By Rozi Hathaway

Rozi is a comics artist and illustrator, whose art encourages the viewer to take a fresh look at the everyday objects and actions. As part of the DrawAble series of resources for learning at home or school, this resource shows children and teenagers how to create their own stories using objects found around their homes.

Notes for Teachers

What is the aim of this exercise?
This project offers children and teenagers a creative introduction to sequential storytelling.
The resource explores comics as a vehicle for drawing children’s own stories, using everyday objects as inspiration and/or a starting point. It encourages children to play and experiment with different elements of their narratives.

What age can this exercise be used with?
This resource can be used with ages 6 and upwards. The extension at the end may be suitable for older or gifted children.

How long does this exercise take?
This exercise will take between 30 minutes and an hour. Children may want to expand their narratives or create longer ones.

How do I measure success?
Success will be measured by the children’s enjoyment of the activity, and the ability to select objects and create narratives based on these objects.

More able or engaged children may show willingness to experiment with mark-making, giving personality and expression to the objects. They may demonstrate greater engagement in the process, and better storytelling skills.

Encourage children to “have a go” at creating a comic, even though the art form may be unfamiliar to them. Remind them that they do not have to have a “story”, or do not have to include text, using images to drive the narrative forward instead.

What can we try after this exercise?
Other resources exploring visual literacy, narratives and sequential drawing.
Try other DrawAble exercises and projects.

Which artists might we look at?
Rebecca Burgess
Emmeline Pidgen
You may also want to look at Rozi’s other comics and projects, and the books she has published with Good Comics.

Introduction
Since the very beginning of our time on earth, humans have used drawings to tell stories – and there’s rock art to prove it! From drawings of reindeer herds and fishing in Norway to dancing and giraffes in Libya. We humans all tell stories, and we love to hear them too!

So, what are we going to be doing?

In this activity, we’ll be discovering how to create a story from the things around us. I don’t know about you, but I don’t really have any reindeer or giraffes nearby, but I think we can give it a pretty good go anyway!
We will be using our eyes to see, our hands to draw, and our imagination to create connections. And you can be sure that what you come up with will be very personal to you!

To tell our stories, we’ll be picking a few objects that we think can be used to tell a story. For now, we’re going to focus on three drawings, but in the future, this can involve as many drawings as you’d like. And long-term, this will help you to create a story out of absolutely nothing – which is a great power to have.

Why are we doing this?
Excellent question! Sometimes writing a story can be hard, and by using drawing as a tool, you can let the story reveal itself to you – like some kind of artistic magic.

And by drawing some random things you can tell your own story without needing to plan it out first, which can be pretty daunting.

What could my story look like?
There really is no limit to what you can create. So it could look like anything! It’s all down to what you pick to draw and how you choose to use that imagination of yours. When picking out your objects at home, be creative! It really is amazing what I could find around my home. What can you find around yours?

Great! Can we start now?
Like all things involving special powers, there are a few ground rules to go over first. Let me hand you over to my colleague Herman in Human Resources, who will be able to tell you more. One moment, please.

Hi everybody, I’m Herman, I’m here just to go through some of the ground-rules with you before you start on your drawing challenge. Okay, so number 1: Check with your designated adult before borrowing anything to draw. It might be delicate or easily breakable, so always ask first.

Number 2: If you’d like to find something outdoors, again, seek your designated adult’s permission first and be careful not to pick anything up that might be sharp or dangerous. If you’re not sure, ask for somebody’s help.

And number 3: Now this is the most important point of all. Have fun!

What objects should I pick?
Here’s where it starts getting fun! Have a look around you and see what is available. Is there a piece of food, or is it some clothing or technology? What do you like about it, or what do you dislike about it?

The same applies to outside. Now, I live in a flat so don’t have a garden, but I can always take a walk to my local park and see if there’s anything interesting there. Now, as Herman said if you’re not sure if you should pick something up or not, always check with your designated adult first.

