Phycology Vs. Art 2007

Alison Cole
2263879
Dec 3, 2007

    I chose to do a study and an art piece on how childrens drawings develop as they grow.  One misconception I had was, the children believe their work to look realistic.  I
learned in my research that children are simply incapable of controlling the drawing tools and producing a picture, and it can be frustrating for them.  I also was intrigued to discover
that children love to scribble and do not think their picture is anything and at a young age only when probed by an adult will they try to impose some kind of meaning on it.
    At around the age of one a child will begin to scribble.  The child simply enjoys using his hands across the paper and is completely indifferent to the final esthetic results.
By around the age of two a child is still holding a crayon in his fist and making clumsy uncertain marks.  At the age of three a child will learn how to make designs such as
swirls, zigzags and lines.  It is at this age that a child will first take pride in the visual result of their work.  He will begin to examine random scribble and try to see meaning
or forms in them.  This is called reading off.  Left on their own a scribble is just a scribble but when questioned by a curious adult the child will tell stories where the scribbles
represent objects.  If drawing themselves, they would point to the top of a scribble as a head the middle as a belly and the bottom as legs.  This is called Spontaneous verbal
designation.   At around the age of four the child will make their first circle.  Within the circle is the absence of scribbles.  Some children learn to draw single line instead.  A big circle, line,
or irregular shaped outline represents an entire person, including both head and body.  A smaller circle inside stands for eyes, nose, mouth or bellybutton.  It is at the age of four when if asked
later a child will be able to tell you if a precious drawing was done by him or another child.  They are also able to remember what it was of.  This drawing is different from reading off because the
shapes are now intentional.


Works cited

Golomb, Claire.  Young Children's Sculpture and Drawing.  Harvard University
Press, Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1974

Eng, Helga. The Phychology of child and youth drawing.  Routledge & Kegan Paul
Ltd 1957.

Coles, Robert.  Their Eyes Meeting the world.  Houghton Mifflin Compant 1992

Fineberg, Jonathan.  Discovering Child Art.  Princeton University Press 1998.