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The Clay Hole University · Pottery Foundations

Your First Ten Pottery SessionsPrintable pottery guide

A practice plan for your first ten visits, on paper: a route for the wheel and a route for the tables, a test for moving on at every session, and both route trackers to fill in.

$10.005 guides, 1 free
  • Skill level: Beginner
  • 29 printable pages
  • 4 video picks
  • 8-question quiz + answer key

Flip through the free sample
  • Instant download
  • Prints on any printer
  • The lesson stays free
The printable, at a glance

What is the Your First Ten Pottery Sessions printable guide?

It is the free “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” lesson rebuilt for paper: ten sessions on the wheel and ten at the tables, each with what to try, what to read first, what to watch for, what counts as progress and when to repeat it. Then the shelf routine, which sessions belong in a class, and permission to repeat, with both route trackers printed inside.

Prefer to read it online first? The “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” lesson is free, and always will be.

  • 29printable pages, US Letter
  • 8quiz questions, with a full answer key
  • 4hand-picked videos, each with a QR code
  • 15glossary terms in plain language
  • 2workbook pages you fill in yourself
For your first ten visits

Bring the next session with you.

An open format studio is a gift once you know what you came to make. On a first night, with a fresh bag of clay and a whole room in front of you, it is mostly a lot of empty table.

This guide is the syllabus you bring yourself. Pick a route, the wheel or the tables, and each session tells you one thing to try, the lesson to read before it, the detail to watch for, and a plain test for when you are ready to move on. The test decides, never the calendar, so repeating a session is the plan working.

Paper suits it because the plan is used at the table. The route trackers sit on your shelf between visits, with a box for every date you work on a session, the numbers the sessions ask you to write down, and a line for the question to save for the next class.

Look inside

Real pages, ready for your shelf

These are actual pages from the guide, shown here with the sample watermark.

  • Page 3 of the “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” printable guide: before you begin, shown with the sample watermark
    Before you beginOne page before the first visit: what you will learn, what you will need, what is worth knowing, the common pitfalls and what success looks like on each route.
  • Page 6 of the “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” printable guide: pick a route, shown with the sample watermark
    Pick a routeThe end of the steps before session one, then the wheel route, the hand-building route and why most people end up borrowing from both.
  • Page 13 of the “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” printable guide: every visit starts at your shelf, shown with the sample watermark
    Every visit starts at your shelfFive steps that come before any session, from leather hard work to covering what you leave, then where class and open studio time each fit.
  • Page 19 of the “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” printable guide: the wheel route tracker, shown with the sample watermark
    The wheel route trackerAll ten wheel sessions with their tests, three dated boxes for each so repeating has somewhere to go, and a box to tick when you move on.
Flip through the free sampleTen pages, free, no email required.
Why this one belongs on paper

A plan that lives on your shelf

Most of this guide is used between visits and at the start of each one. Paper is where you will look.

  • Both routes, card by card

    Twenty session cards laid out to read before you leave the house: what to try, what to read, what to watch for, the test and when to repeat.

  • Trackers you write on

    Four tracker pages, two for each route: dates for every session, the numbers you measured, a log for each piece and a line for your notes.

  • The plan on one page

    How each visit runs, when to move on, where each session belongs and what to do before session one, on a single reference page.

  • It does not mind clay

    A page can sit on the table beside wet clay, and it never locks its screen while your hands are full.

How this one is built

Rebuilt for paper, not printed from a web page

Every guide in the series is set from scratch for print. Here is what that meant for this one.

  • Built on our own lessons

    Every session follows the lessons that teach it in depth, from throwing and centering to pinch pots, coils, slabs by hand and slab molds, so the plan says what those pages say.

  • The wheel route keeps the wheel lesson’s limits

    Light lumps of one clay, cylinders only, and the trimming and handles that wait until centering is dependable, exactly as our wheel lesson tells beginners.

  • Studio rules checked

    The shelf routine, the certifications and which sessions need a class were read against the studio’s own welcome booklet and our open studio page.

  • Written for a reader in any studio

    The lines about our own studio are named as ours, so the plan makes sense to a potter starting out anywhere.

  • Video notes that claim no more than the videos

    Each video note was written from the video’s own title, chapters and description, so it promises only what the video says it covers.

  • Codes that keep working

    Every link is a short Clay Hole address. If a page moves, we point the address at its new home and your printed copy still goes to the right place.

Why the University is free

The lesson is free. It always will be.

All of the teaching in this guide comes from the free “Your First Ten Pottery Sessions” lesson, and that lesson is not going anywhere. The two route trackers are free on the lesson too.

The wheel took me weeks to figure out, and the best year I ever had making pottery was the year I was worst at it.

Move on only when its test is true, and repeat any session as often as it takes. That is the plan working, not you falling behind.

Dan Pearce, founder of The Clay Hole
The series

Build a little pottery library

Every printable guide in The Clay Hole University series takes one free lesson and rebuilds it for paper, with workbook pages, a glossary and a quiz with a worked answer key. Each one keeps its number for good, so a guide you buy today is the same guide in the same place next year.

Put any five printable guides in your cart and the cheapest one is on us. Put in nine and the two cheapest are on us. It happens automatically at checkout, no code to remember.

See every printable guide

  • 5guides in your cart1 on us
  • 9guides in your cart2 on us
Sits next to

Three lessons that pick up where the plan leaves off

Each one is free to read online, and the codes in the guide take you straight there.

