Creativity 521 #93 - My clay sandwich {Review of heART Studio Part IV}

Greetings from Taiwan! Woohoo! I don't blog when I'm on holiday so this post was written earlier on. I'll be back next week, so stay tuned for more updates then!

In today's Creativity 521, I'll share with you something that the little girl did in her art class at heART Studio which I thought was very unique and creative! It is something that you can consider doing with your child at home too - all you need is some clay and lots of imagination! Can you guess what we did? We made a sandwich out of clay!

I was pretty thrilled to learn about the topic for Ariel's new art project - a sandwich made entirely out of clay. It was a good way to teach the little ones about the different types of shapes as well as let them come up with their own desired ingredients for their sandwiches.

When I saw this, I was impressed by the details of the ingredients and the fact that the bread of the sandwich could come in so many different types!



You see, at heART Studio, it's not just purely and solely about art. The teachers also teach the kids some general knowledge and take time and effort to elaborate on the topic whenever a new project begins. For this project, they learnt about the different types of bread - including the shape, texture, appearance and so on.



Every child was tasked to pick out the type of bread they wanted for their sandwich and once that was done, it was time to go shopping from the clay tray! They had to collect the correct number of clay cubes, for instance 5 yellow and 10 white, that Teacher Syafiq had asked them to and most of them found this to be fun and would count out loud along the way.

Next, they had to use the hairdryer to soften the clay so that it would be easier for their little hands to work on later. Once again, they were asked to dry it for around 10 seconds and had to count as they did so. It's quite a good way to practise their counting, right?

After that, it was time for the fun but challenging part - kneading. I must say this was quite a daunting task for many of the kids in the Little Dali class and to make it easier, instead of lumping the clay into one big dough, Teacher Syafiq would break them down into several smaller ones and ask the kids to press the clay so as to mix the colours well. Once that was done, the clay was then combined and knead to the preferred shape for the bread.

I have to say that Teacher Syafiq remains our favourite teacher in heART Studio and as long as he is there to guide Ariel, I'm confident that she is in good hands, will pay attention and learn well. He has such a gift for being able to connect with the little ones and make them listen to him such that learning becomes a joyful and a fun process.

So, Ariel decided on a triangular shape for her bread and once that was done, she used a brown colour to make the crust by rolling it into long strips and placing them around the border.

To make it more like real bread, she had to take a stick with a sharp end to poke and make holes. At the end of the first lesson, she completed both slices of bread and in the next class, it was time to move onto the ingredients!



The kids could choose any three of the various types of ingredients that were pasted on the wall. What I liked was that there was no right or wrong; it was all a matter of personal preference and the decision lay in the hands of the kids. In fact, they were allowed to choose the colours they wanted for their ingredients too. Talk about freedom of choice.

For Ariel, first she made sausages followed by carrots. I totally think that the kneading, pressing and rolling of the clay was a great way for her to practise her fine motor skills and train her hand-eye coordination too.

As for her last ingredient, it puzzled me for a moment and I didn't know what these were, until Teacher Syafiq told me that Ariel wanted cucumbers but she wanted them to be in orange. He didn't want to dissuade her because like what they said before, there's no right or wrong in art. I totally think that's what we as parents need to believe in too, instead of always telling our kids that clouds must be white, skies must be blue and suns must be orange/yellow.

To finish off her sandwich, she had to design a piece of board with her name and drawings. She chose to draw a rainbow and some heart shapes too.

Ta-dah, here's presenting her final artwork! The teachers helped to glue it to the board and put in a flag, which made it look so cute and even a tad yummy. She was really so delighted and proud of her clay sandwich, and I couldn't help it but smile along with her and told her she did a most awesome job through it all.

Won't you have a go at letting your little one make a sandwich out of clay too?

Disclosure: This is Part IV of a series of reviews of heART Studio. Ariel attended complimentary lessons for the purpose of this review. All opinions are our own.