Art 2: Teach them how to draw so they don’t forget!

I was struck by Gibson and Ewing's (2011, p. 129) anecdote about Howard Ikemoto, about his child’s surprise that his father taught people to draw, “you mean they forget?” I am thankful for my creative and supportive upbringing and continued value and engagement with the arts beyond the classroom and the school years. The creative side of my brain has not gone to sleep, and I was amazed at my ability to sketch the portrait of Chris without too many reservations of ‘getting it wrong’. I was shocked that many people said they had not drawn since school, whereas it is sometimes my outlet for the frustrations of daily life!! I hope that I can instill this value of art into my classroom, but I have my reservations given the crowded curriculum. I was impressed at our tutor’s ability to seamlessly integrate other KLAs into her explanation of how to draw a face, using maths, interactive explanations like demonstrating proportions, shapes and so on. Although I did art through to Year 12, I don’t once remember being explicitly taught how to draw using simple conventions like proportions of the face. Doing so would have actually encouraged myself and others to continue to draw.

Follow the conventions of face drawings and you'll achieve surprising results!

Familiarity with vocabulary of art is important, but rather than needing to be explicitly taught, I think it would be sufficient to model it, in the hope that students subconsciously start using the language themselves, such as value, texture and repetition.

A final interesting thing we learnt in the lecture was Wilson's Graphic Principles for decoding children’s drawings. I recognise a lot of these features in my own early drawings, and even now. Perhaps our lack of confidence in our drawing capabilities means we revert back to simple representations – the simplicity principle. I don’t know if you can be judged for drawing a ‘bad stick figure'!

Wilson's Graphic Principles

As homework, we completed a name montage, where each letter of our name consists of a different material and reflects an interest we hold. This would be a good introductory art activity with a new class, to scope their abilities in art and get to know the students (Standard 1: Know your students) (AITSL, 2012).

Name montage

References

Australian Institute for Teaching and School Leadership. (2012). Australian Professional Standards for

 Teachers. AITSL. http://www.teacherstandards.aitsl.edu.au/Standards/AllStandards

Gibson, R. & Ewing, R. (2011). Transforming the curriculum through the arts. Camberwell: Palgrave,

 Macmillan.