I finally have some of these to share! One of my 6th grade classes finally finished their Egyptian artifacts. It always seems to take a little longer to finish clay projects because I refuse to fire my kiln unless it's full. Class B will be glazing/painting theirs when we get back from the February break.
You can see the basis for this project
here. Again, here are what the requirements were for this project:
1. Create an Egyptian artifact out of clay using at least one of the three hand-building techniques.
2. Artifact must include hieroglyphics.
3. Artifact must somehow reflect yourself in it.
4. You must turn in a sketch that tells me what your artifact will be, how you will build it, if you plan on glazing or painting it (or both), and you must tell me how you will be reflected in the project.
I'm sure you can tell which students either didn't "get it" or just didn't try. For some students, this was one of their best projects and for others, I was a little disappointed in their output.
This sarcophagus was this student's best work so far! And, on the plus side, he actually built a larger artifact compared to others.
This one is supposed to be a cartouche-shaped box, however the tail broke off.
This student does really well with coil creations, but I think he wasn't sure (more like I think he gave up) on trying to completely make this box look like an Egyptian artifact, aside from the hieroglyphics. Great craftsmanship on this one though.
Egyptian eye...this one is VERY small...about the length of my pinky finger.
One of the best slab works! This one is very delicate but a nicely done scarab!
Another great sarcophagus. Awesome craftsmanship on this one, and I think she made a wise choice painting it with acrylic paint instead of glazing it.
This is a sarcophagus shaped vessel. Originally this student was making it so it laid flat, but then for some reason she sealed the entire thing. When I reminded her that she couldn't seal it without poking holes (and that it seemed like a waste of clay to me to have a hollow object like this that couldn't be used) she cut out a top and added a handle.
Again, another student who didn't really try to make an Egyptian artifact. He carved a single hieroglyphic on each side of this box, but then he never made a lid and he glazed it so that it was hard to see the hieroglyphics.
Because we had to move onto the next unit before finishing this project, I gave them review questions about the clay itself instead Ancient Egypt. The hand-building skills, even though they've done them with me in the past years and we reviewed them extensively before beginning this project, seemed to be a hard thing for them to remember, step-by-step, how to do. So far, they've done a pretty good job remembering and writing down the steps for each of these questions. If I have enough clay to do another clay project with 6th grade before the end of the year, I'll give them a similar quiz before beginning the unit.
Despite having a rough start with this project, I'm still happy with the results. I will share the rest of these artifacts once they are finished!
