The World of Tiny Clare

1. Collect feathers: take a walk and look out for feathers. What is the most colourful feather you have found? Has it got a pattern on it? Try and find out what kind of bird your feather came from, where your bird lives and what it eats. You can draw your favourite feathers and birds - why not starts a gallery of your art work? 

2. Find an interesting shell: you don't have to be near the beach to find shells. Some insects have shells. Snails in your garden have shells too, and so do some seeds. In Springtime you might be lucky enough to find a discarded shell from a bird's egg. If you are at the seaside you can look for seashells. Find out what animals made your shells and draw them. Remember not to kill or hurt living animals when you are looking at their shells, and never disturb a bird's nest.

3. Make a rocket: all kinds of things can be used to make rockets such as empty bottles, cardboard boxes, tubes from toilet rolls and scrap paper. Design and make a rocket - where will it take you? Find out about some of the things you can see in space and make yourself a travel journal so you can record and draw the imaginary places you have been to! 

4. Pond Dipping: you will need a tray or shallow container and a small net, like a little net for catching pet fish. Oh, and a pond or stream! A magnifying glass will be useful if you have one. Put some water in your container (make sure it's deep enough so the water covers what you find). Keep the container in a shady place so the creatures you find do not get too hot and die. Use your net to dip into the pond and see what little animals you can catch. You can put what you catch in your container for easy studying. Make sure you put the animals back where they came from when you've looked at them. Water can be deeper than it looks - don't fall in yourself and make sure a grown up can see you. 

5. Measure Trees: Tiny Clare loves to measure trees. Find a tree that looks quite big and old. Using a measuring tape, measure around the trunk at chest height. What is the circumference of your tree? What species is your tree? If you're not sure there are lots of books and apps that will help you identify your tree. When you have measured the trunk and found out the species, you can go online and work out the age of your tree. When did your tree start growing? What was happening in the world when your tree was a sapling? (Tiny Clare's oldest tree so far is 1,100 years old, which means it started growing in Saxon times, before the Battle of Hastings! Her next oldest tree started growing when Elizabeth I was queen.)

6. Draw things! People get put off drawing because they think they can't draw. That's not true - everyone can draw. You just have to be brave and be prepared to make a mess. The first drawing Clare Stubbs ever did was not very good at all, and lots of the 'Tiny Clare' artwork goes in the recycle bin - remember you only see the better drawings. Whatever you draw is just your interpretation of what you have seen. Don't be scared of drawing, just draw what you think your object looks like and get colouring in! If you like it, then it's great!

7. Bark Rubbing: different trees have different kinds of bark. Take some paper and some crayons with you next time you go out to a park or garden. Hold your paper against the bark of an interesting tree as flat as you can (don't worry if it's not very flat). Using a crayon, sideways is best, rub over the paper. Can you see the pattern of the bark? Don't worry if it doesn't work at first, try different amounts of pressure. Some of the pictures of trees in the book 'The World of Tiny Clare: Tree' were made using bark rubbings and rubbings of other pieces of grainy wood as well, like old tables and chairs.

8. Play Marbles: Tiny Clare and Little Hiss love marbles. They trade marbles. They roll them around. Sometimes Clare and Hiss have competitions to win each others best marbles. But sometimes they just gaze into the glass and look at the swirly colours in the middle. When Tiny Clare is busy reading, Little Hiss makes a target and rolls marbles at it by himself. What games do you know that use marbles? Can you invent a new marble game?

WHAT ELSE CAN YOU DO TO BE TINY?