How to Teach drawing to kids?

[Shank12]

Dear friends
I have a 6yr old daughter who is showing good inclination towards drawing and doodling. Though I do a bit of sketching myself, I am clueless as to how to teach drawing to kids especially drawing easy animals, birds, landscapes etc.. Any links to ebooks, Tutorials etc...?. Thanks in advance

First, I would provide her with good material. Cheap crayons and markers do not satisfy the need of a child. A good set of crayons should have polychromatic colours like Umbra, Siena, Ocre. Monochromatic colours like Cadmium-Yellow and -Orange or signal-Red are artificial and do not appear in nature, and such colour experiences can distort the perception of a young one.

People say that children like colours. This is correct, but nobody cares about the nature and the quality of those colours. It took me about 20 years to distinguish between different kinds of colours, because as a child I was spoiled with those artificial crayons and markers, and it lasted that long until I un-learned all the wrong stuff.
I don't know if the brand Caran d'Ache is available in your area, but as it is a local factory at where I live, Caran d'Ache is synonymous for good quality colour crayons. Every child that shows some skills finds a set of Caran d'Ache under the Christmas tree someday.

http://www.carandache.ch/products/fineart/index.lbl

There are better manufacturers, but Caran d'Ache is widely spread and still quite good. They have also artificial colours, but most are natural and polychromatic. The real good stuff you get from Artemis, Auro, Heidelberger Naturfarben and other small manufacturers. Difficult to find by the way, but I think it is sufficient for your daughter when you buy her material that is just not too cheap.

The teaching itself is mostly not necessary, as the children discover things for themselves. Sometimes it is even better not to tell them how to do things, and let them discover it. I would avoid prefab children paint books where the children get degradated of only filling out fields. A blank sheet of paper lets them more room for their enormous creativity.

Hope she has fun with drawing and painting.

[xfuv]

We talk about learning to draw or learning to colorising? If you really care about teach your kids DRAWING - put all colored garbage in a exact right place - trash can. Any serious school does not learn to work with such material. That the child has seized skill to abstract objects, has mastered prospect and has understood bases of a composition there is only 1 tool. Simple graphite pencil.

[The_Heartless]

Agree with xfuv...Start with the pencil. Don't take it all seriously and let the child play with it. So She will develope her own style with time. Imho it should all be fun for her - in any way She likes.

[seishirou]

You might want to check this link out :

http://www.goshen.edu/art/ed/draw.html

It has some interesting tips on how to teach drawing to children.

Originally Posted by xfuv

We talk about learning to draw or learning to colorising?

well, you're right about that. But let me explain a bit more why I find the choice of the right pencils is important:

actually there are two major ways of creating artwork:

1. you start with the outline, and add colours to the new created fields.

2. you start from the colour and add the outline later or not at all.

it is about starting from the form or starting from the colour. Starting from the form is a more intellectual approach that we adults prefer: we want to define where possible colours go, we don't want to remain in the unknown. We like borders.
Starting from the colour is a more intuitive way of artwork. You let the colour (that can be grey or black also) evolve into something. You leave open space for the colour to develop, which may also result in a very different result that you intended. Children often are not so pragmatic as we adults are, they may not have any intention at all when they draw and paint. They simply draw for the sake of drawing, regardless of the result. If a drawing is wasted, they start with a new one. This is something we tend to forget, we are used to have a valuable result when we do a "project". There's much more to say about that, I can elaborate further if someone's interested.