediately. Scoring and slipping between pieces is optional since the glaze acts as the adhesive.

Head to FLEX Curriculum to explore student-facing resources, including a visual guide for how to create a pinch pot and assessments to help students reflect on their work and improve their techniques.

Single-fire pottery is more than just a time-saver—it’s a creative shift that can redefine how you and your students experience clay. It simplifies the clay process, freeing up time, energy, supplies, and kiln usage. Single-fire pottery also creates stronger, more durable projects since the glaze acts as an additional adhesive. With fewer steps and more opportunities for innovation, take just one day to explore the magic of single-fire pottery.

What are your student-favorite single-fire projects?

To chat about ceramics with other art teachers, join us in The Art of Ed Community!

Magazine articles and podcasts are opinions of professional education contributors and do not necessarily represent the position of the Art of Education University (AOEU) or its academic offerings. Contributors use terms in the way they are most often talked about in the scope of their educational experiences.
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30/04/2025
The Ultimate Guide to Simplify Your Art Space for Creative Bliss
We’ve all been there—scrolling through endless art supplies and freebie groups to add another “must-have” item to our wishlist. We think that if we have that one material, everything will run smoother, students will be magically engaged, and the projects will practically teach themselves. But as the wishlists grow, so do the piles of supplies in our classrooms. It’s time to hit the pause button, simplify your art space, regain control of your classroom, and encourage creative bliss!

Embrace the “less is more” mentality to foster a welcoming art room.

Japan has a long tradition of tidying up as a path to clarity and balance. Hideko Yamashita, the creator of Danshari, teaches the art of releasing what no longer serves us to create space for what truly matters. Following this tradition, Marie Kondo’s The Life-Changing Magic of Tidying Up popularized the idea that less can be liberating, sparking joy and order in our lives.

These philosophies invite us to take a fresh look at our art rooms. Sometimes too much art clutter and chaos can make it harder for everyone to focus and fully explore ideas. What if simplifying our spaces ignited more creativity, focus, and joy for teachers and students alike?

This doesn’t mean losing the magic of art—it means curating your space with intention to amplify its purpose. Research shows that decluttering your environment can unlock greater innovation and engagement. Simplify your art space to foster calm and imaginative thinking and free up time and energy to focus on what truly matters—teaching and creating.

Simplify your art space with these six manageable steps!

1. Divide your classroom into zones.

Start by thinking of your space as a collection of zones. Each zone can represent a type of artmaking or media, such as painting, drawing, or sculpture. Dividing your room into zones helps you focus on simplifying one area at a time, making the process more manageable. This division doesn’t have to involve physically relocating materials; it can be a mental assessment of each area.

Here are three examples of common art room zones:
1. Painting Zone
  Brushes, paints, and palettes.
2. Drawing Zone
  Pencils, markers, erasers, and paper.
3. Sculpture Zone
  Clay and modeling tools.
2. Take inventory.

Within each zone, lay out all of your materials, tools, and supplies where you can see them. This will feel messy, but it’s an important step in visualizing what you have.

Ask yourself the following questions:
- Does this enhance my teaching?
  Does this item spark joy? Joy isn’t just about happiness, it’s also about energy, connection, and purpose. Even if a material feels like a chore (looking at you, chalk pastels!), consider whether it’s required for the curriculum or adds value to your lessons.
- Does this inspire my students?
  Think about how students interact with each item. Does it spark curiosity and engagement or does it sit ignored?
- Have I used this in the last two years?
  If not, it’s time to let it go.
If you’re looking for a more structured approach to inventory management, The Art of Education has you covered with helpful inventory guides. Use them to streamline your material management and ensure your classroom is fully equipped for creativity.

3. Organize supplies by category.

Zones set up a broad structure to simplify your art space. This particular step focuses on finetuning how you store materials within those zones for maximum functionality and ease. For instance, once you gather all paintbrushes together, further separate them by size or type.

For more tips on how to streamline your classroom, check out Organizing your Elementary Art Room for Success in PRO Learning. While this Pack focuses on elementary classrooms, the strategies shared are beneficial for all art levels!

4. Label everything.

Labels are your best friend when it comes to maintaining an organized and accessible classroom. Use large, clear labels on bins, drawers, and shelves to make materials easy to find. Adding visual cues, such as icons or color coding, can further simplify identification for students of all ages and reading/language levels. Whether you prefer professionally printed labels or a quick piece of masking tape, the key is ensuring both you and your students can easily locate and return materials to their proper places.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvaI77y1zhc

5. Create a donation station.

Turn simplifying your space into a purposeful mission to help others to make it easier to let things go. Set up a designated box in your classroom for items you no longer need but that others may find useful. Label it clearly as your “Donation Station” to make the process quick and organized. When the box is full, donate the contents to other art teachers in your district or community centers to spark creativity in new students.

6. Adopt a “one in, one out” rule.

To prevent unneeded items from returning, establish a simple rule: for every new item brought into the classroom, remove an old or unused one. This habit keeps your space balanced and ensures you’re only adding items that truly serve your teaching goals.

