student drawing analysis
According to What Every Educator Should (But Maybe Doesn’t) Know, written by Mary Erickson and Bernard Young, “Children’s abilities to create drawings and to understand art develop in a parallel fashion to changes in their cognitive, emotional, social, and physical growth” (Erickson and Young, 1996, p. 41). Erickson and Young go on to explain the predictable stages that children progress through in their artwork. These include the Preschematic, Schematic, Gang Age, and Pseudo-Naturalistic stages. In each stage, there are important drawing characteristics, space representations, and human figure representations that help place artwork within the different stages. While drawing within the stages can vary greatly, it is important to look at art development in similar ways we look at mathematic and literature development. Like all stages of development, in Making Theories of Children’s Artistic Development Meaningful for Preservice Teachers, Mick Luehrman and Kathy Unrath say, “To keep the proper perspective when applying stage theories it is important to remember that stages of development are only generalizations meant to be descriptive of tendencies among large groups of children” (Luehrman and Unrath, 2006, p. 8). While some children might excel and demonstrate natural ability, most individuals get from elementary school to college with math skills beyond elementary level because they have had systematic instruction from kindergarten through high school. It is also important that school decision makers know the importance and significance in student development that comes from systematic art education.
It has been long recognized that art enhances education, but by looking solely at a piece of artwork done by a child, one is able to analyze it and establish a stage of development similar to the analyzing and interpreting of other subjects such as math, reading, and writing. Looking at a well-drawn picture of a Ninja Turtle (image attached below) is more than just looking at a picture drawn by a child. By studying it closely, one can identify the Lowenfeldian stage of artistic drawing the child is working in. The child’s drawing of the Ninja Turtle illustrates his or her working in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage. This stage lasts from twelve to fourteen years old and is referred to as “The Age of Reasoning.” According to W.L. Brittain and V. Lowenfeld in Creative and Mental Growth, in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage, the artist’s drawing characteristics include knowledge of artistic shortcomings, ability to focus on specifics, art is no longer spontaneous, details become important to artist, and art becomes personal and non-literal. Space representation in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage has a stronger awareness of the environment with important aspects detailed in art, depth and perspective are beginning to be portrayed in artwork, children participate in their art, and action is portrayed within the picture. Finally the human figure representation in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage develops better proportionality, more awareness of body joints and movements, meaning is portrayed in facial expressions, cartooning is common, representations can be depicted with less than the total figure, and there is a strong emphasis on sexual characteristics (Brittain and Lowenfeld, 1970). Looking at this Ninja Turtle, a wide range of these developments stand out. The most obvious are the muscle lines, which fall into the drawing characteristics of details such as wrinkles and folds as well as the turtle’s facial expression and the overall cartooning, which are both aspects of human figure representation. Other less distinct developments include the drawing’s proportions and the action that is assumed from the turtle’s stance and facial expression. This drawing is also not spontaneous anymore. A child would have to be aware of Ninja Turtles to draw one and, with this much detail and accuracy, it is clear that a lot of thought went into this drawing.
According to What Education Can Learn From the Arts, written by Elliot Eisner, “Imagination is the source of new possibilities. In the arts, imagination is a primary virtue. So it should be in the teaching of mathematics, in all of the sciences, in history, and indeed, in virtually all that humans create” (Eisner, 2009, p. 9). General education has so much to learn from the arts in regards to children’s cognitive development. According to Eisner, art is an important form of expression and communication; it shows that language limits do not necessarily determine limits of cognition (Eisner, 2009). Artistic development carries just as much weight into the minds of learners as any other course, but instead of focusing on the answer, art focuses on the process and the individual creativity that every child has to go about finding those answers in his or her own way. From a stage perspective, the artistic stages of development mirror the stages of reading and writing. When students begin writing, it is all lines and squiggles at first, but slowly, those lines and squiggles start to look more and more like letters, which turn to words, which become sentences, and so on. Artistic development goes from scribbles, to attempts at representation, to more solid forms, to realistic drawing, to precise depictions. Much can be learned from understanding children’s art development. According to Mick Luehrman and Kathy Unrath in Making Theories of Children’s Artistic Development Meaningful for Preservice Teachers, there are four main areas that summarize what teachers discover from watching children draw. These include the impact of watching children draw, speak, and behave in conjunction with the theories of development from readings; differences that result from varying development and social and cultural influences; the importance of understanding how development relates to the “big picture” and how to plan curriculum to meet the developmental needs of the population; and understanding how teaching relates and develops from watching children work independently (Luehrman and Unrath, 2006). To forget or ignore students’ artistic development, teachers would be sacrificing valuable information about their students’ development. Art is more than creativity, it is a powerful form of communication and expression that children are often able to use before language becomes the prominent form of communication. Watching children draw and understanding how to analyze and interpret those drawings helps a teacher gauge where the students are developmentally, which in turn will enhance teaching to meet those developmental needs of students.