Or, if you don’t like anything inside or outside, why not make something up? You can do that too.
I’m going to draw a Day of the Dead skull guy, because he’s kinda weird and that’s what I like about him.

Let’s get drawing!

Okay, remember our toolkit for today? Let’s add to it…

So, I’d suggest picking 2 or 3 materials you’d like to use. I’m going to pick this pencil for sketching, I’m going to pick this pen for going over the top of it, and I’m going to pick this crayon because I really like the colour. I’m also going to use about three pieces of paper for my drawings. And – can’t forget a rubber. Never forget a rubber!

When drawing your object, you don’t have to worry about it looking really realistic either. You could just do a line drawing, or use shading to highlight areas. You could even draw it cartoon-style, or completely and utterly abstract!

Let’s give this first object a go!

Super! Let’s move onto the second drawing. So, for drawing number 2 I think I’m going to pick a different object from around the flat that I collected earlier. And then for the third drawing, I’m going to combine the first two images together and see if I can make something kind of dumb and funny? Let’s see how we get on.

So, that’s my three! My next step is: I’m going to draw a panel border around each of my drawings and then cut them out. You don’t have to draw a panel border – it’s completely up to you.

I think I’m going to keep mine in the same order that I drew them. But If I change the order, it could tell a story too, don’t you think? I guess I could start with the third, and then have it 1 and 2, or 3, 2, 1, or 2, 3, 1. Have a play, see what you can come up with for your drawings.

So my set of drawings work pretty well without words, but I could add some in. With some scrap paper or another sheet of paper, write out some short sentences that could go with your comic. Would it be a poem or a short fact? Or some completely random words?
Have a draw, have a think, and see what you come up with!

And this is my final piece! What do you guys think?

Can we go again?
The great thing about this activity is that you can keep doing it over and over again to make more new short stories. If you want to try something longer, do one drawing a day every day for 5 days and see what you come up with. I did something similar for a comic of mine last year where I started drawing little rocks every day until it began to evolve into its own story. So if I can do it then you definitely can too!

Keep trying this challenge again and again – you’ll be amazed by what you can come up with

This is a sample of a resource created by UK Charity AccessArt. We have over 1500 resources to help develop and inspire your creative thinking, practice and teaching.

AccessArt welcomes artists, educators, teachers and parents both in the UK and overseas.

We believe everyone has the right to be creative and by working together and sharing ideas we can enable everyone to reach their creative potential.

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Published by Black Dog Press, Drawing Projects for Children is a beautifully illustrated collection of activities that will expand the mark making abilities and imagination of children of all ages, and help fuel their passion for drawing.

The book features a collection of drawing exercises and projects taken from the AccessArt website, presenting them in a beautiful and inspirational format.

“A beautiful book, full of ideas and a vivid sense of materials – truly appetising and stimulating.” – Sir Quentin Blake

“Drawing Projects for Children is fantastic and I know it will be an inspiration to many educators.”

“I am so thrilled with the book! Thank you for your inspiration and excellence.”

Philosophy

I have been teaching drawing for many years, and my approach is based upon:

• Providing children with simple exercises and inspiring projects which give them a focus for their drawing exploration.

• Providing non-specialist adults with the tools to enable them to facilitate drawing in others.

• Helping children understand and experience the potential of different drawing materials.

• Balancing experimental mark making with exercises which promote careful looking and thoughtful drawing.

• Helping children understand the importance of risk-taking in drawing.

• Building confidence and experience to enable children to undertake their own drawing journeys.

The book provides a series of modular exercises and projects which can be used alone or in cominbation to build an exciting collection of work. Warm-up exercises are used extensively to help introduce the projects. The projects themselves are suitable for all ages of children, for use at home, in the school, in an art club, gallery or museum context. The book also shares ideas to enable parents, teachers or facilitators to devise their own warm-up exercises.

£14.95
Author Paula Briggs Paperback 144 pages 120 b/w and colour ills 26.0 x 20.0 cm 10.0 x 8.0 in ISBN13: 9781908966742

Bulk Buy

Network coordinators wishing to buy this resource in bulk should contact us here for direct purchase and discount rates.

