I once saw a middle school art teacher do a clay project where the students made something that would have water in it - ie a pool, cup.... and they melted blue glass to make the water. This intrigued me, as I never thought about trying to melt glass in the kiln before. The concept seems simple enough. So this year a couple of the elementary schools in my district began to experiment with this idea. I had some left over clay from this year and thought 'why not give it a try'. So I explained to the students that we were going to do our own art room experiment. I told them the plan and what hopefully would happen - but we would have no idea until we tried it.
Of course the kids were excited about not only the experiment but working with clay AGAIN! So, I drug out all the clay materials, demonstrated how to make a pinch pot, bisque fired the bowls, glazed them, each student picked out one half marble (the marbles that are flat on one side - used for vases of flowers) and fired them again.The results are great! I can't wait to give them to the kiddos. Most of the marbles melted completely - some of them had a bubble that popped and left an optical illusion of a bubble. They are magnificent!
4 comments:
Thought look Cool.. I like the thought of using a marble.. i used glass before and that works great..
good work..
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It has been really interesting. I told the students that it was an experiment that I didn't know what would happen.... turns out the bright red marbles I bought turn completely clear when melted.... no idea why or how - but red marbles went into the kiln and no red marbles came out. The kids have loved it!
SOO funny to see this -- I tried this last year with mild success. I created little bird baths and the kids glazed then we added the glass marbles to the clay and they turned out great. Some were better tahn others....but overall it was a hit and now everyone wants one.
Wow- this is a super cool idea and I can't wait to try it!! Thanks so much for sharing!
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