An investigation of the expressive and representational drawing development in National Curriculum, Steiner and Montessori schools

Little is known about how children's drawing ability may vary between different educational approaches. This study investigated the expressive and representational drawing ability of British National Curriculum, Steiner, and Montessori pupils aged 5 to 9 years old. Ability was measured from performance on specified drawing tasks. One hundred and 35 children participated, 45 from each educational establishment consisting of 15 from each of the three age groups, 5-, 7- and 9-year-olds. Participants completed three expressive drawings (depicting a happy, sad, and angry mood) and three representational drawings (observational drawing of a wooden mannequin, a house from memory and a free drawing). Results indicated that for expressive drawings Steiner pupils generally depicted more content themes, used formal properties more expressively, and produced higher quality expressive drawings than Montessori and National Curriculum pupils. Where there were differences between National Curriculum and Montessori pupils the Montessori children tended to do better than the National Curriculum pupils on these measures. Although representational drawing development varied in younger Steiner pupils compared to their National Curriculum and Montessori peers, no differences were observed among the oldest children attending the three schools. The positive relationship between expressive and representational drawing performance was the strongest in Steiner pupils. The results suggest the art program in Steiner education is more conducive to nurturing expressive drawing ability than those delivered in Montessori and National Curriculum education, with seemingly no disadvantage in representational drawing ability in the primary school years.