Read Most Recent Reviews – August 2020

Eileen Adams, NSEAD

The chunky (8’’x10’) Drawing Projects for Children is a beautiful book: 144 pages, printed on thick paper, with colour illustrations on nearly every page. Well done designers Freddy Williams and Vanessa Wong! It is robust both in content and presentation, a book that will be of use for a long time. Black Dog, the publishers, claim to take a daring, innovative approach to our titles, to maintain high production values and authoritative content and to produce books that challenge, provoke and entertain. There is much here to inspire children to develop their love of drawing, to stimulate them and to engage them. This is not merely a ‘how to do it’ book: it is also ‘how to think about it’.

The book is in three main parts:

• Materials, drawing surfaces and faciltators’ notes
• Warm ups
• Projects

The section on warm ups provided a range of prompts for children to start drawing: exploring line, shape, tone, texture and rhythm to create different kinds of marks that could be manipulated in a variety of ways to create drawings.

The 26 projects vary in complexity and difficulty. Many are based on drawing from observation such as moving water and natural form. Some are prompted by experimenting with marks and materials. Some are concerned with drawing from imagination, such as animal cartoon characters. Some are about storytelling. Others bring new excitement to the activity, such as drawing by torchlight, making carbon paper prints or drawing on plaster. Some drawings come off the page and are developed in 3D. Some drawings turn into books.

Teachers, parents and other facilitators will welcome this book, chock full of ideas for drawing activities. They will also appreciate the explanations, instructions and advice that will help them support children’s efforts. I particularly valued explanations as to the purpose of each drawing activity. What was the intention? What might children experience? What might they explore – ¬ a material, a technique or a concept? What might they learn as a result? This book is not just about learning to draw: it is about drawing to learn.

All the advice is sound, based on Paula Briggs’s long experience of working with her colleague, Sheila Ceccarelli, in AccessArt, to support children and teachers. The projects have been trialed and tested at drawing workshops in Grantchester. They are transferable to other situations and other age groups – secondary students would benefit from exploring many of the activities. They have the potential to inspire young people and build their confidence and competence in drawing.

The whole tone of the book is about enabling children to experiment and take risks so that they are encouraged to push beyond what they consider ‘safe’ (safe drawings are those in which we know what the outcome is going to be before we have even started making them). This is such a relief when teachers and children in schools are being constrained and mis-directed by inappropriate assessment procedures and ways of valuing children’s work.

Prehaps the author should have the last word. \”One thing I am certain of is that we need to raise our expectations of the level of artwork children are capable of making. We need to give children access to more materials, more time and space, provide more focused support, and we need to feed them with projects to give them a reason to explore further. In return, they will demonstrate how fundamentally important drawing is to us as human beings, and they will reward us with the most beautiful, eloquent and remarkable drawings.”

Artful Kids

There are no shortage of practical books about art out there for children, but speaking as someone whose first love in art is drawing, I was curious to review Drawing Projects for Children by Paula Briggs, (published by Black Dog) as there are not so many which focus on the act of drawing itself.

This is not a book about ‘how to draw’ in the traditional sense, and is, I personally thought, all the better for it. Instead it is a truly creative book – the projects are aimed at encouraging children to explore different aspects of drawing for themselves – inviting them to think and create in different ways.

Well-structured, the introduction of the book includes notes about art materials, and is followed by some facilitator’s notes for parents or teachers (there are further facilitator’s notes added for some of the individual projects). There then follows a series of 10 simple warm up exercises devoted to different aims. So for example there are exercises in mark making, continuous line drawing, and activities aimed at encouraging children to work larger, or produce bolder or ‘stronger’ drawings.

The next section is the heart of the book where there are 26 drawing projects. These are unusual and imaginative, many of them with a fun element designed to appeal to children, while at the same time fulfilling a specific learning objective. There are projects which explore the properties of different art materials, and others which encourage children to ‘think differently’ founded on the author’s extensive experience of conducting drawing workshops with children of all ages.

