Ceramic Japanese Tea Cups

Inspired by this post at 'Artastic! Miss Oetken's Artists' I had my grade two students make these Japanese style tea cups. Students at my school learn Japanese as a second language and I have been working on many Japanese inspired art projects recently to integrate with their learning in Japanese and working towards an upcoming Japanese inspired exhibition at the school. 

After looking at several Japanese tea sets (borrowed from our wonderful Japanese teacher) and discussing the customs and traditions surrounding tea drinking in Japan, students were shown how to create a tea cup in clay using the pinch pot method.

After creating a small pinch pot of the appropriate shape, students rolled a thin piece of clay which was attached as a base. During the next lesson, the inside of the cups were glazed in a colour of their choosing, whilst the outside was decorated with a tiny brush, students painting either a cherry blossom design or Japanese calligraphy.  We used the words TEA and PEACE.