The Importance Of Drawing For Children

Drawing is one of a child’s favourite activities, but it has so much more value for them than just making pretty pictures. Drawing helps children develop in so many different ways. Through drawing children learn and practice many foundational skills needed at school. It is a wonderful way for children to make sense of the world around them and boosts confidence and emotional intelligence. Here are just a few of the skills that are developed through drawing.

Fine Motor and Visual Skills
Drawing from a young age helps strengthen and fine-tune your child’s fine motor skills. Drawing helps develop hand eye co-ordination. When planning out their pictures children also learn about spatial awareness, size, distance as well as depth perception.

Problem Solving
When drawing, your child is able to express themselves creatively. It provides them the opportunity to ask and solve many questions such as which colour to use or where to place an object. They are also able to develop their picture through the creative process and can change and improve it as they go. Through making mistakes, they learn how to do things differently or how to include their mistake by changing it into something else to enhance their picture. Drawing also develops concentration and helps children to focus on working towards achieving a goal.

Imagination
Drawing helps your child awaken their creativity and imagination. It gives them the opportunity to express their  creative thoughts on paper. It is also an important way of expressing and processing their feelings and emotions.

Confidence
As a parent you will have experienced the joy a child has sharing their finished pictures or artwork with others. Through drawing children make pictures that represent their thoughts, imagination and experiences which give them an immense sense of achievement. Children’s pictures are also a record of events that have happened. As they share these experiences with their loved ones, it is also an opportunity for them to bond and develop vocabulary and language skills. As their communication skills progress, it gives children more freedom and confidence during social interaction with others. Drawing also develops important pre-writing and pre-reading skills that translates to greater confidence when learning new skills at school.

As a parent it is important to encourage drawing. Here are some fun ideas to try at home:

• Draw with chalk on paving
• Think of a topic to draw about like a recent birthday party
• Ask your child to draw a picture, but include an object with a specific colour or letter sound
• Draw on black paper using pastels or chalk
• Read your child a story and ask them to draw their favourite part or a new ending to the story
• Draw a background to play with other toys on afterwards, like a home for Lego people, a farm for plastic animals or a town for cars (this is good for visual perspectives and spatial awareness)
• Draw on different surfaces like a chalk board or on the floor
• Trace around your child’s body and allow them to draw in the details of their faces, body parts and clothing

Most children draw something new every day and it is often the most precious gift they have to offer their loved ones. Wishing you many happy memories of drawing fun with your child at home.

Bronwen Nuthall
Reception Year Teacher