Somewhat of a failure..

So this is entry 2, and if im typing weird, sorry but im falling asleep. I just had to get this down while it was fresh in my head. Today I fired up my kiln for the first time! i had all the pieces i had made in the kiln, completely dried. I lit the torch Im using (which looks a lot like a flamethrower hooked up to a propane tank) and when i inserted it into the kiln, i noticed it sounded like things were exploding, just very small and rapid. I turned it off and looked inside, and the pieces looked like the flames were licking away layers in the clay! I asked my ceramics teacher, Mrs. Groff, why this happened and the best we could figure is that it was because the massive amount of heat being generated by the torch was destroying the clay, just from it getting so hot so fast. This is only because it was the first firing, or bisque firing. The bisque firing turns the clay from what is roughly a pile of dried mud to something much harder, almosta rock. After the bisque, you apply a glaze or stain to color the surface of the clay. The second firing, which is usually hotter than the first, matures the glaze turning it to a glass coating. So Mrs. Groff and i figured that i could either pre-heat the clay pieces in a bonfire, or something hot like that, or just have the torch on a very low heat. I did another firing as well today, the second firing, on a teapot that i got from school, which had no glaze applied to it. I used the raku process, which includes heating the piece, taking it out at the maturing temperature of the glaze, and quickly putting it in a barrel of shredded paper that then catches fire. You then close the lid on the barrel, and the fire sucks all the oxygen out of the clay, turning it black. After that, you take the piece out and dip it in water, to further and lock in the reduction process. The teapot turned out quite nicely, and i will be putting pictures up as soon as i figured out how. The pieces that were destroyed are already being rebuilt as well!