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My son does a reasonable amount of painting, drawing etc. although his main love is sport.

However everything he produces is abstract. It's always patches of different colour. His technique has changed over the past couple of years, so each work looks unique and is not necessarily rushed. However most of his class mates / peer group (he is in child care) who are the same age can draw houses and birds and trees etc.

My son has only ever on one occasion painted a picture, which was of me, that wasn't abstract. And it was as good as his class mates.

Also if you ask him to explain his art he has a consistent story with each one. So if it's a dinosaur eating cucumbers, if you ask him in 3 months time it's still a dinosaur eating cucumbers.

I've never told him his style is wrong or that he should be like other kids. But I am concerned that he may be missing out on developing hand writing skills.

Is this just an example of uniqueness or should I be encouraging my son to draw more concrete things like birds and houses? This would mean having to spend extra time to make him do it as he would rather be outside kicking a ball.

Aquarius_Girl
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going
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  • How old is he now? – Torben Gundtofte-Bruun Apr 18 '11 at 12:21
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    Handwriting skills are seriously overrated. – Lennart Regebro Apr 18 '11 at 12:34
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    @Lennart I strongly disagree with you there -- the ability to write easily and legibly has a huge correlation with general literacy. – HedgeMage Apr 18 '11 at 20:35
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    @torengb - Just turned 4 – going Apr 18 '11 at 22:16
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    @HedgeMage: Legibly to whom? in any case: [Citation needed]. I could read at five, always read well and a lot, but my hand writing is ugly. I think you get cause and effect backwards. If you can't read well, then you will not be able to write well. But I don't think the opposite is true. – Lennart Regebro Apr 19 '11 at 09:25
  • Quality of handwriting is related primarily to fine motor skills. It appears that crawling is valuable for hand/arm/shoulder development that supports good handwriting. – Marie Hendrix Aug 13 '11 at 12:16
  • I can paint like raphael (from the answer below). My handwriting is trash. I just don't care to beautify it. I wouldn't worry about abstraction in painting and things. It might mean he's more artistic. Houses and people are things we see every day. Abstraction is imagination. – Kai Qing Feb 11 '16 at 20:56

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If your son wants to learn to draw realistically, he can choose to do it at any time in his life. That's a skill that anyone can learn. So there's no particular reason to try to make him draw the world the way you see it right now. If anything, you risk making him hate drawing and painting. His creativity is a wonderful thing.

"It took me four years to paint like Raphael, but a lifetime to paint like a child." -- Pablo Picasso

philosodad
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  • Upvoted for truth. I'd say that it's a good sign if he's able to grasp abstract concepts and express himself thusly, but that's just my $0.02. – eckza Apr 18 '11 at 13:13
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    I've never seen any indication that drawing/painting/etc have any correlation with writing ability. – HedgeMage Apr 18 '11 at 20:36
  • I think its reasonable to associate both with fine motor skills, but I would agree that there is no direct correlation between the two. I can draw quite well but my handwriting is atrocious. – philosodad Apr 19 '11 at 14:12