| One of the most popular free high school pottery | | | | base shapes are cut out with a fetting knife using the |
| lessons plans presently available is "Mi Casa, es Tu | | | | templates as a guide. The slabs can be textured, if |
| Casa", in which students vie to create fanciful and | | | | desired, to create the effect of roof tiles or shingles, or |
| whimsical model houses using an easy, slab-built | | | | wooden boards on the sides (after bisque firing, the |
| ceramic clay technique. Besides releasing the students' | | | | house can be painted with Stroke 'n Coat or another |
| creative imaginations, this lesson also teaches them | | | | nontoxic underglaze; and then further decorated with |
| how to compose images on a three-dimensional | | | | overglaze, to make fanciful designs on the basic |
| object, teaching them how to visualize spatially and | | | | texture). The pieces should be layered between |
| see the object as a whole. Also this project is a good | | | | sheets of newspaper (to help absorb moisture from |
| introduction to the majolica technique for finishing | | | | the clay in order to firm the slabs) and stored in plastic |
| ceramics. | | | | bags overnight. |
| Students are first encouraged to make a drawing of | | | | The house is then assembled by scoring and slipping |
| what the finished house will look like, taking into | | | | the edges of the walls and fastening them gently but |
| account the shapes of the walls (which do not have to | | | | firmly to the base and to each other and then the roof |
| be rectangles - indeed, the most striking houses have | | | | is added and fastened to the top edges of the walls |
| curving walls on all four sides). The type - city or rural - | | | | with slip. Doors and windows can be cut out of the |
| of the dwelling, the shapes and designs of the roof, | | | | finished structures, and the cut-out doors can be fitted |
| windows, and doors, the presence or absence of | | | | to the doorways they were cut from. When the clay |
| people or animals in the house, should all appear in the | | | | is completely dry, it is bisque fired to cone 03 and then |
| original drawing. | | | | creative designs and details can be painted on the |
| Then paper templates for the front and one sidewall | | | | houses with a glaze such as Stroke 'n Coat and fired |
| are cut out (the templates are flipped over to cut out | | | | to Cone 06-05. Any holes or imperfections in the final |
| the back and other sidewall). A slab of clay is rolled out | | | | product can be covered with nail hole filler. |
| with a slab roller or rolling pin, and the wall, rooftop, and | | | | |