
The most difficult part of the lesson is creating the figures with arms and legs that bend in places they should bend. It sounds easy but when you're still new a figure drawing, it is very challenging. I've tried having students pose their own bodies, photograph poses and draw over them on the interactive whiteboard, and cut out paper people that they can pose and trace. All these methods have helped, but I just stumbled on one that may be transformational when I found the Wooden Doll 3D app for the iPad.
Below: These are examples from second graders who have hand-drawn after great struggles the four action poses. They completed these with complementary colors pairs in the negative and positive spaces then completed them with line and shape pattern.