Drawings as Children’s Voice in Studies of Children’s Learning Beyond Classroom

Abstract

Children learn to engage with nature when they have access to play various kind of outdoor activities. This enhances the growth for their development, which has a significant impact on children’s quality of life. Through children’s drawing the possibility to express their moods, feeling and idea on aesthetic sense has little attention. Hence this study to explore the character of the development pattern of children’s expressive drawings especially in shapes, according to their age, as well as portraying awareness in the natural environment that focuses on the farming activities.Through a participatory approach, this research was conducted in a rural setting in Laman Tamara, Kuala Pilah, Negeri Sembilan, Malaysia. The study examined on 20 middle childhood children, aged 7 to 12, from an urban school. As part of the farming programme, the children need to identify the landscape elements surround them before they interpret into their drawings. Their responses were analyzed through two analytical perspectives which based on inductive content analysis. Data were recorded in Microsoft Office Excel 2013 for further analysis. The study found that children have the abilities and skills of remembering on the physical characteristics through their intellectual realism which they transformed into its drawing shapes. Through drawings, children also showed their awareness and appreciation of nature as they were experimenting the real-life education that found in their surroundings. Therefore, children’s expression through drawing leads to the betterment of their knowledge and their experience that can extend the child-friendly outdoor learning to be more fun and joyful.