Simplifying your art space is more than just organizing—it’s a chance to refresh and reset. It helps you realign your art room with your values and goals and nurture an environment where creativity can truly thrive. Letting go of excess makes room for the things that really matter, like connection, growth, and inspiration. Each small step you take toward curating your environment brings you closer to a classroom where both you and your students will experience creative bliss.

Do you want even more tips to make your art room dreams come true? Check out the resources below:

What’s one thing you can let go of today?

What’s your best piece of advice to simplify your art space?

To continue the conversation, join us in The Art of Ed Community!

Magazine articles and podcasts are opinions of professional education contributors and do not necessarily represent the position of the Art of Education University (AOEU) or its academic offerings. Contributors use terms in the way they are most often talked about in the scope of their educational experiences.
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22/04/2025
Printmaking Hacks to Transform Cleanup Into Part of the Creative Process
Printmaking is one of the most engaging art processes for students, but it can quickly turn your classroom into a disaster zone. Inky rollers, murky water, and sticky plates can make cleanup overwhelming. Plus, it can require alternative materials that may be new to your classroom. With smart and efficient strategies, you can keep your printmaking tools in top shape while teaching students responsibility.

Gain time-saving hacks, space-saving solutions, and teacher-tested tricks to make printmaking in the classroom easier than ever!

Smart Flow Stations

Instead of having materials scattered across the room, try stations. This helps students move through the printmaking process with more independence. Give a clearly defined purpose and provide anchor charts to remind students about the purpose, steps, and materials for each station. Try breaking your stations down into the following: Inking, Printing, Drying, and Cleaning.

Here are common materials to include at each station:
- Inking: Inks, brayers, palettes, wipes, and paper towels.
- Printing: Printing press, barens, or large spoons, newsprint, printing paper, and scrap paper.
- Drying: Tables, drying racks, or clothesline and pins.
- Cleaning: Sponges, buckets, soap, wipes, paper towels, and drying cloths.
Space-Saving Storage Hacks

No matter how large or small your teaching space is, printmaking storage requires extra care. Supplies like brayers, printing plates, and rags can pile up fast. To avoid clutter, think in terms of visibility, accessibility, and vertical space.

Explore these three creative storage ideas:
1. Brayers
  Brayers are often bulky to store in containers. Glue magnets to the handle and attach them to magnetic strips, or if there are holes in the handle, use small nails or adhesive hooks to utilize wall space.
2. Printing Plates
  Store a class’s printing plates in a large accordion folder or collect each table’s printing plates in labeled pizza boxes. Ask your local pizzeria for box donations! Plus, they are easy to stack and will keep the plates clean and organized.
3. Rags
  Dry wet rags and cloths on a retractable clothesline. Once dry, store in an over-the-door shoe or pocket organizer.
Budget Drying Racks

Drying prints is one of the biggest space challenges in a classroom because students are often rapidly printing multiples. If you don’t have access to a traditional drying rack, you’ll need to get creative. Immediately hang wet prints up using a clothesline and clothespins. Ask local grocery stores or bakeries for donations of rolling baking racks to store prints on. Tape newspapers under tables or desks and gently place prints under the table. If you have absolutely no space, send prints home the same day. Protect damp ink with “print sandwiches” using newspaper and cardboard.

Team Effort Cleanup

Are you the last one in the room scrubbing brayers and wiping tables? Cleaning up after a printmaking lesson takes time, but it doesn’t have to all fall on you. Creating a job system gives students ownership and accountability over materials and teaches them to respect the tools they use. Make students feel “official” with fun laminated name tags that have their cleanup role on them!

Try these fun cleanup roles:
- Brayer Boss: Cleans and returns brayers.
- Plate Patrol: Wipes down and stacks plates, palettes, and trays.
- Ink Inspector: Checks for inky fingers before anyone leaves and distributes wipes accordingly.
- Table Technician: Ensures all tables are clean and dry.
- Paper Picker: Picks up and recycles all paper scraps.
- Print Pro: Organizes drying racks or hanging prints.
No Sink Printmaking

It’s easy to stick with drawing if you don’t have sink access. However, with some water-saving tricks and a bit of planning, you can still bring the magic of printmaking to your students! The goal is to remove most of the ink before rinsing and to conserve water. Grab a bunch of cheap spray bottles and pre-fill them with clean and soapy water, and you’re ready to go!

Follow these easy steps to make cleanup without a sink a breeze:
1. Cover tables with newsprint or disposable tablecloths and toss them at the end of the period.
2. Roll off excess ink from the brayers onto scrap paper.
3. Spray soapy water on the brayers and roll onto a damp sponge or rag.
4. Wipe the brayers down with a dry cloth and store.
5. Use paper plates for palettes and throw them away at the end of the period.
6. Provide wet wipes or DIY ones to clean hands.
7. Keep shop towels on hand for emergency cleanup!
Leftover Ink Ideas

Leftover ink doesn’t have to go straight into the trash. In fact, it can lead to some of the most creative moments in your printmaking unit. About 5-10 minutes before it’s time to clean up, walk around and see if you notice leftover ink. Turn this opportunity into a mini challenge to foster sustainability! Prompt students to create a print using only what’s left on the brayer and plate.

