March 29th, 2022

Welcome back to the Brown Room! After a week of rest and relaxation, Brown Room is diving right back into our dinosaur work as we resume our dinosaur drawings. The purpose of this exploration is not only to strengthen fine motor skills and build intentionality with choice of color and writing tools, it also encourages keen observational skills. As they drew, each child shared their observations and knowledge of dinosaurs with their friends.

We presented the children with a variety of dinosaurs and four different types of paper to choose from. Children had a chance to walk around the studio and examine the materials before settling in to work. We presented the children with Arteza double sided markers, so as they drew they had to choose between the finer tip point or the wedge point for each color.

Ford looking at the T-Rex: One, two fingers… maybe I can make the teeth. 
Win: I made this and this and this and this (pointing to different spots on her page)
Ford: I’m going to put this one (pulling out the surf blue color). Actually this is kind of a dark blue. I'm still working on that (T-Rex). It’s mixed this and that and that (pointing to three different dinosaurs on the table). 
Elena: What part of the dinosaur is that?
Ford: The um, bone teeth.  I’m making a car for the T-Rex.  It has blue for the road. Can you read this color (holds up a marker)
Elena: Yes, it’s called burgundy, it’s like a dark red. 
Ford: It’s a dark one. What’s this one?
Elena: That one is warm grey. 
Ford: Warm grey? It’s like black. 

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Mimi: I want to do small (paper). 
Elena: Could you tell me about your drawing?
Mimi: I’m not finished. 
Mimi: It’s small black and blue and blue  (the small dinosaur in front of her). I want to be small part (switching over to the finer point of the marker). 
Mimi: this is the body side and this is the poofy part and this is the long nose and the eye. I’m going to choose this pink dinosaur. I see a lot of teeth.

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Above: Mimi's two dinosaur drawings. Note the attention to the spots and color blocking in the top image and the color and shapes in the second, as both were traits she observed and replicated in her design. 

Charlton: I'm doing stripes. There's stripes on his (T-rex) mouth. Uh oh he has a big green marker. 
Ragnar : I kind of like tracing. I'm making a big line. I'm not drawing fossils, pink now? I think this is dried out. Why is it dried out? 
Charlton: Where is my green one? 
Ragnar: I need mine. Is this black?
Charlton: i have black
Elena: this one is called cool grey. 
Charlton: its a dinosaur. This is his head, these are his eyes and then this is his body and this is his legs. It’s too many legs. I'm using some colors. 
Ragnar: I’m drawing a rock. 
Ford: I drew a T-Rex ranasourous. 
Charlton: This one has stripes. I made the triceratops and dots. See big dots (pointing to speckles on the triceratops).

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Above: Charlton's (left) and Ragnar's (right) drawings of dinosaurs. Charlton took time to draw out the circular shape for the head, a horizontal line for the "teeth" and four green legs off to the right side. In blue you can see the circular head of the triceratops and the dots on it's skin. Ragnar decided to draw rocks and initially chose grey and blacks for his image. 

Below: Ragnar's second exploration with the drawing materials where he "made a tent. Tent. Tent. Tent. Tent. Tent.  This is a road. The all white is the highway. I made a highway"

Cal: I chose brown. His is kina silver. He is black and silver (describing the pterodactyl). A wing dino. Here are the wings. Oh. I forgot the wings. This is his wings. Here. WHoa. THose are fancy marker. Oh fancy.