Technique Objectives for Improving Observational and Cognitive Skills
I like to teach still life drawing as a way to promote observational skills. Still life drawing forces, through concentrative repetition and routine, the observer (student) to look more closely at the object or objects being observed and learn to draw what they see and not just what they think they see. It can be a challenge to break the habits of using simplified symbols instead of actually drawing an object.6 Students are creatively forced to look for and use all of the elements of art to create their observational drawings. The elements of art include line, shape, form, color, value, texture, and space.
With the addition of a writing element, journaling now in a sense becomes an all-encompassing cross curricular superhero version of still life drawing. By asking the students to not only draw what they see, but to also write about their experience and what they see, we are discreetly nudging them to learn about the subject on multiple levels, from multiple angles, and including multiple disciplines, all while honing their concentration and observational skills. How can you describe the lines on the leaves? How can you explain how you used the visual art elements of value and texture to draw that cloud? Even though so much is green, how can you tell the difference between the leaves, the stems, and the grass? How could you explain and describe, in words, something you can see that others cannot?
Comments: