Egyptian Art: Clay Pyramids, Spinxes, and Scratch Art Ankhs

My third graders just finished these clay sculptures of pyramids of Sphinxes. We used watercolor and Crayola Texture Medium to create the sandy look.

I used my sample to show students what the clay would look like with each of the brown watercolors in our set and with the medium over or under the paint. 

The whiter look on the right was achieved by putting the texture medium over the paint. The left side has the paint on top.

See our galleries here and here. 

While our clay was drying and being fired we created scratch art Ankhs. The Ankh is the hieroglyph for eternal life and was often used in jewelry and decor in ancient Egypt. Students designed their image on scratch paper and then darkened each line. We taped the designs to the scratch art paper with the drawing facing the scratch art paper and scribbled hard on the back. The image transferred onto the scratch art paper so they didn't have to redraw anything. 

Students had the option of adding some paint details.

See our galleries here and here.