How do you set about making mosaics with children who are not old enough to hold a pen never mind draw a picture and who are more likely to eat mosaic materials rather than stick them to a board?

After some thought I decided to call in the help of some clay that would fulfil the needs of very small people who like to have busy hands. Those that couldn’t write their names would have the opportunity to stamp their names onto prepared clay tiles and the older children could be more constructive and help to make faces from stoneware, while the others rolled, stabbed, pinched and battered some smaller pieces of clay to their hearts content.  All were fired, ready to be included in a mosaic. As for the mosaic, It wouldn’t be possible to lay tiles in anything closely approaching any kind of order, so the tiles were laid into a plastic grid first and then transferred to the design using sticky back plastic.

It worked, and here is the result (more pictures coming soon).