Not just for teachers of art, the book could just as easily be used by parents who are interested in genuinely teaching their children some of the fundamentals of art practice – to explore, observe and be creative, and also by older children who already have an interest in art. One of the strengths of the book however is the range of projects which encourage collaboration, sharing or simply exploring and learning together. The activity from the book which we tried together (Drawing by Torchlight, which you can read about here) turned out to be quite successful on a number of different levels.

The book is lavishly illustrated and produced in paperback format, using quality paper, and at £14.95 I thought it was pretty good value for the quantity of inspiring material it contains.

Julianne Negri

How would you like a drawing book that encourages risk taking in art? A book that emphasises process over product? A book that encourages experimentation within guidance? A book that is full of messy-get-your-hands-dirty drawing projects? In short, a book with smudgy fingerprints all over it? Well if these things tick your boxes like they tick mine, Paula Briggs’, Drawing Projects for Children published by Black Dog Publishing is the art book for you.

Paula Briggs has not only created a beautiful object with this book. She has created a welcome antidote to a world (wide web) full of outcome based children’s activities that seem to be all about the photo opportunity to display on whatever platform – blog/insta/facebook/twitter – a parent chooses.

This is very much a gorgeous(smudgy) hands on book, divided into two sections – warm up drawing exercises and more in depth projects. So the only real way to review this book was to try it out. First – rustle up some children (fortunately not a challenge for me).

The book is firmly aimed at children but without any dumbing down of language or “fun speak” or the sort of cutesy Dr Suess sort of language you often find with this target audience. For example:

“All of the projects in this book also use a huge range of drawing materials from inks and watercolours to graphite and pastels. Remember, great drawing experiences are not always about the outcome, but often about the things you learn when you experiment. So get ready to try out some new techniques, and make some wonderful creations!”

This tone generates respect for the child artist, for the materials being used and for the activity being undertaken. I read sections aloud to the kids first and we discussed some of the concepts – risk taking, process, not worrying about “mistakes”, no rubbing out etc. These are hugely neglected concepts in the world of a 7-almost-8-year old’s art practice. They are at an age where they lose the earlier wildness of creativity and have been firmly indoctrinated into school ideas of right and wrong and drawing like the person next to you, with a seemingly strong preoccupation on getting eyes and noses especially “right”!

While Paula Briggs suggests this book is aimed to be used independently by children, I found it does benefit from focused facilitating. And for kids this age? Fairly strong facilitation is required. Fortunately I had a background in art and understood the materials and requirements of the tasks, but it is written with point by point instructions, a colour coded idea of levels of intensity and a material list like a recipe and is therefore very accessible. For preparation we made a trip to the local art shop with a list in hand – lots of newsprint paper, various pencils, charcoals and pastels and some ink – and we were ready.

We began with some warm ups which were wonderfully fun and challenging. This “continuous line drawing” warm up was a terrific way to display process over outcome. Pens, paper, still life and go. The kids had to look at the object and draw it while not lifting their pen from the page. They were happy to keep trying this for ages! Our second warm up was “backwards-forwards sketching”. This was a good way to focus on looking and observing while slowing down the hand and creating texture.

My kids are very physical and these drawing ideas are also very physical – hand-eye coordination, large gestural mark making and sustained concentration. We interspersed the activities with kicking the footy in the back yard to freshen up.

We enjoyed perusing all the projects in the book and the kids have ear-marked many they want to try asap. But the obvious “project” to undertake right away was the “Autumn Floor Drawing”. We ran around the house and street collecting leaves, seed husks, plants and all things Autumnal.

I found myself joining in and rediscovering the joys of charcoal and of delicate lines and shading in a way I hadn’t indulged in years. It was so relaxing, for me and for the kids, to play with the materials without any pressure on the result.

