Drawing is a skill that can be mastered by anyone. You don’t always have to be a ‘born artist’ to learn how to draw. Drawing can be a potential career, therapy, a habit or even a fun once-a-week activity. Anyone who is good at trying has an extra talent to show-off. Apart from these, drawing helps in improving your observational skills, memory, research skills and even attention to details.

Overall, it is a good skill for your kid to have!

Here is a guide to introduce your kid to the world of art, especially Drawing:

1)  Create an Art Space: This is to generate your kids’ interest in the activity. Children are always enthusiastic about new places or special places (see how they get excited about theme parks?). Pick a corner in your house and designate it as ‘Art Space’ or anything you like. Keep paper, pencils, colors, books, some drawings and so on at that place and try to convince your child that the ‘Art Space’ is a place where they can create anything they want.

2)  Don’t Teach: Do not teach your children how to draw, let them sink into their inner creativity. Teaching is like schooling, if you do that, your child might get scared, instead appreciate everything they draw, observe it carefully. Ask your child about their drawing.

3)  Emotional Processing: Remember art is like therapy. Whenever your child feels sad; ask them to draw a sad picture, whenever they feel happy; ask them to draw a happy picture. Tell them to show their emotions on paper. A child six years of age might understand this and start expressing it.

4)  Display the Art: Your children might consider it an achievement if you put their work on the wall of the living room or anywhere. You can even tell and show your kids’ work to everyone who visits your home. Your child will think it’s a good thing to draw, and will try to improve!

5)  Observation: If you are following the above steps carefully, it is time that you lift the bar. Teach your kid to remember an interesting but simple object they saw when they were out and ask them to draw it out. Do not critique it when they finish drawing, rather ask them about the details. Follow this procedure to bring stability and detail to your kids drawing class and sharpen their memory.

6)  New ventures: A change of place, object and scenery never hurt anyone. Take your kid to outings and ask them to draw sunsets or the moon or anything. Rather than telling them to practice old objects, again and again, mix it up. Ask to draw anything new every day. This will develop a sense of playfulness about the activity and your kid might love it.

7)  Make a Book: This is very necessary. A drawing book for your kid will be like a journal, historical piece or a great memory. You can also observe your child’s progress with a book.

8)  The ‘No-look’: As part of a fun activity, ask your kid to draw an object without looking at the drawing sheet. Tell them to fix their eyes on the object and trace it only with their hand on the sheet. This is difficult to do, but if you take it positively, your kid can learn speed-drawing.

9)  Drawing proportions: Drawing with suitable proportions is tough to do. Mastering proportions will make you a professional artist. People tend to see eyes as bigger than they actually are; same with other features. Ask your child to take a mirror and draw themselves, let them try different poses. This is teaching proportions through portraits.

10)  The problem with introspection: At the age of 9 or above, children tend to draw more realistically. Your child might try portraits, animals etc. Keep in mind that when the drawing doesn’t come out as perfect, your child might lose confidence. Try to tackle this issue by telling them that they are maturing pretty well and soon will go on to draw perfectly.

To conclude, the above guide might help your kid to take interest in drawing, but that is always subjective. It depends on how you, as a guardian, respect their art and train them positively.