Build on the Child's Curiosity

"Multiple viewpoints and impossible stairs"
 by M. C. Escher may be used to decorate a
dollhouse or shown in a Doll Art Gallery.

       As I count recognition, or identification, as one of the first elements of a child's interest in pictures, I regard curiosity as another. It is a pleasure to look at something which provokes investigation. From pictures of domestic pets, which a child identifies so quickly, he passes with awe and curiosity to pictures of strange creatures which have never come into his ken : elephants, camels, lions and all the rest. From pictures of houses and churches, such as he sees daily, he turns with inquiring eyes to views of beautiful Old-World buildings. Let the new thing be enough like the old to seem half-way familiar, yet enough unlike it to stimulate a fresh interest. The child must begin with what he can understand, but his thirst for knowledge gives him an eager zest for something a little beyond his understanding, not so far beyond it, however, that it is in outer darkness. The universal rule of progress is by one step at a time. 

• Why Young Children Are Curious 
• Tips on Nurturing Your Child's Curiosity 
• How Arts Education Develops Lifelong Learners
• Curiosity and Wonder: Cue Into Children's Inborn Motivation to Learn (pdf)
• A year with children 2016

The Museum of Natural Curiosity

the Child's Pleasure Is That of Recognizing Something Familiar

"Three Machines," by Wayne Thiebaud, 1963.
Read more about him and/or hang a print in a
dollhouse or Doll Art Gallery.

       If Dad is fond of fishing or sailing, the boy's first toys are likely to be boats, and so he is ready for any sea pictures, even Turner's. If Mother has a love for gardening, the little girl trained in the love of flowers will naturally like pictures of flowers. In all such cases it seems to me quite plain that the child's pleasure is largely that of recognition. He is proud and pleased to be able to identify and name the object. You secure his interest in a picture by pointing out the familiar things. The other day I dropped a bank-book which opened at a small woodcut frontispiece of the "Institution for Savings" - not much of a work of art. My four-year-old nephew fell upon it eagerly. "O see the house, isn't it cunning!" he exclaimed, gazing at the picture with the rapture of a Ruskin before the cathedral of Amiens. This of course was the sheer joy of recognizing a familiar thing. The mother might well take a hint from the episode. Here was a starting-point from which one might lead a child on to an interest in great architectural monuments. It behooves us to find out, first, what sort of picture a child likes, and if possible why, and then to gratify this taste in the most beautiful and artistic forms. If the child likes animals, give him Rosa Bonheur and Barye, rather than posters and Sunday comic strips. If baby pictures are in favor, supply prints of Correggio and Bellini, Van Dyck and Sir Joshua, rather than a ten- cent picture-book. If it is flowers, fruit, boats, houses, search out pictures of those objects which have genuine artistic merit. 

• What Makes Your Child "Tick"? Using Children's Interests to Build Communication Skills
• Want your children to survive in the future? Send them to art school.
• 7 Ways to Foster Creativity in Your Kids

Begin With What the Child Likes

Child with Toys by Pierre-Auguste-Renoir, 1895. Read and see more.

      It is too much to expect a very young child to like a picture because it is beautiful. The esthetic element is not to be reckoned with in his early picture experience. It is the subject which interests him, not the art in which it is embodied. His pleasure turns on what it is about, not on how it is treated. He has reasons of his own for his preferences, and some of them are rather hard to fathom. On the whole, however, they seem to grow out of very simple psychological principles, which we can analyze by careful observation. I recently asked a young mother what sort of pictures her little boy liked best. "Animals," was the prompt reply. I glanced around the nursery and saw a perfect menagerie of toys: horses, dogs, cats, bears, etc., in every imaginable form, from rubber and china to the most realistic skin and fur imitations. The father had begun in the child's infancy to bring home this sort of toy, and it was a natural transition from toy to picture. A girl baby's first and most common toy is the doll, and from this the natural transition is to pictures of children. 

• Encouraging Your Child's Exploration of the Arts
• 21 Ways to Display Kids Artwork
• 10 Reasons Why Arts in Education is So Important for Kids

How to Interest Children in Pictures

"A room hung with pictures is a room hung with thoughts." Reynolds.

"Children On The Beach" by Mary Cassatt
may be printed for a doll's bedroom or a 
Doll Art Gallery.

       The lack of youthful training can never be fully made up in after years. In manners, speech, and taste we see this inexorable law illustrated in the lives of hundreds of people about us. The child who hears his native language murdered in his own home will never escape from that malign influence if he live to take a Ph. D. in philology. Girls and boys brought up on trashy reading can never by dint of the most devoted study of after life develop the same sensitive literary perceptions as the more favored children of cultured homes. Children surrounded by sentimental or meretricious pictures come to maturer years heavily handicapped in their susceptibility to noble art. If the young mind is fed only on the best in books and pictures it will by and by turn naturally to the good and reject the inferior. The taste cultivated in the impressionable years becomes as sensitive to esthetic impressions as a delicately-adjusted instrument to atmospheric conditions. Realizing the force of this argument, ambitious parents are eager to surround their children with the best art influences. But while the theory is obvious enough, its practical application in matters of art is much more difficult than in the matter of literature. Unfortunately the knowledge of good art is much less widespread than that of good literature, so that the desirable material is not so available. Many who are perfectly competent to select reading matter for a child are utterly at a loss in choosing pictures. In many a home where only the best books are found, the selection of pictures is execrable. I remember very well the family amusement when my small brother came home from grammar school in a state of incredulous amazement that a certain playmate had never heard of Raphael. The youngster soon learned that there were many others in the same deplorable ignorance - and this in families whose culture was not questioned. People willing to spend money freely on books are often very stingy in their purchase of pictures. Anything is good enough to cover a bare space on the wall! As well say anything is good enough to fill a vacant place on a book-shelf. Far worse, indeed, because the picture forces itself on the attention willy-nilly, while a book may be left unread.  by Estelle M. Hurll 

• Famous North American Painters Students Should Know?
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• Growing Readers: Foster Early Literacy

Learning to walk scrapbooking page

Description of scrapbook page: Busy little parents have quite a challenge teaching their dolls how to walk! It's a clever photo opportunity for their own mom and dad to snap pics of this event for their child's scrapbook. (helping hands, baby walks)

Click directly on the image to download the largest available size.

Don't forget to drag the png. or jpg into a Word Document and enlarge the image as much as possible before printing it folks. If you have a question about this coloring page, just type into the comment box located directly below this post and I'll try to get back to you as soon as I can.

Naps scrapbook page

Description of scrapbook page: Your little friends love to take naps so wrap them up properly and tuck them into their very own beds and cradles. Take a few charming, restful pictures and paste them into this scrapbook page for your collection. (bed, toys, sleepy baby, text baby blocks "Naps")

Click directly on the image to download the largest available size.

Don't forget to drag the png. or jpg into a Word Document and enlarge the image as much as possible before printing it folks. If you have a question about this coloring page, just type into the comment box located directly below this post and I'll try to get back to you as soon as I can.

Potty training scrapbook page

Description of scrapbook page: Dolls potty train in moments, thank goodness. But you can include photos of a variety of small triumphs your doll makes under the management of an excellent doll parent. (teddy bear, bunny slippers, toilet paper, potty training chair)

Click directly on the image to download the largest available size.

Don't forget to drag the png. or jpg into a Word Document and enlarge the image as much as possible before printing it folks. If you have a question about this coloring page, just type into the comment box located directly below this post and I'll try to get back to you as soon as I can.