Texture Magnets for Kindergarten

Two of my Kinders classes worked faster than the others during the clay unit so I taught a texture lesson and gave then each a ball of clay to make a texture imprint from the bottom of their shoes.  This is usually a Spring project for me and I use model magic and add a magnet to the back.

I begin the lesson by reading the book "Feely Bugs" by David A. Carter.  I have the mini hard back version from when my soon to be 20 year old daughter received it as a child.  As I read, I have good listeners come up to feel the bugs and report back to the rest of the group with their descriptive feeling words.  This helps them to define texture as something we can feel and challenges their vocabulary as well.    If the group is doing a good job as listeners, we read the book twice through so everyone can have the opportunity to report.

I give them a piece of clay about the size of a jacks ball that they form into a ball and then carefully press into the bottom of their shoe to flattened to about 1/4".   With the model magic, they are left to harden for the following week and with the low-fire clay, of course they had to be fired.  The rest of the class period is usually used coloring with texture sheets.   I have a pre-drawn picture of a turtle that is turned into "Texture Turtle".  They then practice cutting skills by cutting it out on the lines when finished.

Back to the clay, with the model magic texture magnets, I have the students color with water based markers and then I spritz then with water to create a tye dyed finish.

In the process of trying to complete all the projects in the remaining three weeks of school, I came upon the clay textures the other day and was scrambling for ideas on how to finish them.   I did not think the marker tye dye would be as effective so went to google to find an alternate method to finish these up.  All the sites I tried to visit were blocked by the district but I though I remember reading on other blogs something about oil crayons and tempera.  Here are the results and I could not have been more pleased with the outcome.   The students were so excited that each one showed them off to the principal!  First they colored as they chose using the oil crayons.  Then a quick coat of black tempera went over everything.   As they dried, I rinsed them under running water and patted them dry.   I think I ill replace the model magic with the low-fire clay in all of the classes next year.