What do the SS Carpathia, a panda, Tiko, mushrooms, Among Us cast mates, soccer playing self portraits, and a volcano have in common? They were what 4th grade clay artists chose to create this year as their clay projects.

The 4th graders really amazed me with their creativity and hard work with their clay projects this year.

As with 5th grade, we tried adding color with gloss Apple Barrel paint instead of with glaze. 4th grade liked it too. Win win with saving money and kids loving instant clay gratification.

I learned to help the artists pace themselves as they painted. Glazing is a two-step process that naturally slows them down, but with using paint for the first time on clay, somehow they wanted to go much faster, which sometimes resulted in sloppy application. I reminded them as the class went on and most of them readjusted to a painting pace that gave painting results that were just as beautiful as their clay creations.

It was a race against time to pass out all the paint to the students and then have them carefully paint their whole clay creations, clean brushes, dry clay if needed, and wrap their clay to take home. Several of the pieces didn’t get photographed in the frenzy, but they were beautiful.

The artists seemed very happy to add color to every part of their clay. I didn’t realize that it was a bummer to them to not paint the bases of their clay, but that was another perk of gloss paint vs. glaze.