Making Meaning, Making Marks – Progression
Last week I posted about children’s mark making, and where they tend to start. First children experience the joy of making their mark; the recognition that they have the power to change things in their world. Once they have discovered this, children begin to take control of the act of mark making in a different way, beginning to explore what the process and the look of the mark in different ways. Some educators and experts refer to the early stages of mark making as ‘scribbling’ – where the child is not trying to draw anything in particular, and neither do the marks look like anything in particular. What is more interesting at this stage is figuring out how to control the marker, and how to coordinate all those muscles at the same time, whilst simultaneously keeping the paper on the table and occasionally changing colours. This a complex dance children are choreographing! In this stage of mark making, lines and shapes tend to join together, with no distinct stops and starts. Mark making tends to start with circles, or circular shapes, and then move into lines, both vertical and horizontal, although it is important to remember that each child’s journey through mark making is unique and may not fit within the typical pattern (this is no cause for alarm!). Children may draw layers of zig zags or round shapes, or one single large motion across the whole paper. The mark may only occupy one corner of the paper, or itRead more