The power of really looking.

It is universally recognised that teaching children to really look can be transformational to their enjoyment and understanding of art. But in reality, this can be a huge challenge. In our fast paced world where our attention is so constantly divided, we have all become a bit deskilled at just sitting, just observing and just taking the time to enjoy the world around us.

I am constantly reminded of this in my own life. I used to absolutely love reading, but now I struggle to get through more that just a few pages before I realise that I have absolutely no ideas what is going on and that my mind has now wandered to a job that needs doing or some other distraction that gives me an excuse to put the book down. It is so much harder to remain focussed on one thing for a prolonged period of time than it used to be and I am sure this is doubly so for our children. The amount of sensory information our children receive in a day is truly bonkers - sitting still and looking at art is so far removed from what children spend their days doing, it is no surprise at all that many find engaging with art really, really challenging.

My own children are no different. They traipse around art galleries because they know it makes mummy happy and they 'oooo' and 'ahhh' in the appropriate places, but don't be fooled; if the promise of a cake in the cafe afterwards hadn't been firmly negotiated, I wouldn't get them anywhere near a piece of art without very strong and very loud resistance. I dream of a full day on my own in a gallery, taking in the art armed with my sketchbook, but in reality, I wonder if I too have lost the ability to sit for any length time and really get lost in a painting. Luckily, with three young children, I am very unlikely to be putting this to the test anytime soon so ignorance is bliss!

So in school, how do we encourage children to really look? To spend focussed time really taking in a painting and actually noticing what is there and developing those key inference skills where we attempt to interpret what the artist is trying to tell us? The answer is that these are skills we need to actively teach. We need to devote specific lesson time to teach children how to appreciate and understand art and help them develop their own opinions and preferences. Without deliberate time put aside to guide children through the process of looking, they are missing out on such valuable experience and input that will positively impact their own artistic development.

During my most recent visit to the National Gallery, this was the focus. Activities that can be used with primary school children to explicitly teach 'looking' skills and to make engaging with art in the classroom something that is active, fun and energising. Here are some of the ideas you could try with your own children:

Take a walk through a painting:

Set up your classroom to reflect the subject matter of the painting you want children to really explore. Think about music that might make a good soundtrack; consider any smells that you could introduce or any textures that children could experience alongside. Before you even begin the journey, ask children to think about the clothes they would need to wear if they were inside the painting and what equipment they might need to bring. Then, as a drama activity, take children inside the painting and ask them to react to what they encounter as you narrate their way around the scene they are observing. Go with the ideas the children suggest - you might be surprised what you notice within the painting that you didn't see before once you hear how the children respond!

Guided Looking:

Instead of asking children just to look at the artwork in front of them, guide their eyes by giving them specific places to look. Maybe start in the bottom left corner and ask children to move their gaze upwards, across, down and back until they have travelled around the entire painting. Then ask them to look at the the thing nearest the front, nearest the back and then look for different attributes; something spiky, something soft, something light, something dark. Get children to share their ideas as they look. This activity is likely to spark some interesting debate as children compare ideas. You will be amazed at how differently children interpret what they are looking at!

Guided Drawing:

Place children into pairs, back to back, with one facing the whiteboard and the other facing away. The child facing the board can see the artwork that the class are studying and it is their job to describe it to their partner to such an extent that their partner (who cannot see the art) is able to produce a sketch of what their partner is telling them. This activity will definitely take practice, but will really redefine the way children see art as they will need to be able to articulate the whole as well as the different details they can see. At the end, the partner turns to see the art work and talks to their friend about how the image relates to what they had in their head. In what ways did they visualise the image in the same way and in what ways were they surprised? You could do this activity with younger children taking away the element of drawing and making it discussion based so that children engage in artistic conversation without the pressure of trying to recreate the image.

Art Detectives:

Ask children to look at an image and answer these questions. Who is the most important character? What is the artist trying to show us? Where in the world is this taking place? When in history / time? And why is this important? Get children to provide clues from the image to justify their ideas and share how they have come to the conclusions that they have. See if children can contextualise the art considering what might have come before and what might come after in terms of the storyline of the subject matter. Again, children will have very different opinions about all of these questions and the conversations they have as they try to argue their perspective will add even greater value to this activity.

By giving children activities like this, you are modelling the process of artistic looking that will hopefully become automatic the more the children practise this skill. Who knows, by nurturing this ability at a young age, we can only hope that we are developing art engaged youngsters who will seek out, explore and engage with art as they get older and reap all of the many rewards that this is proven to bestow. Being able to engage with art in this way for a prolonged period of time is the epitome of mindfulness which, as we all know, has significant benefits for children's health and well-being. It is so important for us to carve out windows of time in the school day for children to be still, to be calm and to be able to think freely and critically - make active looking a regular part of your art provision and see what you and the children can learn from each other as you step into a whole world of amazing art.