The “Good Colouring” Chart…
Okay.
As a reasonable person… (who tries to see differing perspectives)… I’m going to approach this little colouring chart from two directions.
To be honest, my first response was one of instant, irritated frustration. But now that I’ve given it some thought and calmed down somewhat… I’ll offer this perspective instead:
Option One: This Chart Was Designed to Teach Children how to Follow-The-Rules
If the purpose of the chart was to help children understand The Rules (of life, school and perhaps, even…art), then the chart does it’s job. Most schools teach kids – from an early age – to follow-the-rules and colour-in-the-lines… and to be compliant and obedient little worker bees. If that’s the purpose of this chart, then it succeeds.
If the idea of the exercise is NOT to encourage children to be creative thinkers and initiators… then full-marks, ten out of ten goes to the teacher who created this chart. If the idea is to demonstrate to children that art… (as in life)… has a “right way” and a “wrong way” – and that colouring in the lines is the Right Way (just like fitting-in and living within the constraints of the Status Quo is also the right way)… then, well, the chart isn’t so bad after all. It does what it was always meant to do (kinda like schools).
Option Two: This Chart Was Designed to Teach Children the *Right* Way to Create Art
To be honest, I’m leaning towards option 1. Because “colouring in books” and “colouring in sheets” have nothing to do with “Art” in the first place. Art is about creative expression. What – pray tell – is creative (even slightly creative) about colouring in a picture that somebody else has drawn? And… jeez… if you can’t even add your own creative expression whilst colouring… and choose your own colour palette… or draw outside of the lines… what’s the point? It’s definitely not art.
One of my pet personal hates is colouring-in-books for children… or colouring-in-sheets. I think kids should be allowed (and encouraged) to create… and express themselves… in whichever way they choose. There is no right way to draw a cat… or a flower… or a sun. Walt Disney was scolded by his teachers at school for drawing faces on flowers… and it seems like Society is still hell-bent on imposing similar stupid rules on our kids today.
My mother (bless her) banned colouring-in-books from our home. We drew – on paper – what was inside our head. We didn’t colour in neat little cartoons that adults had drawn. To this day – all of my artwork comes straight out my head. I don’t copy from other people’s illustrations, photos or references. Mom did me a huge favour… encouraging me (in a multitude of ways) to express myself fully and authentically.
This came out of my head yesterday morning… while waiting for a coffee to arrive.
A couple of years ago… when life was very different… my daughter spent her days at pre-school. And the pre-school teachers seemed to love colouring-in books and colouring-in sheets. “Art” lessons simply required handing out some photocopied sheets of a cat or a dog… and instructing the children to “colour in neatly”.
It was only 3 years later, when I took my daughter out of pre-school, that I realised how something so seemingly insignificant as colouring-in-books (and the accompanying rules) had really taken it’s toll on my little girl.
We were doing art at home… and I had supplied her with a colourful range of paper, pencils, paint – and encouraged her to draw.
“What must I draw?” she asked me.
“Anything you want!” I said.
“But I don’t know how to draw” she said.
“Of course you do!” I encouraged her, “Draw what’s in your head!”.
She agreed to attempt to draw a mouse. But… no sooner had she made the first marks on paper, she began getting very upset.
“It’s all wrong!” she cried
“It’s not wrong!” I said, “I really like your mouse”
“But it doesn’t look how it’s supposed to look!”, she said… with tears streaming down her face.
Morgan had already – even with only 3 years of pre-school – been so programmed to believe in “right” and “wrong” and rule-following… and how things are “supposed to be”… and “supposed to look”… that – in her mind – only the neat predictable cartoons, illustrated by adults, were “right”.
Her beautiful art – in her eyes – was wrong.
It took 2 years of gentle encouragement (and – of course – NO colouring-in-books and stupid rules like ‘colours must make sense’) until Morgan really began to embrace her own, unique creative expression. Today, she draws confidently and many, many hours of joy has been derived from making art.
Here’s a little picture that she drew (about year ago). I love it!
