Today was the last day of A+'s week-long
wheel-throwing afternoon summer camp at Parkdale
Pottery in Toronto. She's focused on wheel
throwing at the moment, not hand-building. It's
hard to find pottery wheel lessons for 9-year-olds
because of strength and safety concerns. A+'s been
doing the all-ages 2-hour wheel-throwing workshops
at Clay With Me independently around once a month,
and she's also tried painting premade pieces. It
felt like a minor miracle to find a half-day camp
focused on just what she wanted.
Before the workshop, A+ wasn't sure about trying
out a different studio, since she'd gotten
comfortable at Clay With Me. She settled in
quickly, though, and even took charge of packing
her snacks and getting her clothes and apron ready
for the next day. It was great to see her grow
more independent.
A+ likes to work with smaller balls of clay so
that they're easier to centre and handle. In Clay
with Me workshops, she usually asks the
instructors to divide a ball in half. Because the
Parkdale Pottery camp was for kids 8-12 years old,
the clay balls they provided were the right size
for her hands, and the instructors also
showed the kids how to prepare their own.
The first three days focused on wheel throwing.
The instructor complimented A+ on her centreing
skills. She's gotten pretty good at bracing
herself so that she can form the puck right in the
middle. She also learned about adding attachments
by scoring the clay and adding slip. The fourth
day was about refining and trimming, and the fifth
day was about glazing. She enjoyed learning how to
marble her pieces with interesting blue-and-white
swirls, and I enjoyed her description of the
process: layering the underglazes, then swirling
them around to create the design. This was the
first time she was able to trim and glaze her own
pieces, since the Clay with Me workshops are
one-off sessions where the pieces are all finished
with a clear food-safe glaze. Parkdale Pottery
will fire A+'s pieces with a food-safe glaze too,
and we'll pick them up in a few weeks.
When kids finished early or wanted to take a
break, they explored hand-building, drew circles
with markers on paper attached to pottery wheels,
worked with beads, and played the board game
Trouble. The instructors did a good job of
managing the occasional squabbles.
Looking at other students' work on the shelves and
the instructional posters on the wall, I saw
interesting ideas that we might try in future
workshops. (Gotta make a face vase…)
The half-day summer camp was from 1 PM to 4 PM
from Monday to Friday, and it cost $250+HST. There
was a full-day option, but A+ wasn't interested in
hand-building. I think the half-day was worth it,
especially since I managed to squeeze in about 2
hours of consulting every day even with setting
aside time to bike back and forth. We're gradually
transitioning to the phase where she wants to
learn about things I can't teach her, and paying
for clay workshops is a great way to access
people's specialized expertise and equipment. I
don't know how many kids there were in the camp,
but A+ was happy with the teacher-student ratio
and felt like she had enough time to get whatever
help she needed.
From her previous workshops, we've collected a
good selection of little ice cream bowls and
saucers. This camp will add a few more saucers and
tiny bowls. It might be a good idea to learn how
to make little treats (maybe chocolate truffles?)
that we can place on the saucers for an
extra-special birthday gift. ("Wrapped in plastic
and tied with a bow?" she asks.)
Next steps: We'll probably continue with the
Clay with Me workshops, since A+ likes the studio
and is comfortable with the process. I also want
to explore a little handbuilding with polymer clay
and air dry clay, and some sketching to imagine
pieces. Maybe she'll get into that too. When we
come up with pieces we really like, we can do one
of the handbuilding workshops at a pottery studio
in order to make a food-safe version, or consider
a clay-at-home package (Shaw Street Pottery) that
can be fired. When A+ turns 10, she'll be old
enough for the wheel courses at places like Create
Art Studio and 4cats. They generally schedule
their teen wheel courses on weekdays, though, and
a weekend would probably be better for us.
A+ wants to do this summer camp again next year.
She prefers unstructured time and plenty of
afternoon playdates, so it'll probably be just one
week, like this year. We'll see when we get there.
Plenty to explore. It's nice to have a craft, and
maybe this will be one of hers.
