2/19/2026 - Week 6 / Meeting 12: Art / Drawing

 

 


 I

Unit: Art

Theme: Drawing

 

Introduction

Drawing happens when one makes a picture or diagram with a pencil, pen, or crayon rather than paint. For instance, "a series of charcoal drawings on white paper" are considered drawing. Modes of drawings can be broken down into three different types: realistic, symbolic, and expressive.

II

Learning Objectives

  •  Understand why children face difficulties when drawing
  • Explain Edward's theory about left brain-right brain
  • Gain an awareness of the complexity of the brain 
  • Experience the importance of drawing for children


III


WARM UP

Mindfulness

 

IV

Creative Storming

 

1


 

 https://youtu.be/w46bWxS9IjY


Question 1

What do you think is the message in this video?

Why don't we say, I ..... with all my brain?

 

2 

Creative Storming

Students simulate the creation of a shaped object and pass it to the next student. Each student changes the object using hand gestures.

 

Question 2

Write a reflection about the activity and explain how you think it could help your students. 

 

3 

Video

Alessandro D'Avenia - L'adolescenza non è una malattia

https://youtu.be/uW_Osb9QJwI?si=iLq5Lkxhh2-DytFB

 

Summary 

Interesting article by Alessandro D'Avenia on adolescence:
 "Adolescence is not an illness," in the Corriere della Sera.

Here's a quick summary, mostly based on quotes.

Three stages of adolescent development:

Preschool age (up to six years) 
Very rapid physical expansion
Maximum exploration
Wide-ranging curiosity
School age
Brain expansion slows to select the connections that opened in the previous stage
The child learns to concentrate and becomes more skilled
He wants to organize the world in his own way, for example, collecting objects or
Knowing everything about dinosaurs and planets
Puberty 
Hormonal upheaval
The brain begins to reshape itself as it did in preschool age
Exploration of the world no longer occurs in a protected context
Parents and teachers must encourage a daring amateur to take the 
stage, to bring about the difficult but fundamental abandonment of 
the nest
The adolescent becomes a child again, but now to stop being one
Having stabilized the neural structures for survival, now he prepares... to live
Two systems guide adolescent development, one more emotional, 
the other more reflective:

Emotional part
The adolescent seeks immediate reward (pleasure), driven by the
neural reward centers that are highly active at this stage.
Therefore, first loves, first books, first trips, first losses are powerful
experiences that remain etched in the memory.
The reward is confirmation of their uniqueness in the world, found in
the approval of their peers.
It is a social reward: they don't get drunk because they like alcohol, 
but because someone is watching them drink.
It is a way to understand that their actions have real consequences.
Parents and teachers must reward adolescents with some compliments.

The neurotransmitter is dopamine, which appears when we receive
a like and makes us feel alive, but it is addictive. 
 
Reflective part 
The adolescent stabilizes. He begins to understand the difference 
between pleasure and happiness: instant gratification wears off 
quickly, while the one that comes from long-term projects is 
long-lasting. 
 
The neurotransmitter is serotonin, which brings fulfillment and 
happiness, relaxing and lasting feelings.
 Completing a challenging job, experiencing a faithful love or a strong 
friendship: this is how we are truly alive, because it is a stable internal
 state and not a fleeting emotion.
 
Therefore, children must be guided to seek long-term gratification, 
otherwise they will only indulge in the pleasure of immediate 
satisfaction (likes, video games).
Activities that require discipline and attention to repeated actions 
lead to self-control: fortitude, loyalty, reliability, sincerity, 
resourcefulness, generosity.
These include, for example, sports, emotional control through playing
a musical instrument, art and craft workshops, drama and reading 
groups; the entire field of volunteer work (from after-school programs for children in need to serving in a soup
 kitchen); and temporary jobs to earn a living.
 
Question 3 
Why is D'Avenia saying that "adolescence is not a disease" ?

---------------------- 


V 

Main Lesson

 


1

 

When one googles "why is drawing so hard?" One gets the following:

If you're wondering why is drawing hard, one important thing to know about drawing is that it requires involvement of the right side of the brain, a side people are not used to use that much. It can be very tricky to change the way you draw with your brain at first, but that needs to happen in order to draw well.Jul 11, 2017

Why is drawing hard? And what to do about it to draw better ... - SweetMonia

However...

after reading Jess Dorn's article Drawing on an Outdated Theory one concludes something different. Although it is sometimes said that our brain consists of a left hemisphere that excels in intellectual, rational, verbal, and analytical thinking and a right hemisphere that excels in sensory discrimination and in emotional, nonverbal, and intuitive thinking, in the normal brain, with extensive commissural interconnections, the interaction of the two hemispheres is such that we cannot dissociate clearly their specialized functions.

 Question 4

Search for "What is drawing so hard."  What do you get?

 

2

 Teaching Drawing to Young Children

https://bartelart.com/teaching-drawing-to-young-children/

by Marvin Bartel 

 

Activity 1

Students gather in groups. Each group reads and discusses a section of the article above. They post a summary of their section and share it with the rest of the class.

 

VI


Video





------------------------------------------------
 
 Question 5

According to the video, why should kids draw?
 
 
VII

A Note to Remember
 
 Drawing is only difficult if students feel judged or if they judge themselves. If the teacher creates a safe and creative environment, drawing could be a genre that would make any child feel creative, successful and accomplished.
 
VIII
 
Case Study 
 
Nic Hahn currently works for District 728 in Rogers, Minnesota. She attended college at The University of Wisconsin. She has worked with all levels of students, Pre-School through adult. Ms. Hahn was honored with Minnesota Art Educator of the Year 2017/18 award. Ms. Hahn started a blog called Mini Matisse in 2010 to connect parents to the art projects that were coming home in the hands of their children,
Drawing a Self-Portrait.



 
 
IX

 
Activity 2
 
    Individual Work
 
Draw your self-portrait.
 
Activity 3
 
Create a lesson plan to teach drawing using the MDCPS Competency Based Curriculum & the Visual and Performing Arts Department shown bellow.

 
 

 Visual & Performing Arts Department, Division of Academics

https://vpa.dadeschools.net/#!/

 


POST YOUR LESSON PLAN ON DISCUSSION BOARD

 

X

Journaling

 

XI

Glossary

 

XII

Sources

 


XIII

Students' Work


Self-Portraits
 


 

 LESSON PLANS

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