Random Marks

Children really do not draw during their first year of life. Drawing tools usually go in the mouth than on paper. According to Piaget, children's first scribbling begins around the age of thirteen months and they are made randomally and are not attempts at portraying the visual world.

The youngster often watches closely to see what he is doing, but apparently the importance of watching is to follow and enjoy the lines, not to control them; yet sometimes he looks away while continuing to scribble. The surface is not always paper. It can be walls, tabletops, or anything that will take a mark.

Girl's scribble aged twelve and a half months

The first stage of art skill development is purely mechanical and manipulative. The child is gaining control over the art tool and makes random marks or covers the paper with colour without using eye control. Even blind children make the same kind of random marks.

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