Here are four ways to use leftover ink:
1. Pull ghost prints from the same plate.
2. Save roll-off sheets for future collage or layering.
3. Play with color mixing and gradations.
4. Experiment with textured scraps of paper.
Printmaking is truly all about the creative process, so why not invite students to extend the experience into cleanup? When you provide students with structure and empower them with responsibility, cleanup will transform from a chore into part of the learning. The key to success is preparing your hacks ahead of time and ensuring all systems are in place with clear expectations before students crack the printing ink open. These small routines build lasting habits and teach students that caring for their creative space is just as important as creating within it.

What printmaking hack would you add to the list above?

How do you incorporate cleaning into part of your students’ artistic process?

To chat about printmaking with other art teachers, join us in The Art of Ed Community!

Magazine articles and podcasts are opinions of professional education contributors and do not necessarily represent the position of the Art of Education University (AOEU) or its academic offerings. Contributors use terms in the way they are most often talked about in the scope of their educational experiences.
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21/04/2025
Maintaining a creative practice — Lynne Cameron Artworks
- how the physical space of the studio makes a difference, what’s on the walls, the materials, my tables and easel
- my use of images, sketchbooks, photos
- how my practice is about the intangible too: commitment, values, intention, life choices
- how rituals and routines support making art
- the daily practice of journal writing, reading, intuitive painting, and time in the studio space
- how the practice is nourished with gallery visits, books, talks
- influences on my work of other painters and philosophers
After reflecting on their own work, we discussed aspects of the physical space in which conflict transformation happens, the meeting rooms people sit in, the food offered. Every aspect incorporates a message to participants and contributes to the conditions in which dialogue happens.

We talked about visualising ideas to simplify and to adjust thinking.

And arising as perhaps most important was the question of how time and space for creative, non-linear thinking might be incorporated in the pressurised processes of conflict transformation and peace-building.

I labelled this idea ‘the imaginal space’ and next time, I’ll share our deeper dive into what happens there.
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13/04/2025
Creative thinking in the Imaginal Space — Lynne Cameron Artworks

In the middle week of the residency we dived a little deeper into the idea of the imaginal space and what can happen there. Taking space literally, we held an in-person Studio Interlude and set up a table with materials for art-making in the canteen. But the term imaginal space is powerful as a metaphor to characterise creative thinking in project teams and by individuals.

The imaginal space is where

•       creative thinking happens

•       we catch whispers of possibility

•       unknowing is welcomed

•       opposites are held in creative tension

•       sparks fly

•       intuition speaks

•       we attend / listen / look

•       multiple ways forward reveal themselves and enter into creative tension with what is

If you were to watch me painting in the studio, you would see me in a physical space with resources that support my artwork. You would also notice that the work is marked by pauses and ponderings, periods of sitting and looking, of walking around the room, of doodling on scraps of paper and writing in notebooks. What’s going on in these times is all of the above – I take the painting in progress into my own imaginal space in order to find the next steps. These come out of letting new possibilities arise and holding them in creative tension with what is already on the canvas.

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13/04/2025
Responding to Simone de Beauvoir on creative work (1) — Lynne Cameron Artworks

One way I respond to her statements about what holds back women is to feel how they apply to my own art practice/life, then turn them around, and affirm the reversal:

i stand up in front of the world, unique and sovereign.

I have found reversed statements like this both bracing and encouraging. They have given me courage on days when being an artist feels so hard, such a waste of effort and precious time.

i throw prudence to the wind and

try to emerge beyond the given world

I can even try:

i have this madness in talent called genius

and if that sounds too much, I can still ‘try on’ the statement or ‘hold it against me to see how it might fit’.

This OWN-TURN-OWN practice of working with de Beauvoir’s words has been very formative for me. It has given me energy to continue on bad days, and to place my work in a larger perspective. It moves beyond a reprimand into spine-strengthening encouragement.

Next time: Themes and metaphors in Chapter 14, all the words

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12/04/2025
responding to Simone de Beauvoir on creative work (2) — Lynne Cameron Artworks

From Chapter 14 The Independent Woman, I extracted statements that Simone de Beauvoir makes about women artists and writers, in particular and in general. Doing this is an act of noticing and attending that you might want to do for yourself. If not, you can find the list of quotes here: List of quotes from Chapter 14, in order.

The next step was to TURN each statement*, using I … rather than she, woman. For example:

she tries to deny her intelligence as an ageing woman tries to deny her age

becomes

I do not deny my intelligence… or my age

Each act of turning took me deeper into de Beauvoir’s ideas and my responses. I recommend doing it yourself but if you want it, my list of quotes and turnings/reversals is here.

This list has accompanied me throughout the last 8 years I have pondered it, read it aloud while walking the room, hidden it, refound it, and been re-energised by it countless times. They have become a list of affirmations, a kind of creed, a manifesto.

————————————————

*I’ve come to appreciate TURNING or reversing as a technique from the Byron Katie’s Four Questions in her book Loving What is, from Jung’s ideas of the Shadow, and David Richo’s book Shadow Dance.

In the next post, the themes of Chapter 14, a summary.

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12/04/2025