What can children learn from a big lump of clay? In our preKindergarten classes, the answers have included shoes-off discoveries, imaginative designs, and even the delight of seeing themselves “fly.”
Our teachers use clay to invite children to investigate the world around them. With no finished product to copy, students can explore their own questions: What happens when I push this? How can I move something so heavy? Will this piece stay on top?
Teachers noticed how eagerly children connected with clay during an initial exploration. They followed that interest, bringing it back on a larger scale and giving students more room to investigate together. Children’s observations helped guide the learning. One student wanted to add water to make the clay softer, while another noticed it felt too hard to roll flat. These discoveries gave students reasons to experiment, compare results, and put their thinking into words.
In one of the classes, two 25-pound bags of clay offered a puzzle worth solving. Children tried lifting, rolling, and sliding them, adjusting their approaches as classmates cheered them on. It took coordination and persistence, with the shared satisfaction of working through a challenge.
Once teachers cut the clay into large slabs, children explored it with their whole bodies. They pressed with their feet, dug in with toes and fingers, sat on it, and even rested their heads against it! Each footprint and changing shape helped them see and feel the effects of their actions.
Working against clay’s resistance builds strength, while squeezing, rolling, and pinching exercise the small hand muscles used for drawing, writing, and cutting with scissors. Its cool texture also invites children to slow down and pay attention to what they feel. Students found their own words for those sensations, describing clay as “kind of soft, kind of wet, and kind of bumpy,” similar to wet play-dough.
As children build three-dimensional structures, questions about weight, shape, and balance become wonderfully concrete. A leaning creation or a collapse invites another approach. Because clay can be reshaped, children can work through frustration and try again. There’s room for personal expression, too. The same material offered each child a way to bring a different idea to life, from leaves and shells to a robot face!
Curiosity takes unexpected leaps, too. Students discovered they could jump over the clay, then delighted in photographs showing them “floating” in midair. Those images helped them notice their movements and discover what their bodies could do.
That freedom to explore matters. As children learn about clay, they also build confidence to carry into other experiences.
Learn more about Gillispie School's Early Childhood program.