(Have any of you used Graphic Drawing Software as part of your school time? –
Please comment or email me to give any tips of how to incorporate this aspect – and what it has done for your child!)

I have noticed recently that my sketchbook has been in my hiking backpack for quite a few weeks. I”ve taken over with the camera – leaving the sketching behind as a means to remember a moment. I used to love mindless scribbles while gazing at  landscape or scene.  This week over at Handbook of Nature Study, we were challenge to read some of the sketching/journaling pages of the book.  I feel inspired to put the sketch pads back on the dining room table. Go back to the discipline of finding one thing to sketch a day.

One of the discouragements I have is in the “art” part of it.  I’m a horrid drawing artist.  I get it in my head that if the drawing doesn’t appear beautiful – then it isn’t worth it, and I can get my camera to capture such better macro detail. Well. Of course it does. That’s no excuse not to sketch!  Anna Comstock reminds us that sketching what we see in nature is not art – per say.

On another discipline note – our school was given a WACOM Tablet (Thanks Dad!) towards the end of last school year.  I LOOOOOOOUUUUVe it. The boys think it is hard to draw with, and prefer their finger pads or mice. This week I downloaded AutoDesk’s (maker of AutoCad) Sketch Pad Pro software.   I am going to have the boys sketch with the WACOM tablet pencil at least one object a day. I am not sure if we will sketch in our notebooks one object a day – it will depend on rain, if we have been outside or not.

By the way, Autodesk has quite a few of their advanced software systems for free downloads for students.  Quite a few are way past our 4th –7th grade levels – but the Sketch Pad seemed like a great start!