Art Assessment

When my younger son Ryan received a book, "I Love To Draw" from his grandmother for his birthday, I personally thought it was an excellent way to practice their art skills.

Every other night, I have encouraged both boys to use their art skills on a white board in the garage. This was a purpose of using a picture for their homework assignments or writing assessment test. Dylan often has a homework packet with drawing. He is able to use more details in his drawing. Ryan was on the other hand. He often uses during the class time. I have seen their art works when they bring home on Fridays.

Ryan was the ones who needed the most to practice his art in order to keep his age level up. After I had done the research, I see that he is at the age appropriate level, "Pre-Schematic" stage. It means that the kids at his age (4-7) usually may draw a human figure with a circle and two dangling lines for legs. Sometimes they include a rectangular shape for trunks of bodies, and often little marks inside the circle to represent facial features. But this excellent book I got it from my mother was the BEST! He was able to represent a spider, and caterpillar clearly. He tried his best on making a butterfly. His "Bugs" pictures interpreted that he loves to look for insects which matches his personality.Not only working with Ryan in art, I even included Dylan. I sometimes gave him the ideas on adding pictures or coloring the pictures. Dylan, who is at Schematic stage, is the son that would rather to write a book more than just drawing a picture. Who knows he would become an author like my cousin, Cheryl? But my cousin also includes her pictures in her "The Commuters" book. But, I found his picture interesting because he always asked for sweet. I often told him to wait until after dinner, or have any sweet once in a while, too.

I just was amazed that even drawing a picture from " I Love to Draw" does reveal a lot about the person's personality. Frankly, I would love to see them drawing more pictures before they reach up to age 9-10 where the art therapy says that they often lose their interests in Art. While I have an open window to work with them in art, I would love to collect more art books from the author, Jennifer Lipsey Edwards.