All of this reminds me of The Logical Song by Supertramp.
It goes like this:
When I was young, it seemed that life was so wonderful, a miracle, oh it was beautiful – magical…
and all the birds in the trees, they’d be singing so happily, joyfully, playfully watching me…
Isn’t childhood like that? When kids are so full of innocence and wonder? When life is beautiful, miraculous, magical?
But then they sent me away to teach me how to be sensible, logical, responsible, practical…
and then they showed me a world where I could be so dependable, clinical, intellectual, cynical…
Well… yes… that’s what school did. That’s what school taught. Even Morgan’s pre-school taught those lessons to her. Taught her how to obey orders, be ‘good’, follow rules, fit in with everyone else and comply.
Watch what you say, or they’ll be calling you a radical… a liberal… fanatical, criminal…
“Won’t you sign up your name, we’d like to feel you’re acceptable, respectable, presentable…” (a vegetable)…
(That’s how I often feel about posting in this space… we can’t be TOO honest… too radical… we need to watch-what-we-say….)
There are times when all the world’s asleep, these questions run so deep for such a simple man…
Will you please, please tell me what we’ve learned? I know it sounds absurd – please tell me who I am!
Well… I know who I am now.
And I know who my kids are.
And even though Society… in general… is still trying to tell us fit-in, slot-in, follow the rules, be normal… colour-in-the-lines… we have found SUCH freedom in saying: “No thank-you. We’re doing it OUR way”.
While I agree with you 100% that coloring a picture from a coloring book isn’t art, you need to understand, from an educators perspective, why these aspects of coloring are important. Coloring in the lines isn’t a method of stifling a little one’s creative spirit, it’s teaching them fine motor control. Learning how to hold and manipulate a writing/drawing utensil with proper muscle control is an essential skill, and one that takes TONS of practice. And I find that 99% of the time when a child hands me a piece of coloring that is scribbled, or all one color, they weren’t having a drastically creative moment, they were rushing so they could move on to the next activity.
The only time my students do any structured coloring is on the pictures that accompany our short daily letter practice. The kids, after doing the printing practice for the letter of the day, color the image that is associated with that letter. My students know that when they are coloring their printing pages they need to go slowly, not rush, and try their best to stay in the lines and not leave white spaces. But when we do art (real art) or free time when the art station is open I allow them full creative control and I always compliment them on their work, and the strange and magnificent creations they come up with are proof that asking them to color in the lines once in a while isn’t damaging them emotionally, or artistically.
Fair enough perspective, Kaia. And I respect your opinion and point of view. Thanks for commenting. 🙂
This mirrors my thoughts on this pretty accurately. Encouraging kids to color “properly” isn’t about stifling creativity, it’s about motor control and putting in one’s best effort. Scribbling black carelessly all over a picture of a flower is rarely going to be creative expression, and more likely to be a kid who isn’t putting any effort into what he’s doing. Arming kids with the tools and skills they need early on will better prepare them for being truly creative. It’s probably pretty rare for wonderful stories to be written by someone who can’t form their letters.
I was kept in at recess for not coloring hard enough with my crayon. I was 5. FIVE. From that day forward I loved my own art and I hated the stupid pictures my teachers made me do. Sometimes they’d say they were helping and try to color on my art. I hated that. I still don’t let anyone draw on my art.
Awhile ago I put my kids’ box of never-being-used coloring books into the basement. I think they got wet. I should probably throw them out.
Your daughter’s art is very pretty 🙂
Yup – I hear you Jessica! I really don’t *get* why colouring-in books are so popular (even as gifts) when children’s OWN unique drawings are SO much more interesting! (I also don’t *correct* my kids’ illustrations. I think artistic expression is quite sacred in our home). 🙂
I am very artistic, although my strength lies more in textiles, but as a child, I loved coloring in a “color book”.