Drawing Projects For Children, while not completely independently accessible to younger children, actually benefits from involving a facilitator as well as the child. I found that Paula Briggs language and ideas generate an inspirational and stimulating practical art experience. Through warm ups and projects she extends children’s idea of mark making and drawing into a new realm. It challenges children (and teachers and parents) to explore, take artistic risks and to discover the fun inherent in drawing when there is no pressure for the outcome. It is a book we will return to and from just one day of experimenting it has already inspired these two kids to observe things a little differently and to think more about how to represent their world through art.

Drawing Projects for Children is highly recommended for those who love messy art. For those who want to encourage careful observation, thoughtful mark making and inspire artistic processes. For those who understand that experimentation and sustained exploration of a medium is more important than a quick simple art activity that results in a picture perfect photo opportunity. Go get the book, some supplies, some kids and get your fingers dirty.

The BookBag

Drawing Projects For Children is a beautiful, full-colour guide that encourages children to use a range of materials to create stunning and thought-provoking artwork. As the author points out, the end result is not always as important as the journey and this book helps children to move away from the more traditional, or ‘safe’ type of drawing styles and indulge in a little more experimentation and risk taking. The book is ideal for parents to use with their children, but each chapter is a self-contained lesson plan that facilitators and teachers can use with groups.

The theme of the book is all about experimenting with materials, so it is a good idea to stock up on the basics in order to get the most out of the projects. The focus is on using different paper and drawing media to create effects, so items like graphite, charcoal and pastels, as well as papers of varying textures, are useful items to have on hand.

The book also has some engaging warm-up exercises to help the child become more aware and mindful of physical movements and rhythms involved in the drawing process. For example, drawing to a slow rhythm using a metronome, or trying to create a picture using a single, continuous line can improve hand-eye coordination and observation skills.

The projects are suitable for all ages and can be as simple or as detailed as the artist wishes them to be. Projects include turning paper into fur, drawing by torchlight and printing with carbon paper. Each project encourages a thoughtful approach and introduces a new aspect of drawing or mark-making.

There is something in the book for everyone and it is visually appealing. My daughter is a budding artist and loves perusing the pages for ideas and inspiration. It would also be a useful resource for home-educators and childminders.

Fran Richardson, Artist Educator

“Being both an artist specialising in drawing and a parent who wants to inspire my own children to draw, I was glad to have discovered this book. Although pitched at an older child to read and follow independently, it offers guidance for parents and teachers who want to lead activities at home or in the classroom.

The layout is simple and pleasing with contrasting fonts in different sizes. It is fully illustrated with colour photographs of children making the work alongside examples of materials and drawings at differing stages of completion, which makes it both engaging and easy to follow. No prior experience is required so anyone can start immediately with the items already available at home.

I particularly like the way the author moves away from the traditional model of seeking to make a finished product though a series of specific steps to a focus on different techniques and the enjoyment of using materials in an experimental way, gently pushing at the boundaries of what children can achieve.

Drawing in charcoal by torch light, the picnic drawing party, or being your own art installation are things that I would never have thought of doing. I haven\’t had any experience of teaching children so I feel much more confidant that I will be working with them at the right level. Packed with ten warm ups and 26 projects with three levels of difficulty it offers value for money for any adult who wants to enjoy some creative time with children – a must for the holidays!” 

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Continuous Line Drawings (Squiggle Drawings) of Sticks

A great warm-up exercise for all ages – whatever their level of experience, continuous line drawings are a very useful way to get children (and adults) to tune into their subject matter and quieten ready for drawing.

Drawing hands

Another warm-up exercise that can be done anywhere! Drawing your own or someone else’s hand in continuous line can be a very useful way to explore concave shapes for scuptural/making projects such as nests and bowls.

Warm-Up Drawing Exercise: Drawing Spirals

A great warm-up/ice breaker to use at the start of a drawing workshop for both adults and children. As well as getting participants to start making marks on the paper without worry or mental blocks, this simple exercise aims to introduce participants to the idea that drawing and mark making comes from the finger tip, wrist, elbow, shoulder and whole body.

