Why do children paint like this?

Children's painting activity is a modeling activity in which children use brushes to represent three-dimensional objects on a two-dimensional plane. Because children solve the problems in modeling from their own thinking level, their painting modeling style is often unique. It is difficult for adults to understand these styles from their own perception and thinking level, and they often ignore, dilute or even deny them. The research of children's painting psychology shows that the modeling style of children's painting has experienced a development process from simple to complex, from undifferentiated to differentiated. Teachers can use the psychological theory of children's painting. Starting with children's painting works, this paper deeply interprets children's modeling style, carefully analyzes children's modeling characteristics and development level, and on this basis, guides and supports children's painting modeling activities.

Case 1: hand-painted on the head

In the middle-class art district, Pingping quickly drew a man on a piece of paper: his outstretched hands were drawn on both sides of his head and under his ears (see figure 1). The teacher came over and asked, "What did Pingping draw?" Pingping smiled and replied, "A little friend, she is doing exercises." The teacher pointed to the hand on the painting and said, "You drew it wrong. How did your hands grow on your head? " ? Repaint. "Pack up Pingping happy smile, awkwardly lower the head, silently picked up another piece of paper. Under the teacher's gaze, she carefully drew a big circle in the middle of the paper as the head, then drew a small circle as the trunk below, and then moved the oil pastel to one side of the small circle without writing. Instead, she looked at the teacher and saw the teacher nodding slightly. This confirmed that she drew two semicircles on both sides of the small circle as hands. When the teacher saw that Pingping had corrected his mistake, he left the art district with satisfaction. Pingping, who was out of the teacher's sight, breathed a sigh of relief and quickly painted his feet and facial features. She said to her companion on the edge, "This is mom. She is dancing on the stage. " She didn't stop and continued to draw a little person on one side of the paper. The little man has no trunk, and his hands are still drawn on both sides of his head. Pingping said to himself, "The baby is watching his mother dance. " .

Analysis: In case one, there are three personality styles, among which the baby is a typical tadpole. Tadpole man is composed of circles representing the whole human body and lines as hands and feet, which is an early character style in children's works. At this time, the human torso has not been distinguished from the circular whole by children. With the development of children's perception level and representation level, it is gradually found that a circle can be drawn under the head to represent the trunk. Children can draw a person from the trunk (the mother's style in the case), which shows that children's character modeling ability has entered a higher level than tadpole people. The new modeling style is developed from the old one. The children changed the structure of tadpole people by adding circles and reconstructed tadpole people. However, reconstruction can't be accomplished overnight, and children need repeated exploration and application to get rid of the old style completely and master the new style. Pingping in this case is in the stage of reconstruction. Because the structure of the trunk is not very clear, she sometimes draws her hands on her head, sometimes she draws tadpoles, and sometimes she forgets to draw her hands or feet. This is a common phenomenon in the process of style reconstruction. Teachers should understand the characteristics of children's development, not simply think that children draw mistakes, but be satisfied with correcting children's apparent "mistakes." In this case, the teacher's attitude made Pingping feel nervous and restrained, thus making the original active creative activities depressed and passive. Under the pressure of teachers' authority, Pingping followed suit and was cautious. In fact, teachers can follow Pingping's thinking and ask questions about the figure 1, thus arousing Pingping's active thinking, instead of rushing to "correct mistakes".

Case 2: Why do you always stand still?

On the parents' open day, Jia Jia's mother pointed to a painting of Jia Jia (see Figure 3) in the exercise book and said discontentedly to the teacher, "Why are people who draw Jia Jia always so stupid?" I have told her many times that you can bend your hands and feet to make movements, and she just won't listen to me when you want to draw some movements! The theme of Jia Jia's painting is "Being with Mom and Dad". She painted herself and her parents standing on the grass smiling, drawing the details of their clothes, hairstyles and figures, and drawing the surrounding environment. It's a good painting, but the posture of the characters is a bit dull.