Why? Because I did not want to be bothered, yet, was not ready, yet, to draw, but could grasp color and began at a very early age with Crayola crayon, to color lightly and blend by coloring over one with another (it was nearly pointillism) and creating shades and tones i did not have in the little box. And I still am not about drawing, although I draw well and have taught line art, but I still will grasp any blank space, such as the circle the “o” makes in a title on a page in a book, and shade it or color it in. Or I will draw my trademark potted daisy mum and shade it. I see differently than you do, but was ever glad to have the outlines already done for me because I had work to do. And it was shading, coloring, blending. I hated making the lines. I was always glad for someone else to have done it for me. 🙂
Thanks SO much for sharing your thoughts and your perspective. You have certainly given me food for thought to chew on. As a “Questioner” type of person… I am always interested in the stories and perspectives of other people… and often times, the stories and experiences of others might shift my initial perceptions and prompt me to re-think my original stance. I think… that for anything in life (actually)… that we all need to do whatever works best for *us*… as individuals. For the people who love to colour (and I know some adults who find colouring in the lines that someone else has drawn… almost as a soothing and therapeutic process)… I think if it works for you – and if you enjoy it… then that’s exactly what you need to do! I guess I write from a negative experience (from my children’s old pre-school)… where they were never granted any kind of creative freedom of expression. Even… if they had a task such as “Make a craft duckling”… they couldn’t just created THEIR version… or THEIR interpretation of a craft duckling. The whole process was a formula… a series of rules… things that everyone *had* to do – in order to make a “proper” and “acceptable” duckling. That kind of thinking has ALWAYS really rubbed me up the wrong way. But – like you’ve showed – maybe there’s just a whole lot of people (and even kids) who LIKE colouring (and would prefer NOT to create the lines)…. and that’s ALSO okay. Thanks for writing! H.
I will admit I was entertaining my adorable grandson, who also is extremely gifted in art, by inviting him to color with me, side-by-side in a “color book”. He was patient. He chose green for the grass as I was doing.
After a few minutes of it, though, he asked me, “Grandmother, why are we doing this?
Cracked me up! 😉
Tee-hee! That’s funny! 🙂 Different *strokes* for different folks, huh…? 🙂
Yeah, I’ve been frustrated by my daughter’s teacher’s instructions to “make art”, but “no blue trees, or green skies”……..I was wondering WHY NOT?? I personally love blue trees. Kinda funky. The world NEEDS creative people of all kinds…….otherwise where will our graphic designers come from?? Fabric designers?? Fashion designers?? Artists?? Musicians?? Song writers?? gardeners?? plant researchers?? Book writers?? The Spoonflower site is great: it lets aspiring artists and fabric designers upload their own designs and they print it on your choice of fabric ( a bit pricey, but a great way to explore that venue). Some of us can’t draw, but we love color. I love your illustration above.
Thanks for commenting, Karen… I like the sound of that Spoonflower site – I must go and check it out. 🙂
Pretty much all I want to say has been said already. Colouring is teaching fine motor control. If they can’t colour they won’t be able to write.
I’ve also found that kids who colour all over the lines, do it because they are lazy or rushed. Not because they are being creative.
I also love colouring. I liked it as a kid and I like colouring with my first grade Sunday school kids now. Some of them really, really truly and honestly love colouring.
On the other hand I kind of sympathize with your point of view. School is about teaching kids to do stuff one way. To be obedient and compliant. Not necessarily because of some nefarious purpose. Some of it just comes down to what is practically possible with the recourses available. Also, in fine art it is valuable to learn the “right” way to do things. A good grasp of Technique and history gives you tools to be creative and expressive.
I only teach little kids once a week. I like it best when I give them only a few guidelines a lot of materials and then watch what they do. Like this Sunday we had some unstructured play time and the kids made slings and paper rocks out of paper so they could protect their animals. I’ve had kids draw me 3-D palaces, palaces going over 6 pages with multiple layers of dungeons, a huge queen with a very elaborate dress and a body guard consisting entirely of coloured in wolves and so on. All these kids have been taught to colour in the lines 😉
Well apparently coloring books are so popular because people think it teaches kids how to write and how to make art the “right” way.