Today I used the same activity for two classes - Paula, Sophia, and Nate at 9 am, and Adriana at 11.  It's called "Finish The Picture," an old assignment I was given in junior high school that has been used for many years with children of all ages.  It's been successful because it accomplishes several things at once.

First, it can be a rough gauge of a child's level of art development.  Does he sense proportion?  Can she form and execute a concept?  Is she ready to draw what she actually sees?  (Children begin by drawing what they know:  boats float on top of a line of water at the bottom of the page, for example.)  Second, it introduces children to the grid - so useful to artists through the ages for getting perspective and proportion right, and such a stretch for young artists to grasp.

I let the children choose two identical pictures lined with a nine-rectangle grid.  Identical except for one thing:  in one of the pictures the center rectangle is missing, and in the other picture, everything except the center rectangle is missing.  In stage one I am asking them to draw the one missing rectangle in the center of the picture.  In the second part I am asking them to draw everything except the one rectangle that is present.

Above is Sophia's drawing inside that one missing rectangle - the crucial center rectangle - of the picture she chose.  Sophia really challenged herself with this drawing.  Notice how she was aware of and correctly drew two lines - the line where the pond meets the wall, and the line where the lily stems meet the water and become reflections.  She was able to foreshorten the lily pads as well.

The next part of the exercise is even harder.  Looking at only the center rectangle taken from the picture, I ask the children to draw the bigger picture right out to the edge of the paper.  This really requires spatial awareness.

Here is Adriana's drawing in which she extended her small portion of a cat outward to fill the paper.  Isn't this cat charming?  In doing this drawing, Adriana was surprised at how big the cat's ears actually are.  She was also able to mimic the cat's tabby stripes, which bend around the curled-up cat.

The last part of the activity, should time and attention spans allow, is to use a nine-rectangle grid to draw and paint the entire picture - the same picture we have been working on - on a fresh piece of paper.  By this time we are familiar with it, having drawn it already in parts.

Here is Paula's watercolor based on her picture.  She used a faintly-drawn grid to get the proportions right, then used the wash technique we learned last week to paint the water and the sky.  I notice Paula's understanding of how objects appear to sit below the horizon, not on top of it.

Adriana spies something else she'd like to try.  She wants to turn over a small picture of a flying bird and trace it on the back.  Of course!  But she must then extend the drawing all the way out and fill the paper with nothing to guide her but her imagination. 

                                              

She did it!