Clay could be claimed to be the original malleable material. It is a natural resource that has been used creatively by humans for thousands of years, but can be overlooked in early years settings in favour of manmade substances such as playdough, sand and slime.
Practitioners often think of clay as a medium that is messy and requires complex knowledge, but – once a few basics are understood – there is enormous potential and benefit to be gained from introducing clay to children, including:
- It is an ‘intelligent material’ – an open-ended resource that allows children to use their imagination and explore, which brings endless possibilities and stimulates creativity and thinking skills.
- It can be encountered and explored by children of all ages who can bring their own developmental needs to it as they follow their own curiosities – from exploring the weight of a block of clay to its texture and even covering themselves in clay.
- Using clay gives children another ‘language’ for expressing their ideas in both two and three dimensions.
- It has a unique transformative nature and can be explored in different states from soft or stiff to wet or leathery. It can also be dried or fired to produce a permanent object.
- Children often experience high levels of involvement and wellbeing when given the time and space to explore clay.
‘Clay has an earthy smell and it is like reconnecting with the ground,’ says Alexandra Chiorando, managing director of Marmalade Early Years Consultancy. ‘There are lots of synthetic malleable materials, like slime, which have their place, but there is nothing better than the coolness of clay, the texture and how you can move and change it, but also make something permanent, which is powerful.
‘Clay gives a lot of sensory feedback – the feeling of wet clay going through your fingers is so regulating. So it’s not just the academics of what you can make from manipulating clay, there is also much personal, social and emotional development involved. It helps children to connect to nature and think about what they are doing with their hands. When children are allowed to relax and manipulate clay, you can have conversations about deeper things than while sat on the carpet – it’s like therapy.’
INTRODUCING CLAY
Polly Moakes, senior teacher and additional learning needs co-ordinator at Tremorfa Nursery School (pictured) in Cardiff, recently introduced clay to the setting after witnessing it being used during a visit to Reggio Emilia in Italy and returning with a ‘real passion to research and introduce clay’.
‘We saw a great appreciation and respect for clay, which made us realise how, despite being experienced early years educators, we’ve never shown this appreciation of a material and taken time to properly investigate and understand a material, which limited children’s potential for creativity,’ says Polly.
‘At Reggio, we saw babies and young children using clay for long periods of time and also went to an exhibition on children’s work with clay which showed the endless possibilities of the material and how, if it’s introduced properly by knowledgeable, nurturing practitioners, the potential is amazing. The visit made us really reflect on our practice – how we use and introduce materials with children and how we were limiting their potential by not giving children the time and space to explore and really appreciate the material in depth, almost like a scientific exploration; to work out how it works, moves and changes with interaction from our touch.’
Staff and children at Tremorfa Nursery School have spent the past year going on a ‘journey with clay’ together. They have invested in staff professional development through Froebelian short courses on pedagogy and practice, held an inset day on clay and visited a clay studio to enable staff to explore and gain a deeper understanding of the material before introducing it to the children. Polly has also undertaken a lot of reading and research into clay, particularly exploring the ‘stages of clay’ which they are slowly following with the children:
- Exploring large chunks of clay for long periods of time with hands and whole bodies without a pre-determined end product.
- Introducing water and exploring how it transforms the clay.
- Using hands as a working tool with clay.
- Introducing different physical tools for exploration and to develop skills.
- Teaching and modelling tool use and specific skills and techniques related to clay, such as modelling and sculpting.
Research suggests that children need to work through the stages of clay at a developmentally appropriate pace, which Polly emphasises varies for individual children. She says that, after a year of exploration, the children at Tremorfa are still exploring the early stages.
ENDLESS POSSIBILITIES
Staff thought about how they wanted to introduce children to the clay to create an environment of ‘irresistible learning’, and settled on presenting big blocks of wrapped clay on the floor with the children questioning what it could be and touching the packages before unwrapping them. ‘Offering access to clay initially for exploration before adding anything allows children to truly start to interact and form a relationship with the clay in this state,’ explains Polly. ‘As the children play with the clay, they start to notice how it changes, becomes softer and easier to manipulate.’
Staff observed the children’s interactions were mainly through touching the clay with their hands. They then showed the children how they could explore the properties of the clay through their whole bodies – feet, hands, elbows, arms and legs. Some children also chose to experience how clay felt on their bodies by rubbing it into their face or limbs. Polly says these open-ended possibilities allow for the development of creative thinking. ‘Over time and with frequent access to the clay, children may begin modelling the clay, using their hands, touching, smoothing, rolling clay, making indentations and marks with fingers and talking about the process, their creations or what the clay represents to them,’ she says. ‘Through observing the changes in clay over prolonged periods of time, children begin to show curiosity in exploring clay in all of its forms.’
After many weeks of exploration, staff introduced water. ‘We offered pipettes, small jars of water, sponges and spray bottles so children could gradually add water and explore the interaction between water and clay for themselves,’ explains Polly. ‘Children started to notice and comment upon the changes in the touch, texture and density of clay.’ The exploration of water and clay together helps children to understand the process of creating ‘slip’, which is used in later stages for ‘gluing’ pieces of clay together.
