Assessing Children’s Drawings in Response to COVID-19

ABSTRACT

The unprecedented onset and extensive spread of COVID‐19 has affected the lives of citizens around the globe. Children, in particular, have been thrust into modified and new learning environments. Although the global lockdown has confined so many, it also has connected people from different but shared experiences. One program that supported such connections is the International Youth Library’s (IYL) effort to invite children to visually respond to this challenging time in their themed call titled: “I-solation. Kids, paint yourself.” Young children from around the world, representing 42 countries, responded to this call with over 800 submissions. The purpose of this article is to share our exploration of how children used art elements and principles of design in their self-portraiture drawings to express their ideas and feelings during the COVID-19 pandemic. This exploration offers relevant curricular implications for teachers seeking to expand their literacy practices by inviting children to visually respond to how they are dealing with global and natural disasters, including difficult situations in their daily lives, that affect one’s sense of self, the home, and community.

KEYWORDS:

• Children’s drawings
• diversity
• literacy
• literary instruction

Acknowledgements

We wish to acknowledge Maria Luise Weber, International Youth Library Foundation Schloss Blutenburg, for providing us with the drawing samples; and Yue Zhuo, a graduate of the doctoral program in Literacy, Culture, and Language at Oakland University, who assisted with the analysis of the drawings.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).