Clay on Words

I love these eighth grade clay projects! I got this lesson idea at an Art Share I attended years ago from another teacher in a local independent school and think it's a great one... The challenge given to the class was to become more aware of the understanding and usage of idioms/sayings/word plays in language and to interpret them creatively in clay. We talked about word plays and idioms, and how usually, native speakers of English understand what the sayings mean, but that people learning the language might be quite confused when trying to literally interpret them... for example, chicken fingers... huh?! Chickens don't have fingers?!

Our Lower School library has some really great books that I like to check out as references for this project, especially Fred Gwynn's books titled The King Who Rained, A Little Pigeon Toad and A Chocolate Moose for Dinner. Students have to come up with 10-12 ideas, and then sketch out their ideas for four of them before deciding which to make. Then, they spent several class periods using a variety of sculpting techniques in order to create these final pieces! See if you can guess the saying before reading the captions beneath each one! :)

"Rule of Thumb"

"Swordfish"

"Spring to Defense"

"Buffalo Wings"

"Ants in the Pants"

"Monkey Business"

"Rainbow"

"Smart Cookie"

"Cat Burglar"

"Sick as a Dog"

"Party Animals"

"Hold Your Horses"

"Corn Dog"

"Saved by the Bell"

"Crab Apple"

"Cash Cow"