Activity

A Drawing Game

How To Do It

• Supplies needed: One sheet of paper, a marker, and other art supplies you have.
• Take turns giving instructions like the ones below. You can make up your own instructions. You need about ten instructions to produce interesting results.
• Everyone draws following the instructions given, without showing their work.
• At the end, share your work.
• Example instructions:
  • Draw four straight lines from one edge of your paper to the other.
  • Draw five circles – any size – anywhere on your paper.
  • Add designs (lines, dots, circles, etc.) in three of the five circles, however you like.
  • Select two shapes and fill it in.
• You may also give other instructions, like “Add three balloons” or “draw two trees.”

Questions

1. What other situations can you think of where people follow the same directions but end with very different results (for example, following a recipe when cooking)?
2. Are there games from your childhood that involved drawing? How about “air drawing” as in Charades? When, where, and with whom did you play this game?
3. Share other games that you enjoyed playing when you were a child.
4. Do you play games now? If so, what games and with whom do you play?
5. What do you think of George Bernard Shaw’s quote: “We don’t stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop playing”?
6. How might you introduce more playfulness in your current life?