Drawing

Drawing is often underestimated. The benefits extend far beyond fine motor development. Drawing can help children think, observe, communicate, plan, socialise, and understand their world.

Drawing relates to engineering, science and nature, as much as visual arts. Mark making and scribbling is emergent handwriting.

Drawing has no age limits. Babies who are just old enough to grasp a crayon can draw. Children can also use their fingers to draw lines in sand or across a misted window.

EYLF learning outcomes

The Early Years Learning Framework encourages children to use materials (4.4) and a range of media (5.3).

Children can use drawing to:

understand how symbols and pattern systems work (5.4)
be imaginative and creative (4.1)
experiment, hypothesise, research, investigate and solve problems (4.2).

Drawing materials

What tools can children draw with?

Ballpoint pens, chalk, charcoal, coloured pencils, crayons, felt-tip pens, graphite, highlighter pens, lead pencils, oil pastels, permanent markers, and watercolour pencils.

What can children draw on?

Acetate, brown paper, canvas, cardboard boxes, chalkboards, corrugated cardboard, coloured paper, fabric, handmade paper, magazines, painted paper, plastic wrap, printed paper, timber, tissue paper, transparent paper, whiteboards.

Draw big and small

Vary the size and shape of your paper:

Cut out tiny squares of paper the size of postage stamps.
Unravel a roll of paper until it is the size of your room.
Cut paper into long, thin strips that look like ribbons.
Cut paper into shapes like stars and hearts.

Try scratching

Children can also draw by scratching:

Use fingers, toes or pointed tools to scratch marks in sand, dirt, flour or mud.
Scratch drawings into a cardboard box.
Paint a piece of paper. Scratch a drawing into the paint before it dries.

Learning experiences

Draw a self-portrait

Place a mirror in your drawing area. Encourage children to look at their own faces while drawing self-portraits.
Show children how they can draw their self-portraits using one continuous line, without lifting the pen from the page.
Assist children in wearing blindfolds while drawing self-portraits.
Print a photo of a child's face and cut it vertically in half. Glue one half of their face onto a piece of white paper. Encourage the child to draw the other side of their face.

Pose for friends

Teach children how to pose in creative ways while another child draws their portrait:

Posing can be difficult because it requires children to remain still for a period of time. Challenge children to balance on one leg.
Add movement into children's poses. Ask them to perform star jumps or bounce on an exercise ball. Can you draw movement?
Teach children about perspective. Ask the posing child to stand on a table while the artist draws sitting on the floor. How does this change the drawing?
Suggest that children dress up in their favourite costumes before posing for their portraits. What colours should the artist use to draw the costume?

Make marks

Mark making refers to the lines, shapes, textures, tones and patterns that young children make when they are learning to draw. Before children can write, they need to experiment and play with marks. Even experienced artists practice their mark making skills.

Provide children with opportunities to make marks every day - at the drawing table and with fingers in the sand pit.
Talk to children about the marks they make: "look at those beautiful swirls!"
Sit alongside children and make marks with them. Try drawing the texture of the table or the fabric of someone's dress. Let children copy you; they will learn a new skill.
Draw a simple line or symbol and ask a child to copy it. Praise them for their effort even if the result isn't accurate. Copy their mark making too.
Demonstrate how to make darker marks by pressing harder with your pen or pencil.
Demonstrate how to make solid marks, like scribbling lines close together. Also show children how to draw fine, clean lines that are separated from each other.

Draw to observe

Drawing complements project work. Children can expand their knowledge of a subject by drawing it. Place objects (e.g. shells, bones, fruit) in the centre of a drawing table as a provocation. Take sketchbooks outside to draw trees, clouds or crawling ants.

Draw the senses

Listen to music and draw what you hear. How do you draw fast and slow music?
Draw with a finger on someone else's back. Can they guess what it is?
Draw dark scribbles that look like the dark sky. Now draw bright sunlight.
Use your pencil to poke holes in the paper you're drawing on. Run your fingers over the bumps to feel the texture.

Draw a plan

Drawing is an excellent way of visualising and testing something you want to happen. Ask children to draw a plan of:

a special event they are organising (e.g. a parent's afternoon tea)
a sculpture they want to make
something they want to build with wooden blocks
what they will play with their friends.

Learning environments

Draw in new places

Place paper on clipboards and go for a nature walk. Draw what you see.
Tape paper underneath a table. Children will need to crawl underneath to draw.
Tape paper on the floor. Children can draw while sitting on the ground.
Add paper and pens to different learning areas, like your home corner or block corner.

Restrict colour

Remove coloured pencils and pens for a week so children can only draw using shades of black, white and grey. Observe how children's drawings change over this week. Show children how to draw using white pencils on black paper.