Conversations about Visual Arts: Facilitating Oral Language

Visual arts, such as drawings, are attractive to most young children. Marks left on paper by young children contain meaning. Although it is known that children’s oral language could be enhanced through communication with adults, rarely is there a series of dialogues between adults and young children about their drawings. Often heard instead are simple comments given by adults like “It is a neat picture!” “You did a great job painting!” Yet, dialogic communication between adults and young children could not only help facilitate children’s oral language, but also bring about many other merits. Regrettably, little literature addresses oral language facilitation about visual arts. This article describes the significance of facilitating children’s oral language via adults’ talking with young children about their visual arts based on Otto’s (Literacy development in early childhood: reflective teaching for birth to age eight, 3edn. Pearson Education Inc, Upper Saddle River, 2008) linguistic scaffolding strategies and Halliday’s (Language in a social perspective: explorations in the functions of language. Edward Arnold Model of Language Functions, London, 1973). Implications and suggestions for future research are given at the end of this paper.