Stages of Art Development - The Universal Tadpole

Do your preschooler's drawing of people look somewhat like the form above? Right on! This is what I would expect from a preschooler developmentally. Your child is drawing "universal tadpoles!" When children all over the world are asked to draw a person at this stage, the same general form appears. Some sort of roundish blob with arms and legs and sometimes a face. It starts as a simple blob and lines and as the child develops you'll get more and more human details.

For fun, you can ask your child "Can you show me where the belly button is?"

"By understanding the developmental stages children progress through when drawing, you will be able to allow your child to express themselves spontaneously (Kellogg, 1969)."

· Ages 2 -3--scribbling. All children, regardless of their culture, make the same markings, in the same way at approximately the same age.
· Ages 2-4--scribbles take shape and look like circles, ovals, squares, triangles and crosses.
· Ages 3-5--children begin to make designs from the shapes they have been drawing.
· Ages 4-5--designs take on the form of people
· Age 5-6--children are at the pictorial stage

When parents understand the various stages all children go through, they will know it’s the child's first step in the developmental process of learning to draw.

Page 3 of the following shows pictures of the developmental stages in early childhood art. http://www.crayola.com/educators/media/successGuides_ece.pdf