Adults supported and guided where appropriate and used questioning to extend children’s thinking. They also carefully modelled techniques when appropriate, such as using different parts of the body to move and shape the clay and the process of softening the clay to make it more malleable. Polly emphasises the importance of giving children the time, space and freedom to experiment, follow their interests, ask questions, comment and become familiar with using the clay and what it can do. They even took it outside to enable larger-scale exploration and investigate the impact that the weather has on clay – from rainwater to the sun. Through the explorations, Polly says, ‘children are showing curiosity in testing things out, hypothesising, discovering and making sense of the world around them’.
When staff thought the children were ready, they introduced the concept of a workspace with hessian boards to work on and wire or string to cut the clay. They encouraged children to use different parts of their hands for exploration, including:
- Fist, palm, fingertips, knuckles
- Press, push, beat and flatten the clay
- Roll it into a ball and sausage
- Bend, stretch, twist and fold it.
Some children have also moved on to using simple tools and loose parts to mark-make indentations, textures and impressions. ‘Children may begin to talk about what the shapes they have made look like, or may begin to intentionally shape the clay to make simple representations,’ says Polly. Some children are now showing an interest in beginning to create with the clay and take on individualised small projects.
In recognition of the importance of their clay work, Tremorfa Nursery School now has a dedicated clay area as part of its continuous provision to enable children to continue to explore the material as and when they choose.
Creating a clay area
Clay – Polly Moakes recommends kiln clay for whole body exploration rather than air-drying clay because its texture is more appealing and does not dry as quickly. For other work, use air-drying clay. You can even dig clay from the garden to use – children at Tremorfa found clay in their allotment.- Leaving out – use a plant mister spray bottle to keep air-drying clay damp while children leisurely explore it. Kerry Smith says it is possible to make it malleable again once dry, but that it takes a lot of effort and water.
- Large scale – put clay on the floor in tuff trays, on hessian or sheets.
- Storage – wrap balls of clay in a damp cloth or clingfilm and store in an airtight container to keep it moist.
- Work space – cover a table with hessian or work on wooden clay boards.
- Water – small pots, spray bottles, pipettes, paint brushes.
- Tools – resist introducing tools until children have had plenty of time to explore with their hands. Then consider rolling pins, traditional clay-modelling tools or objects such as forks, mashers or mallets. Use wire or string for cutting the clay.
- Natural objects – provide loose parts for combining with the clay or printing on it, such as leaves, shells and sticks.
- Clothing – in the early stages, consider children exploring clay in their underwear or nappies. Then provide overalls, large T-shirts or aprons to protect children’s clothes.
CASE STUDY: Little Barn Owls in West Sussex
Clay is offered ‘in abundance’ at Little Barn Owls, from the baby room through to pre-school, starting with sensory exploration and understanding its properties to having the knowledge and confidence to use it in a more ‘dynamic way’ in project work enquiries. ‘By the time children are in the pre-school room, they can use clay to mould into whatever they are wanting to create – from fairy houses to trees – and start to add different elements, use tools and slip [clay and water together] and also a potter’s wheel,’ explains head of adult’s and children’s learning Kerry Smith.
Educators lead skills-based sessions in the atelier to enable pre-school children to be able to manipulate clay and use different tools and techniques. ‘If we’re going to use clay as a language of expression then children need to be able to use it effectively,’ says head of pedagogy Alice Fisher. ‘So we tell them the names of tools, what tools they’ll need and what effects they will have, such as what tool they’ll need to cut a sausage of clay or how to score and wet the clay to fasten two pieces together. Recently, we had a big piece of clay on the table and children were making little sausages, scoring it and making the slip. We then returned the following day when it had dried to see which has fastened or fallen off. There is lots of revisiting, reflection and research.’ When children are making sculptures, they will talk about their work and critically reflect on it with their peers.
Educators introduce techniques according to children interests, for example, children were fascinated by scratching paint, which led Alice to show them graffito used in pottery – scratching to show the contrasting underlying layers. This led to them researching how to make patterns on flat clay surfaces.
Children wanted to use a potter’s wheel after seeing one being used to make a pot in a video. ‘We spent a lot of time learning about the mechanisms of the potter’s wheel because it’s a complicated tool. The wheel was slightly too big for the children to sit and use the foot pedal at the same time, so they realised they’d need to collaborate. We spent time focusing on the soft skills of collaboration, turn-taking, sharing space and negotiation, before the children decided to make a fruit bowl,’ says Alice.
Children used trial and error to work out how their hand movements made the bowl change shape from wider to taller as it spun around. They also experimented with how much water they needed to make the clay flow through their hands effectively. To contrast with ‘throwing’ the bowl on the wheel, children hand built pinch pots and coil pots and compared the results.
FURTHER INFORMATION
- Marmalade Early Years Consultancy: marmaladeearlyyearsconsultancy.co.uk
- Follow Tremorfa Nursery School on Instagram @tremorfanurseryschool
- https://www.littlebarnowls.co.uk
- The Language of Art: Inquiry-Based Studio Practices in Early Childhood Settings by Ann Pelo
- The Hundred Languages of Children: The Reggio Emilia Experience in Transformation, edited by Carolyn Edwards, Lella Gandini and George Forman
- Exploring Clay With Children by Chris Utley and Mal Magson
Many Shapes of Clay: A Story of Healing by Kenesha Sneed