Beyond Representation: Exploring Drawing as Part of Children's Meaning‐Making

Abstract

Drawing is an everyday feature of primary school classrooms. All too often however, its role within the classroom is limited to a ‘representational’ one, used to demonstrate the accuracy of children's images and representations of the world. Furthermore, drawings, which most closely ‘match’ objective, dominant perspectives are generally given greater value. Reflecting on the role of drawing in the classroom is particularly interesting at a time when there is increasing emphasis on ‘evidenced‐based’ and research‐informed practice within schools. Such a policy context, which is primarily concerned with ‘objective’ forms of evidence, raises questions about a possible role for drawing to support a more nuanced understanding of learning processes, taking account of the uniquely contextualised experiences of the children. In response to this context, this article reports on my engagement – as a primary school teacher in Scotland – with a Participatory Action Research (PAR) project with children aged five to seven. The project enabled us to explore how drawing could support our own, collective meaning‐making. The process involved employing walking and drawing as methods to open up rich linguistic spaces to enable the children to engage with and reflect on their lived experiences. The analysis of the drawings that were created surfaced many tensions within the Scottish education system, highlighted from the perspectives of the children. Such findings point to the need for more relational interpretation of ‘evidence’, arising from classroom actions and interactions, which include the perspectives of children.

Perspectives on Multi‐Material Craft in Basic Education

“…During the holistic and multi‐material craft process, students learn to apply materials, techniques and technology concretely which allows the students to make choices and take actions that support creativity and diversity in craft. Participatory learning culture with shared multi‐material practices and authentic learning in collaboration with others (Haupt ; Darling‐McQuistan ) may enhance students’ understanding of the surrounding world and help them to acquire the requisite skills to reflect also on the material world. However, as Riikonen et al () reminded, teacher expertise regarding design and fabrication methods, materials, as well as pedagogical solutions, appears to be crucial when conducting knowledge‐creating projects.…”

“…For that reason, students’ feel for the material assists design (Väänänen et al ) through the acquisition of applicable skills, definition of basic operations, technical experiments, prototyping or model‐making and communication with others. Collective meaning‐making and learning can be supported by drawing (Darling‐McQuistan ).…”

“Mom Said after the Spring Festival, I’ve Grown a Year”: Chinese Preschoolers’ Perspectives on Growing Up

“…An increasing number of studies incorporate them into the research methods. Researchers have found that utilizing such tools can enhance children’s memory retrieval, support their meaning-making, and enable them to express more of their ideas effectively [ 21 , 33 , 34 , 35 , 36 ]. The researcher, therefore, invited the children to draw what made them feel they were growing up and then narrate the stories behind their drawings, while not limiting the discussion to what is in the picture.…”

Research with young children: Exploring the methodological advantages and challenges of using hand puppets and draw and tell

“…The drawing activity was viewed as helping to introduce a play element and a mechanism by which the child competencies may be enhanced and strengthened. Talking about the drawings was seen as encouraging children to be coresearchers in the sense that they cocreated meaning about their drawings and therefore provided insights into their worlds and shared this with the researchers (Barfield & Driessnack, 2018; Darling‐McQuistan, 2017). We, as in the research team, saw both techniques as representing a participatory arts‐based approach that may somewhat shift but not necessarily reduce the power‐differential between adults and small children.…”