Learning to draw takes lots of practice. One of the best ways to practice drawing is by doing contour drawing. It's even better if you keep yourself from looking at you drawing, while keeping your focus on your object. This is considered blind contour drawing.

Blind Contour drawing is a wonderful exercise for training the hand and eye to work together. We do blind contour drawing at the beginning of each class as a warm-up exercise. The more often blind contour drawing is practiced, the easier it will be to draw/sketch objects from life. Contour drawings are fun to do, interesting to look at, and can be great conversation pieces! They will show you how "in-tune" you are to some details, and where you can improve. They can be a great relaxation exercise, too. Here are some things to remember while doing blind contour drawing:

-Remember to keep your eye on the object, not your drawing. Hold something in front of your drawing to keep yourself from peeking.

-Pretend that there is a string connecting your eyeball to your pencil tip. Wherever your eye goes, so does your pencil, at the same time.

-Go slow! This isn't a race. Stay focused and patient as you move along the outlines and inner lines of your object. The slower you go, the better you will get at picking up all the little details.

-Contour drawings almost always look wierd. Don't worry. Don't judge it. Just keep practicing!

Some ways to incorporate blind contour drawing are:

Road Trips! Have your child (or yourself) draw objects seen out the window while riding in the car. Have them keep their eyes on the object, since peeking down at their drawing could cause motion-sickness!

Bored at school? Instead of doodling, do contour drawing. Students can draw their teacher while still keeping their eyes at the front of the room!

At the Beach! Great place to do contour drawing while people-watching! Can you draw fast enough to "catch" a wave?

Window tracings Use washable markers, grease pencils or dry erase markers to trace objects you see outside, onto the inside surface of a window. (Draw trees, cars, houses, neighborhood pets, etc...)

Sketchbook Journal Start drawing every day! You can include daily contour drawings, sketches, doodles, or whatever you want!

Leaf Rubbings Collect leaves of different sizes and shapes. Place them under a piece of paper, use crayons to rub along entire area of the leaf. Watch the veins and details of the leaf magically appear. These make good greeting cards, wrapping paper, or place mats!

Classic Pumpkin Carving Draw a funny, scary, happy, sad, or silly face onto the pumpkin. Draw a round, jagged or curvy line around the pumpkin, a few inches away from the stem. Cut along the line around the stem, and remove it from the pumpkin. Scoop the seeds and stringy pumpkin flesh out. Cut along face lines, removing pieces. Place a candle inside, like a lantern. Place your "jack-o-lantern" on your front porch or walkway to greet "trick-or-treaters."

Shimmery Spider Webs On black paper, draw a spider web with white glue. (You may want to draw in in pencil first.) Sprinkle the glue web with glitter. Silver glitter gives the best effect. Once the glue has dried, shake off the excess glitter. This makes a great Halloween decoration. You can also make smaller ones for Halloween greeting cards.

Contour Drawings of Each Other's Hands While drawing, rest your other hand on the table in front of you so that the other person can see it. Draw each other's hands. Try posing with the "peace" sign, the "A-OK" sign, "thumbs-up", etc... You can also try drawing each other's feet.

Family Mirror Tracings You'll need a large mirror for this. Have your family members all sit or stand in fromt of a mirror. Using a washable marker, of a dry erase marker or grease pencil, have each person trace themselves in the mirror, or have another person trace all of you. You will end up with a line drawing of a family portrait in th emirror! Fun!

Memory Sketch Book Instead of just keeping a journal about things you did or places you visited, try to sketch places you have gone to into a large notebook or sketchbook. this is a good time to capture places still fresh in your memory that you visited this summer. It's of if you don't remember what places looked like exactly. Sometimes just certain details can help you remember your travels in the future. Your feelings about the places will come out in your drawings.