The Not-Very-Good Drawer

Some not very good drawing leads to a lot of very good fun!

ADDED February 04, 2010

At some point, kids become quite self-critical of their artwork. "That picture is no good," they say. "That doesn't look anything like a fireman." Or a baseball player. Or a dragon. Or ballerina. Or whatever.

Well, here at Today is Fun, we do appreciate people who strive for perfection. That's good and healthy. But -- as with everything else in life -- perfectionism is good . . . in moderation.

Today's activity is all about making artwork communicate with very little effort and with no perfectionism! It's fun to boot.

Today you'll be doing some drawing and your kids will be doing some guessing. So get some blank paper and some writing implements . . . and off we go.

Tell your kids that they have to guess what you're going to draw. And then draw a banana. Try to do it very, very quickly and very, very simply. Give yourself no more than five seconds to do it. And use as few lines as you can get away with. Here's a really fast banana I drew:

Show your banana drawing to your kids. Can they guess what it is?

Now, if your banana is too good, that's a problem. What fun is it for your children to look at a perfectly realistic banana and guess that it is a . . . banana? How would that get their minds going at all?

Only by doing a not very good job -- only by being a not very good drawer -- does this activity work.

Try drawing some more simple things for your young guessers: a tree, a house, a dog, and so on. Remember to do it very quickly and use very few lines. Are your kids interested yet? Are you guys having fun yet?

Next move onto more "difficult" concepts. Try quickly sketching: a beach, a crying person, a map of the state where you live, a portrait of someone in your family.

My kids love this activity -- I hope yours do, too. And I hope that you're a really good, not-very-good drawer!