Analysis: In case 2, the static character modeling style is vertical, horizontal and vertical. Common in children's paintings. The difficulty children encounter in painting is that only two dimensions of three-dimensional objects in the real world can be directly displayed on the screen. In order to overcome this difficulty, children use the vertical dimension to represent the upper and lower parts of the object, and the horizontal dimension to represent the left and right parts of the object. Using this principle, they arranged the head, body and feet of the human body on the vertical axis and the arms on the horizontal axis. They don't care about the actual angle between their arms and their bodies. On the contrary, we just use the simplified principle of "vertical-horizontal" to express the direction difference between the arm and the body. Vertical and horizontal pattern is a relatively stable model invented by children, which is used to express the concise and orderly relationship between image components. In addition to role modeling, this model is also widely used in other modeling styles of children. The characters drawn by the vertical and horizontal relationship can't reach the level of elegance and vividness, and can't show dynamics. In the eyes of adults, it is dull, but children have a special liking for this kind of images and enjoy it. From the perspective of children's psychological development, repeated use is a valuable practical activity, which makes children feel competent and confident in painting activities, thus gaining a sense of accomplishment and satisfaction. At this stage, children will not be bothered by the rigid style of their characters, and Jia Jia is an example. The dynamic description proposed by Jia Jia's mother needs a high level of modeling ability, which represents a relatively late level. Therefore, mom's opinion can't make Jiajia change. Arnheim once pointed out: "We can see that gradually mature psychology needs more and more complex forms and styles. However, to reach the advanced stage, it is necessary to go through the low stage. Only by mastering the image of a certain stage can new demands be generated. " So ... the teacher said to Jia Jia's mother, "If you remind her but it doesn't work, it means that Jia Jia hasn't understood or realized this problem, you might as well wait a little longer." Only when Jia Jia is not satisfied with her painting, will she try to change a new look. Education sometimes needs to wait. "

Case 3: Ocean balls are connected.

In the large class painting teaching activity "I Play Ocean Ball", the teacher provided a picture of children playing Ocean Ball in order to arouse their memories and facilitate their observation (see Figure 4). After some observation and discussion with my own experience, children's independent creation began. At this moment, Ye suddenly stood up and asked, "Teacher, how to draw an ocean ball?" The teacher is stupefied. Obviously, this question is beyond her preset: the focus of this activity is to show the dynamics of the characters, and drawing a round ocean ball is something that small class children can master. Fortunately, other children came to help her out: "Draw a circle. I don't know yet, hahaha! " Who knows that Ye Ye's attitude is firm: "No, they don't look at the circle!" "Although the teacher didn't understand the meaning of Ye Ye, he didn't hit him either, but said," Look at their shapes carefully and draw them, will you? " Foliage nodded. After the activity, Ye Ye took the initiative to send her work to the teacher (see Figure 5). The teacher just took a look and said, "OK, put it away." Ye Ye walked disappointedly towards the work bag with his own paintings. ...

Analysis: Children usually use the simplest and most typical two-dimensional shapes to represent three-dimensional objects. The ocean ball is a round sphere, and children use it to represent it. However, when many ocean balls are stacked together, there is an overlapping and shielding relationship, and the ocean balls do not look like a single circle. In the case, Ye Ye keenly observed the change of the ocean ball, and tried to make his works loyal to his observation. It's not that other children haven't found the overlapping relationship between ocean balls, but that children of this age are trying to draw a simple and clear picture. Often like to separate visual objects, try to ensure the integrity of each shape and avoid one shape infringing another. Therefore, most children still draw the ocean ball as a separate circle, each circle is independent, and there is no overlap and occlusion between them (see Figure 6). Few children can draw realistic styles that block each other (see Figure 7). In fact, Ye Ye in the case did not break away from the principle of "graphic separation" observed by most children, because the ocean ball style he created was still separated by three groups. As teachers, we may highly praise Figure 7, because it conforms to the realistic standards of adults; We will also determine Figure 6. Because the diagram presents a simple geometric style; But for Figure 5, I'm afraid most teachers will shake their heads: What is this painting? Although the teacher in the case did not directly deny Ye Ye, her indifference gave Ye Ye a negative hint. The ocean balls created by Huahuahua's painstaking efforts contain his keen sensitivity to the outside world and valuable spirit of exploration and innovation, which is really valuable for children's growth ... So, when Yuzryha Ye gave me his works as a souvenir, he was very happy and explained to me over and over again: "Teacher, the ocean balls are connected, and the ocean balls are connected."

In short, children's painting activities show children's psychological characteristics and cognitive characteristics. Teachers should abandon the evaluation criteria of adults, interpret and evaluate children's works from the internal development law of children's painting psychology, and give understanding and respect to children's creative performance.