A CHILDS DRAWING ANALYSIS 1

A Childs Drawing Analysis

Anna Curran
University of Missouri





























A CHILDS DRAWING ANALYSIS 2
A Childs Drawing Analysis

Just by looking at a childs artwork, you can tell many things about where they are in
development. Development follows a pattern and as children begin to evolve and mature
these patterns change. They can change by the way they think, the way they interact with
others, and how they handle emotions. Schools are starting to push fine arts out of the
curriculum and focus more on mathematics and reading. Although math and reading are
very important, creativity and artistic ability play an equally important role in the process
of development. Since technology is making huge advances in this day and age, right-brain
thinking is becoming more valuable than left-brain thinking. This is because left-brain
thinking is more logical and with these advances in technology, will soon be able to be done
by a computer (Pink, 2006). During the early years of their lives, children are developing
cognitively, socially, emotionally and physically. Along with these types of development,
children are also developing artistically. The stages for this type of development are called
the Lowenfeldian stages. This consists of the scribbling stage (two to four years old), the
preschematic stage (four to seven years old), the schematic stage (seven to nine years old),
the gang age (9 or 12 years old), the pseudo-naturalistic stage (12 or 14 years old), and
adolescent art (12 or 17 years old).
Describe and Analyze
The artwork that I chose to write about is an uncolored, self-portrait of a young boy.
As you can see in Figure 1, the boy has short hair and the face includes eyes, eyebrows, a
nose, and a mouth. The boy is shown facing forward with his arms to his side. The artist
only pictures the boy from his waist up. I also noticed the drawing is cut off at the wrists. I
came to the conclusion that the hands are missing because the artist did not know how to
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draw hands. Many times children will leave the hands out of their drawing because they do
not like the way they look. Based on Lowenfeld and Brittains (1970) chart, I decided that
the artist of this picture was seven to nine years old and in the schematic stage of
development. This is when the child reaches the achievement of a form concept and is
drawing bold, direct, and flat representations (Lowenfeld & Brittain, 1970, p.476).












Figure 1. Example drawing in the Schematic Stage
What I first noticed about this drawing is how the child drew the neck as a rectangle.
One of the characteristics for the Schematic Stage is that drawings are made up of mostly
geometric shapes. With this, you can also see that the child has the ability to add detail to
the shirt. He adds the textured collar to the self-portrait, which shows advanced
development for his age. The arms in the picture are correctly placed and show volume,
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which is a characteristic of human drawings in this stage. I could also tell he was in this
stage because of the facial features. Although he does include most of the facial features
(missing ears), they are not proportional to the size of the face and the placement of the
eyes and eyebrows are off. I also noticed that he did not use a lot of detail for the mouth. He
used multiple curved lines to create what is supposed to be his mouth (Kellogg, 1970).
Along with that, his hair does not flow. He draws it flat and it extends down to cover where
his ears should be. According to Kelloggs basic scribbles chart, the artist is using multiple
curved and diagonal lines (Kellogg, 1970). This stage of development also says that
proportions depend on emotional values (Lownfeld &Britain, 1970). The artist of the
drawing made the mouth and arms larger compared to the rest of the body. This shows
that he places more value on these body parts over other body parts.
Like Erikson and Young said, art skills vary just as much as reading and math skills
(Erikson and Young, 1996). They develop along side with cognitive, emotional, social and
physical growth in very predictable ways. As children grow, they gain more math and
reading skills. This is the same with art skills. As a child matures, they begin to pay more
attention to details and this shows in their artwork. Paying more attention to details means
that they are looking at the world in a whole new way. If you take a closer look at a childs
artwork, you can see how they make sense of the world. Are they drawing specific details?
Are they drawing a whole scene or just one object? Just by looking at a childs drawing, you
can see what stage of development they are in.
Conclusion

Being able to look at the artwork of a child and know where they are in
development is a very important skill teachers should have. If teachers are able to pick out
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where a child is in artistic development, they can use the appropriate lessons to ensure that
their students continue to progress. It is important that children are given the opportunity
to expand their artistic and creative knowledge. L-Directed Thinking remains
indispensable. Its just no longer sufficient. In the Conceptual Age, what we need instead is
a whole new mind (Pink, 2006, p.51). Since technology is growing rapidly, the need for
left-brain thinking is decreasing, and the need for right-brain thinking is slowly starting to
increase. Left-brain thinking is more logical and sooner or later a computer will be able to
take over left-brain jobs. Therefore, jobs that require right brain thinking, which is more
emotional and creative, will start to rise. It is important that schools emphasize creativity
because it is what they will need in the future. Teachers knowing how to incorporate
creativity in the classroom will benefit students greatly. By having children exercise art in
the classroom, it allows them to use the right side of their brain and be better prepared for
the changes that are beginning to occur.










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References
Erickson, M., & Young, B. (1996). What Every Educator (but maybe doesnt) know.
School Arts, 96(2), 40-42.
Kellogg, R. (1970). Analyzing Childrens Art. Palo Alto, CA: National.
Lowenfeld, V., & Brittain, W.L. (1970). Creative and Mental Growth. New York: Macmillan.
Pink, D.H. (2006). A Whole New Mind: Why Right-Brainers Will Rule the Future. New York,
NY: Riverhead Books