March Month-To-Month Mural: Wet Clay

We weren't quite sure what the next step for our mural should be. The Frogs have shifted into a phase where they are investigating three-dimensional artwork. They are especially into working with clay. We weren't quite sure if it was possible to incorporate this exploration into our two-dimensional mural.

Then we put this out on the art table;

...Which eventually turned into this;

...And this;

...which, we decided, could easily translate to this;

There was one point in the process where the entire canvas was covered in wet clay. Our previous layers were completely obscured. We teachers definitely had a bit of an, "Uh oh, What have we done!" moment.

Not to worry! The kids revisited the discovery that they made the last time and used Popsicle sticks, paint brush handles, and whatever else they could find, to scrape off some of the wet clay, once again exposing the layers of paint underneath.

Just to be on the safe side, we fell back on an old pre-school teacher standby;

When in doubt, add glitter!

We have found that using spoons to sprinkle glitter works well with this group. The kids are so very precise, almost delicate with their sprinkling and spreading- very different from the "Shake the bottle, hard, until it's empty!" approach that we see when we offer glitter in shakers.

For good measure, we also offered google eves and plastic spangles, perfect for embedding in the wet clay...

Once the glitter-storm had passes, we figured we should probably attempt to somehow seal this new layer. We mixed white glue and water, and painted the milky mixture over the entire surface.

Here's what the mural looks like now;

We almost don't want to change it again!