References
Brittain, W.L. & Lowenfeld, V. (1970). Creative and Mental Growth. New York, NY. MacMillan Co. pgs. 474-479.
Eisner, E. What education can learn from the arts {Lowenfeld Lecture, 2008 NAEA National Convention New Orleans, Louisiana}. Art Education, 62
(2), 6-9.
Erikson, M. & Young, B. (1996). What every educator should (but maybe doesn’t) know. School Arts, 40-42.
Luehrman, M. & Unrath, K. (2006). Making theories of children’s artistic development meaningful for pre-service teachers. Art Education, 6-12.
It has been long recognized that art enhances education, but by looking solely at a piece of artwork done by a child, one is able to analyze it and establish a stage of development similar to the analyzing and interpreting of other subjects such as math, reading, and writing. Looking at a well-drawn picture of a Ninja Turtle (image attached below) is more than just looking at a picture drawn by a child. By studying it closely, one can identify the Lowenfeldian stage of artistic drawing the child is working in. The child’s drawing of the Ninja Turtle illustrates his or her working in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage. This stage lasts from twelve to fourteen years old and is referred to as “The Age of Reasoning.” According to W.L. Brittain and V. Lowenfeld in Creative and Mental Growth, in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage, the artist’s drawing characteristics include knowledge of artistic shortcomings, ability to focus on specifics, art is no longer spontaneous, details become important to artist, and art becomes personal and non-literal. Space representation in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage has a stronger awareness of the environment with important aspects detailed in art, depth and perspective are beginning to be portrayed in artwork, children participate in their art, and action is portrayed within the picture. Finally the human figure representation in the Pseudo-Naturalistic stage develops better proportionality, more awareness of body joints and movements, meaning is portrayed in facial expressions, cartooning is common, representations can be depicted with less than the total figure, and there is a strong emphasis on sexual characteristics (Brittain and Lowenfeld, 1970). Looking at this Ninja Turtle, a wide range of these developments stand out. The most obvious are the muscle lines, which fall into the drawing characteristics of details such as wrinkles and folds as well as the turtle’s facial expression and the overall cartooning, which are both aspects of human figure representation. Other less distinct developments include the drawing’s proportions and the action that is assumed from the turtle’s stance and facial expression. This drawing is also not spontaneous anymore. A child would have to be aware of Ninja Turtles to draw one and, with this much detail and accuracy, it is clear that a lot of thought went into this drawing.
According to What Education Can Learn From the Arts, written by Elliot Eisner, “Imagination is the source of new possibilities. In the arts, imagination is a primary virtue. So it should be in the teaching of mathematics, in all of the sciences, in history, and indeed, in virtually all that humans create” (Eisner, 2009, p. 9). General education has so much to learn from the arts in regards to children’s cognitive development. According to Eisner, art is an important form of expression and communication; it shows that language limits do not necessarily determine limits of cognition (Eisner, 2009). Artistic development carries just as much weight into the minds of learners as any other course, but instead of focusing on the answer, art focuses on the process and the individual creativity that every child has to go about finding those answers in his or her own way. From a stage perspective, the artistic stages of development mirror the stages of reading and writing. When students begin writing, it is all lines and squiggles at first, but slowly, those lines and squiggles start to look more and more like letters, which turn to words, which become sentences, and so on. Artistic development goes from scribbles, to attempts at representation, to more solid forms, to realistic drawing, to precise depictions. Much can be learned from understanding children’s art development. According to Mick Luehrman and Kathy Unrath in Making Theories of Children’s Artistic Development Meaningful for Preservice Teachers, there are four main areas that summarize what teachers discover from watching children draw. These include the impact of watching children draw, speak, and behave in conjunction with the theories of development from readings; differences that result from varying development and social and cultural influences; the importance of understanding how development relates to the “big picture” and how to plan curriculum to meet the developmental needs of the population; and understanding how teaching relates and develops from watching children work independently (Luehrman and Unrath, 2006). To forget or ignore students’ artistic development, teachers would be sacrificing valuable information about their students’ development. Art is more than creativity, it is a powerful form of communication and expression that children are often able to use before language becomes the prominent form of communication. Watching children draw and understanding how to analyze and interpret those drawings helps a teacher gauge where the students are developmentally, which in turn will enhance teaching to meet those developmental needs of students.
References
Brittain, W.L. & Lowenfeld, V. (1970). Creative and Mental Growth. New York, NY. MacMillan Co. pgs. 474-479.
Eisner, E. What education can learn from the arts {Lowenfeld Lecture, 2008 NAEA National Convention New Orleans, Louisiana}. Art Education, 62
(2), 6-9.
Erikson, M. & Young, B. (1996). What every educator should (but maybe doesn’t) know. School Arts, 40-42.
Luehrman, M. & Unrath, K. (2006). Making theories of children’s artistic development meaningful for pre-service teachers. Art Education, 6-12.