Questions

Good to know

How is this different from the free lesson?
The teaching is the same, and the free lesson is not going anywhere. The guide is that teaching rebuilt for paper: a learning dashboard at the front, every session card laid out to read before a visit, both route trackers, a one page reference, a glossary and a quiz with an answer key that explains every answer.
Are the trackers the same as the free ones?
Yes, page for page. The lesson gives both trackers away free, and the guide prints them inside so the whole plan is in one place. Print a fresh copy of either whenever a page fills up.
Do I need to be a member of The Clay Hole to use it?
No. The routes work in any studio that lets you practice. The lines about our own studio, like which sessions suit a class and how our shelves work, are named as ours.
Is this too early for me?
It is written for your very first visits. If you have done pottery before, start at the first session whose test you cannot already pass.
Wheel or hand building?
Both routes are in it, kept separate, so pick one as home and borrow sessions from the other whenever you like. Most members of our own studio switch between the two.
Do I need a fancy printer?
No. It is set for an ordinary home or office printer on regular US Letter paper, with nothing important near the edges, so normal printer margins cut nothing off.
Does it print in black and white?
Yes. The text and the tables are black on white, so they print clearly in grey. Color is used for headings, small labels and the session numbers.
Can I print just part of it?
Yes, and most people do. The tracker pages for your route and the one page reference are the ones worth keeping on your shelf. They are numbered pages like any other, so you can print those and keep the rest on a screen.
How does delivery work?
It is a digital download. The link arrives by email and on the order confirmation page right after checkout, so you can have it printed before your next visit.
What happens if the guide is updated?
Every edition carries its version number on the last page. When we correct or improve one, the new edition replaces the old one in the shop, and we can send the updated link to anybody who already bought it.
Can I share it?
It is licensed for your own use. Print as many copies for yourself as you like, on as many of your own devices as you like. Please do not pass the file on, upload it or use it with a class or a group without asking us first.

Pick a route. Bring the next session.

Ten sessions on the wheel or ten at the tables, a test at the end of every one, and permission to repeat any of them. The guide keeps the plan in front of you and the trackers on your shelf.

Get the guide · $10.00

The Clay Hole University Printable Guide Terms

Licensing, safety, digital delivery, and refund terms

Your copy is yours. The guide is not.

Your purchase gives one individual purchaser a limited, non-exclusive, non-transferable license for personal use only. You may download the guide to your own devices, print copies for your own use, write all over them, spill clay water on them, replace a coffee-damaged copy, and generally use the heck out of what you bought.

What you may not do is distribute the guide to anyone else, whether you charge for it or not.

That means you may not share, forward, email, upload, post, publish, copy, reproduce, resell, sublicense, redistribute, or otherwise provide the guide, or any substantial portion of it, to another person. You may not place it in a shared drive, group chat, membership library, online community, file-sharing service, studio resource folder, classroom packet, employee handbook, course, workshop, or other shared collection. You may not make copies for students, members, employees, friends, classes, studios, schools, groups, or organizations.

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If you would like to use one of our guides with a class, studio, school, team, or other group, contact The Clay Hole about permission or group licensing. Please do not make twenty copies and call it manifesting.

Pottery is wonderfully unpredictable. It also carries real risk.

We work hard to make The Clay Hole University accurate, useful, practical, and ridiculously thorough. But pottery is a hands-on craft involving countless variables that no written guide can completely control or anticipate.

Depending on what you are doing, ceramics may involve extreme heat, kilns, electricity, gas, flame, sharp tools, spinning machinery, heavy equipment, pressurized equipment, silica-containing dust, fumes, chemicals, raw materials, stains, oxides, glazes, combustible materials, hot surfaces, breakable objects, and other hazards capable of causing serious injury, illness, property damage, fire, or worse.

These guides are provided for general educational and informational purposes. They are not a substitute for hands-on training, competent supervision, your studio’s safety procedures, applicable laws or codes, Safety Data Sheets, or the instructions and warnings supplied by the manufacturers of your clay, glaze, chemicals, tools, kilns, equipment, protective gear, or other materials.

Studios, kilns, clay bodies, glazes, firing schedules, electrical systems, ventilation systems, equipment, environmental conditions, application thicknesses, material formulations, and individual techniques vary enormously. Something that works beautifully in one situation may fail spectacularly in another. That is part of pottery. Occasionally, it is a very expensive part of pottery.

You are responsible for determining whether any technique, material, combination, firing schedule, tool, or process described in a guide is appropriate and safe for your specific circumstances before using it.

Use appropriate protective equipment. Use adequate ventilation and dust control. Read manufacturer instructions and Safety Data Sheets. Follow your studio’s rules. Obtain qualified instruction when a process or piece of equipment requires it. Test materials and techniques before committing important work to them. If you do not understand how to perform something safely, do not proceed until you do.

Never assume that a ceramic surface, glaze, clay body, firing method, finished vessel, repair, decoration, or other result is food-safe, microwave-safe, dishwasher-safe, oven-safe, structurally sound, chemically stable, or suitable for any particular purpose solely because it appears in or is discussed in one of our guides. Verify suitability independently when it matters.

Ceramics also refuses to sign contracts promising beautiful results. Colors change. Glazes move. Kilns have opinions. Pots crack. Materials interact unexpectedly. Manufacturers reformulate products. Equipment behaves differently. The Clay Hole does not guarantee any particular aesthetic, functional, firing, glazing, structural, or other result.

By choosing to use the information in a guide, you accept responsibility for your own materials, equipment, workspace, safety decisions, testing, methods, and results. To the fullest extent permitted by applicable law, The Clay Hole and its owners, employees, contributors, and affiliates are not responsible for injury, illness, property damage, lost work, failed projects, kiln or equipment damage, financial loss, or other loss arising from or related to your use of, or reliance upon, the guide.

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Terms version 2026-09-19b