Drawing to Teach

Drawing is Engaging

For a student to learn, they must be engaged by the teacher. I find that watching someone draw is an engaging experience. A wonderful example of this are the RSA animations. Here's one featuring Sir Ken Robinson.

 

 

I think you'll find, that while Sir Ken is a masterful orator, the drawing animation makes his message even more engaging and memorable. Drawing can also transmit a lot of information quickly. Humans are largely visual creatures – descended from arboreal primates, it's rather important to be able to gauge distance, speed and to quickly analyze what you're about to grab to keep from falling.

 

So, if drawing is an excellent way to engage students, how can it be brought into the classroom? You could use a chalkboard, or an overhead projector, but they are single user devices, and usually mono-color. The new technology of the tablet computer is an would be an excellent extension of those devices. A tablet with its graphical-touch interface, makes a nifty sketch pad. A sketch pad that can be transmitted to other tablets, that can be shared by may people simultaneously and that can record what's being sketched.

 

So, given that drawing is an effective way to engage students and quickly transmit large amounts of information, that tablets provide a collaborative drawing platform, it reasonable to predict that being to communicate graphically will become an important teaching skill.

 

To this end, I've enrolled in ART-101. It's my goal to learn (hopefully) basic drawing techniques. Given that I haven't drawn much since I was a small child, this will likely prove very challenging. I will then take my drawing skills and try to apply them using tablet technology to different teaching scenarios.

 

This blog will chronicle my efforts.

 

Mr. iPad @ SU - looking to learn and teach!