Drawing a Person

In OT, we use the activity of drawing a person as a way of teaching body awareness/schema, sequencing, symmetry, and visual motor integration skills.  It is interesting to watch how your child develops these skills over time by observing how his/her drawings get better and more recognizable the more he/she practices.  Drawing recognizable pictures is a skill that is needed as a precursor for learning to print.

In our school district/special services unit, we use the Handwriting Without Tears (HWT) program as a means of handwriting intervention with our preschool through grade school kids.  Check out the link at http://www.hwtears.com/hwt  At the preschool level, this program introduces Mat Man, which is a hands on way of learning how to draw a person, as well as addresses development of body awareness, drawing and counting skills (if you are in our school district or special services region, then your child may have told you about Mat Man already!).

Mat Man  (I can't get the picture to turn vertically!  Sorry!)

If you don't have access to Mat Man materials, though, here are some ways to practice learning to draw a person with your child:

-Draw a picture of a person along side your child i.e.: you draw a head, your child draws a head...you add a face, your child adds a face... you add a body, etc.  This is imitation, and it is a skill that comes before copying or drawing independently.  Make sure you have at least these body parts:  head, eyes, nose, mouth, body, arms, hands, legs, feet.  Also add: ears, hair and later add embellishments such as buttons, a belt, etc.  (If this is too hard, back it up a bit by you drawing it, and have your child tell you what is missing in the picture, or what you need to draw next.  Example:  draw a head, and ask, “What else do we need?”  “How about eyes?”  “A nose?”,  etc.  You could also start the drawing and have them add to it as they answer what needs to be added.).

-Draw a picture of a person, and give it to your child as a model to copy from.  Include the same body parts as mentioned above.  Copying from a model is the skill that comes after imitation.

-Have your child draw a picture of a person independently.  This is the next skill after copying.  If they are having trouble, give them some verbal cues/clues as to what they forgot to draw or add to their person.

These are some drawings from a couple of my little guys-  the one on the left is by a 4 year old, the one on the right was drawn by a 5 year old.

variations:  draw a house, draw a tree, draw a flower.  Use the same techniques as above to teach them how to draw them (imitation, copying, drawing independently).