We tend to drill, drill, drill, and we get the children who are bored and disengaged. The nature of this project is high engagement.

What the program is really about is there fine motor skills and developing those to give them the confidence to help them in their everyday writing and it flows over into their reading.

An absolute first rate program to teach children not only drawing skills, but attending, sharing, manners, and literacy. So many gains.

I was absolutely floored when Wendy said that the kids would sit down for 70 minutes and draw. I was like, yah right, they’re five. And my kids, they do!

The students who might have behavior issues or they don’t have stamina to sit there. Those kids for me were the most surprising, because they do. They sit there and they’re drawing and they’re engaged and they do the best that they can. I think that’s really important and empowering for them.

At first I wasn’t quite sure if this is exactly what our students needed. I’m a building principal, who really looks at how we spend our time and start instruction. I didn’t know really, can we afford to cut out 45/50 minutes a week for a drawing lesson. After looking into it a little bit more and studying it a little bit more, I realized that the “Connection Project 64” is really a great stepping stone into writing.

In second grade a lot of kids have wonderful ideas but somewhere the process of getting those ideas out of their head and onto paper was stuck because of the process of handwriting. Drawing Children Into Reading allows for children to develop the handwriting skills to make writing easier and more enjoyable because they get the idea, they visualize it, and are able to get it down before the ideas are lost.

“When I used to teach second and third grade, I would have been very pleased if I had second graders coming into my classroom doing work that (now) my kindergartners are exiting with at the end of the year…”

“My feeling has always been, that if kids love to come to school, they will work with you, work hard, and be successful. Drawing with Wendy has brought all of us, myself included, great joy, and yes, peace. We all sit down, we relax, we talk, and we draw.”

“I think there is a whole bunch of good going on in these (DCIR) experiences. Kids learn the moves their hands need to make in order to convey meaning, and they learn to draw and color and represent things - but where they are as they do it is in this PRESENT moment. This is about as close to “flow experience” as you could get in an instructional environment. It’s about as close to PLAY as young kids get when doing literacy practice.”

“A great many benefits have come out of my oldest drawing with the DCIR lessons. I have watched my daughter gain confidence and an "I can" attitude approach for trying new things. Her confidence has been strengthened because she sees herself improving every time she draws a lesson with Miss Wendy. The creativity and innovative thought she puts behind the many projects she creates on her own now is a joy to watch and I know this way of thinking will carry her through her successful path ahead." Thank you Drawing Children Into Reading for this wonderful resource. I look forward to my youngest to go through the program!”

"Not only has it increased their confidence in the things that I would have anticipated like holding a pencil and holding a crayon but I have also seen this overall willingness to take risks and try something new. I'm a neuroscientist myself. The thing about Drawing Children Into Reading is that it's an art program, it’s a fine motor program and it just opens up all these neural pathways for them to be able to make connections across all other disciplines.”

“A compelling learning program that links drawing to student engagement in the world around them. Witnessing kids delighting in drawing a subject and finding a tangible return on their efforts is clearly evidence of motivational momentum. This is a fundamental part of what is so dearly needed in classrooms today. Their successes in further understanding their subjects through drawing becomes a powerful tool in gaining the confidence and experience for meeting the challenges and discoveries yet ahead in life.”