Quick Drawing Exercise: Helping Children to Draw Larger!

A quick 5minute drawing exercise to encourage children to work large and make their drawing fill the page.

Right Hand, Left Hand – Non Dominant Hand Drawing Exercise

Practising drawing with your ‘none dominant’ hand, (right hand if you are left handed, left hand if you are right handed), can be a useful strategy for loosening up and for experimenting with the potential of mark making without worrying about the outcome. Another excellent ice-breaker for accessing drawing processes across all mediums.

Making a Shy Drawing – Drawing Exercises for Beginners

This resource shares unusual yet accessible drawing exercises for beginners. How can we change the nature of the drawings we make – how would we make a “shy” drawing? These exercises and suggestions provide a focus which enables pupils and teachers to explore different aspects of making a drawing, including sound, action and intention.

Drawing Minibeasts – using a continuous line, graphite and oil pastel

Using images of insects as inspiration, children make 4minute continuous line drawings in pen as a warm-up exercise to encourage close looking and to get their fingers moving.

One Line Street Scene: A Visualisation Warm Up Drawing exercise

Another fun variation on the continuous line warm-up exercise: children made a drawing consisting of a single line, which started at the left hand side of the page, and finished at the right hand side. The subject matter was a street scene, which they visualised by listening to details of the buildings/objects that they would meet. The results were beautiful and the children enjoyed their journey!

Simple Perspective Art Lesson for Young Children

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Making a Blind Contour Drawing

This is a classic drawing exercise to use with all ages & all abilities and helps you focus upon careful looking, without the worry of what your drawing looks like. In this resource we describe the process and suggest some suitable subject matter and drawing materials.

Minimalising: Using Simple Line Drawings to Explore Sculptural Form

Teenagers explore form using a reductive or minimalising approach to drawing. They were encouraged to create a series of drawings in quick succession, using a limited number of lines to record their objects. For each subsequent drawing, they dropped a line, starting with a seven line drawing and working down to a drawing in one line. This exercise was to get students thinking about essential, sculptural elements in their constructions and drawings.

Exercise to Introduce Foreshortening and Volume in Line Drawings

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Inspired by Google Earth: Drawing

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Inspired by Henri Matisse – Repetitive Life Drawing Exercise

This workshop encourages students to challenge pre-conceived ideas of what a drawing should be or what finished drawings should look like. By making drawings of each other they can experiment with line and expression, inspired by the working practice of Henri Matisse, who often drew an object or life pose many times in succession.

Red to Green: Patterns in Nature, Line and Wire

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Drawing Insects in Wire and Tracing Shadows in Black Pen

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Teenagers are challenged to create sculpture that was able to stand up and to explore how tall the sculpture could be before it fell down. They experimented with elegant solutions to make their wire forms stand, considering also the relationship between its base and the surface it was standing on.
This was also an opportunity to explore construction materials and finding the right materials for the job.

Reaching the Limit: Making Tall Sculptures and Stretching Materials

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Landscape Sculptures in Wire and Mixed Media: Working Through Ideas

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In Western art, we use the term ‘negative space’ to talk about the areas between objects on the page/canvas but this tends to convey quite a static idea of space. There is a Japanese word, ‘ma‘ (間), that suggests a more evocative and dynamic spatial experience and it was this concept that inspired this workshop, in which teenagers made three dimensional line drawings to explore the space around them.

Teachers Explore ‘Line and Shape’ at the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge with AccessArt

In the spring and summer of 2016, Paula Briggs and Sheila Ceccarelli from AccessArt and Kate Noble from the Fitzwilliam Museum, Cambridge to create and deliver a series of InSET sessions (in-service-training) for primary school teachers.
The aim was to fuse top Museum Education practice with practical, hands on learning in Fine Art disciplines including: drawing, printmaking, sketchbooks, collage and sculpture.

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Making drawings which compete with the background

Making a Charcoal Animation

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Many thanks to Pink Pig International for the sketchbooks