Hi folks, I teach evening classes for adult students and one of my "regulars", about to return for her fourth term, has Downs Syndrome. Her hand/arm strength and co-ordination does not allow use of the wheel. We have been using molds to make various shaped bowls etc and also different types of hand built wall hangings (e.g. birds, primitive type face masks, fish etc). She gets so much pleasure from her achievements but I have almost run out of ideas for things that she could be capable of making and she wants to do some different things. I have not tried coiling but did try pressing balls of clay into a mold but for her, it was not really a success. Has anyone (especially someone who has taught someone with Downs Syndrome) got any ideas for suitable projects that I could try with her? Any ideas would be appreciated. Thanks, Hugh.
I've never taught anyone with Down's Syndrome, but I did take some adult/child classes with my son when he was younger. What works for a child to make would probably work well for your student. Some of the projects we did that were fun were making pinch pots, rattles, wind chimes and coil pots. We also made stamps to stamp designs into our clay.
The rattles were made by making two half-round pinch pots and putting little balls of newspaper wrapped clay inside before closing them up. Then they were decorated on the outside, a little hole was poked into the rattle, and they were fired. Wrapping the little interior balls of clay with newspaper kept them from sticking to the walls of the rattle while firing. The wind chimes were flat pieces of clay cut into shapes and pressed with our stamps before firing. Be sure to leave a hole poked into the top for adding string. They were strung on either a stick or a top piece made from clay. We made pinch pot coffee cups that were brightly glazed (low fire clay) and could be used afterwards. The coil pots were fun because we made them together as a joint parent/child project. Does your student come with a parent or friend?
No experience with Downs, but I recently tried out "tar paper" (roofing felt) techniques with my 10yr old nephew. There was a nice write-up in Pottery Making Illustrated (May/June 2003), but the basic idea is that you can design your slab work on paper, trace it on tar paper, roll out the clay, dampen the tar paper and stick it to the clay, trace around it with a blunt knife, and assemble the slabs while still attached to the tar paper. The tar paper backing makes the pieces much easier to handle without messing them up, and gives them support during the initial drying. When the work is firm enough, you carefully peel off the tar paper and apply any surface treatment you want. You might want to keep the texture left by the tar paper... it's rather nice.
You can use the tar paper over and over. Tar paper comes in (at least) 2 grades. You only need the lighter 15 lb grade, though I suppose the 30 lb might be better for really big or thick slabs. (Be sure to ask for "roofing felt"). It's quite inexpensive. I think the roll I got was about $15 and will probably last me as long as it would have lasted on a roof!
Anyway, the main feature in your case and mine was that the tar paper guides the knife, so you don't need much coordination to do it. And because a big construction can be made up from multiple pieces, you can get fairly complex. For this project we made a covered butter dish for his mother's birthday.
You don't need to confine yourself to flat sides and rectangles. I've made (but not fired yet) two mugs by rolling up slabs with the tar paper backing, and pressing onto a round base. The only thing to remember is that the clay will of course shrink as usual, so put the tar paper on the outside so it won't resist the shrinkage too much. (Also makes it easier to remove.)
Hope this helps!
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I have taught a girl with a similar disorder. Coils would be good to try. Pinch pots might be good, making them into little sculptures. Keeping the interest up is tough. Underglaze painting is good. Good luck.
I had a group of four here for several days, three of them had Downs Syndrom, the fourth had something else. This was a while before Christmas and they made joint project, a nativity set. The building was a flat piece, oval, about 10 inches in length with a wall out of one inch balls (stones) around half of it and sort of curved, to make it look like a cave. The one girl was perfectly happy to build this cave (with a little help) and the other three had a ball making Mary, Josef, the baby, shephards, lots of sheep, a donkey, an ox, all kind of things. I think we ended up having two babies, but that was ok with them. Of course they all looked a bit funny, but the whole thing was delightful when it was finished. We even made a star (with a whole in it) and attached it afterwards to the roof, which also had a whole in it, with a thin bamboo skewer. They were very proud of it.
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