Children learned about clay in art class

Twenty-five years ago this week, local children were learning about clay and ceramics.

The July 11, 1998, edition of The Commercial Review featured a story about the “Parks Animal Pots” class that was part of Jay County Arts Council’s Arts in the Parks program.

Rhonda Franklin of Cleveland taught the class for Jay County Arts Council (now Arts Place). It was her third summer visiting Jay County as a teaching artist.

“The kids here are really great,” she said. “They’re responsive, and I feel we’re offering a service they really want.”

Students in the class learned techniques for working with clay while also developing other artistic skills. Franklin said the “Secret Garden” class was especially popular.

“They get to mix up the clay by themselves and get dirty,” she said. “They like it because it’s like playing in mud.”

For the gardening project, students made plans and animals out of clay that did not need firing. In the animal pots class, students looked at books to get ideas for how to design their projects.

“They have to think about how they’re going to apply the techniques to make what they want,” said Franklin, a teacher of art courses at community colleges as well as an elementary school in Lakewood, Ohio. (She had a bachelor’s degree in art from Allegheny College in Meadeville, Pennsylvania, and a master’s degree in fine arts from Ohio State University.)

She also worked with older students — ages 14 through 21 — in “Generation X” classes. The were creating mini ceramic tile murals while also helping to design a larger mural to decorate the exterior of the new Arts Place building, recently converted from the former Jay County Public Library. Franklin and her students were working on designs, with ideas to be submitted to the arts council in August.