Drawing at the heart of the Art Academy Scheme of Work

Across all cultures, throughout history, humans have drawn. (dirt, sand, chalk, cave art). Young children love to draw but as they grow older can become discouraged when their drawings struggle to represent an image that is true to life. Drawing is a teachable process it is not a magical gift only bestowed on a few lucky individuals.

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Every lesson in the scheme of work begins with a Five Minute Drawing Activity.

These are the essential lesson starters that develop children’s drawing skills and techniques over time. The intention of these short sessions is to encourage the children to draw and practise their key drawing skills and through the activities improve their fine motor control and hand-eye coordination. 5-minute drawing activities should be done in children’s sketchbooks are designed to be drawn in 8cm-10cm square boxes. For some activities children should be encouraged to copy the images from the 5-minute drawing slides, for other activities children can be creative and use the images from the slides as inspiration. For some more complex activities, teachers should model and guide the drawing technique.​​

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Observational Drawing is a strong feature in many units of work

Observational drawing is drawing what is in front of you as realistically and as true to life as possible. Being able to draw is not a ‘gift’ or talent, it is a skill that has to be learnt, and most importantly, practised as frequently as possible. Observational drawing translates three dimensional objects to two dimensional drawings on paper. When drawing children need to consider many of the elements of art, such as line, shape, value, and texture and how they are used to make the drawing as lifelike as possible.