Gifted Issues Discussion homepage Forums Age or Ability Specific Forums Pre-school The "Draw a person" test

DS is almost 2.5. Until today when he got crayons he would scribble. When I would ask him what he drew he would say "I'm just scribbling." Several months ago he got to play with some paint and when I asked him what he painted he said "two lines."

He is quite literal.

Anyway, tonight he announced he was going to draw Olaf from Frozen. He drew a "big ole head" with appropriately placed eyes, a carrot nose, and a big mouth. He drew the snowman body with the buttons and one arm coming out of the body. Then he moved on to drawing Kristoff. He drew the head, eyes, nose, mouth, and hair.

Then he erased it all in the magna doodle and went back to scribbling.

I googled drawing people because I thought his level of detail was above average and came across some posts about the "draw a person" test. Is that an actual thing? It's supposed to reflect mental age but I've never heard of it.

My son likes to do this to me. He unveils a complete skill rather than show me what milestone he is working on! Since all I can draw is a stick figure he has already surpassed my abilities.

My skills aren't much above Mat Man! I googled him.

I have not worked with him on drawing a person yet. I guess my first step will be working on a snowman.

The hubby had him outside last weekend when it was nice and he sent pictures of DS writing his name. He has 3 of 4 letters perfected and we really close to making an R. Once he gets the R he will be able to write his whole name.

This might give you an idea:
http://www.funandeducation.org/funcreative/artgallery/drawtest.htm

My brother's kindergarten teacher gave his class the "draw a person" test on the first day of school. Then she realized a couple of weeks later that she had not read all the directions, so she gave it again. At his first parent-teacher conference, she told my mother that he had regressed about five years during his first two weeks of school.

His person on the first day of school, was in profile, with one eye visible, a nose, mouth, and hair. He had five fingers on each hand, and recognizably different thumbs from the fingers. By two weeks in, my brother had learned to camouflage, and his man was a egg with arms and legs like everyone else's. It made me realize that these tests are not 100% reliable! (This is the same brother who "tricked" his IQ tester a couple years later by figuring out that if he intentionally answered a few questions wrong, she would go on to the next part of the test.)

My 6 year old hates to draw anything other than airplanes and had fine motor issues that frustrated him with drawing up until a year or two ago... he seriously draws people like a 4 year old.

I just leave him alone about it because I figure of all the things we demand excellence in from him he should get to stink at a few things too.

ElizabethN -- that's a fun story. Unless you're the person paying for the invalid IQ test I guess.

My DD10 wanted to do this recently. I administered the test with a scoring sheet I found online and told her it was just for fun. She used the results as fuel for her argument on why we should get her a mobile phone because the results said she was 15.

DS9 hates to draw and his drawings are scribbled and look like a 4 year old might have done them, but if he sees a purpose, then they are more skillful. We were arguing about a math problem and he whipped out a piece of paper and drew a 3D block and shaded the part he wanted to show me. Spatially, he is obviously well aware of what he is doing. He can also draw maps from memory. But if you asked him to draw a cat or person it would look like a 4 year old did it. He just doesn't care, and he has fine motor issues so tries to get out of drawing whenever possible. I don't think a test like this could be used reliably with a child with delayed motor ability or other 2e issues.

Yes! My DS that doesn't draw people well is also really good at 3D shapes. He's actually interested in them and will work at it...

There is a fair amount of data on what the average child draws for human figures at different ages, so clinicians used to use DAP (or HFD--human figure drawing) as a measure of mental age (cognitive ability and developmental level). A whole literature, including multiple possible scoring systems for cognition, development, emotional markers, etc., exists around it. (Not with particularly robust psychometric qualities, though.) These days, most clinicians I know use it mainly as a rapport-building exercise, a vehicle for clinical interview, and a loose screener for visual-spatial skills.

It's still popular with kindergarten teachers, and consequently often a component of kindergarten screening protocols.

It can be amusing to play with, but I wouldn't place too much weight on any score obtained, especially if it's regarding anything other than visual-spatial skills.

HID, you can tell your DD that it doesn't have strong statistical properties, so it's not rigorous evidentiary support for her claim.

blackcat, a test like this cannot be used reliably with any child, with or without 2e!

Ha - I wondereded how DS5 would do with this since he avoids and claims to hate drawing. His twin draws very detailed people. Today, spontaneously while playing with fuse beads he said "hmm, I've started with a line of beige: I'm making a person's mouth - here is the skin above the mouth, here are the lips, the gums, the teeth, more skin ... Oh I ran out of that color; well here's a freckle..." :-). He likes to create faces using the heart-shaped template, and made one today then explained some meta elements such as "in the eyes I have used three different blues to represent you, twin and DD2, green for daddy, and orange for myself". (Orange is his current favorite color)

Though I'd love to see his resistance to drawing disappear, I'd guess that I shouldn't be too worried about the general "draw a person" test ;-)

Incidentally and on a tangent from this thread, at what age did you see your children indicate that they consistently preferred a particular color over others?