{"id":1901,"date":"2026-04-21T17:56:05","date_gmt":"2026-04-22T00:56:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/?p=1901"},"modified":"2026-04-21T18:11:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-22T01:11:14","slug":"on-becoming-a-student-of-drawing-part-2-emotional-beginnings","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/2026\/04\/21\/on-becoming-a-student-of-drawing-part-2-emotional-beginnings\/","title":{"rendered":"On Becoming a Student of Drawing, Part 2: Emotional Beginnings"},"content":{"rendered":"

This post is part of a series beginning with Tales of a Sabbatical: On Becoming a Student of Drawing, Part 1<\/a>. For February and March 2026, I was a student in\u00a0CDSR 100 Introduction to Drawing\u00a0<\/em>(Continuing Studies) at Emily Carr University of Art and Design. Throughout, I kept and analyzed a journal, in preparation for a Scholarly Personal Narrative <\/em>(Ng & Carney, 2017<\/a>) paper.\u00a0The question guiding my research is: What are my lived experiences of being a student in a new (to me) discipline? <\/em>What follows is part of my preparation, a narrative portrait (Rodr\u00edguez-Dorans & Jacobs, 2020) with reflection in the style of Brookfield (2017, Chapter 9)<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\n

Emotional Beginnings<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The night before class started I noted various emotions ranging from excitement and hopefulness, annoyance at the complexities of the registration system, \u201ca little disappointed that the original teacher was swapped out last minute but open to someone new,\u201d and \u201ca little anxious about the other people \u2013 who will they be? How will they impact my learning?\u201d I arrived to class prepared and early. The first hour \u201cI am in my element\u201d with familiar classroom guideposts including a lesson plan, syllabus, and paired introductions. Then we began drawing. At first, drawing our own hand without looking at it \u201cis supposed to look weird\u201d so that was fun.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
First attempts at blind contour
8B pencil in 9×11 drawing sketchbook.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Then came the admission, while physically shaking, that<\/p>\n

\u201cthe last 40ish minutes with timed gestural drawings [was] overwhelming! I almost cried! I couldn\u2019t \u201cdo it\u201d \u2013 shapes wouldn\u2019t come \u2013 where even to start? What do I choose? How? and yes\u2026 everyone else LOOKED like they were so confident and skilled\u2026 and at the end their pieces were just so varied\u2026 and it <\/span>doesn\u2019t<\/u> matter and it <\/span>does<\/u>!… Gesture seems like there was a code to crack and I couldn\u2019t figure it out\u2026. OH. MY. THIS. IS. A. LOT. Daily homework practice. Tempted, a tiny part, to back away.\u201d<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

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Best attempt at gesture drawing
Black charcoal pastel on 18×24 newsprint.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The next day, \u201crecognizing I didn\u2019t feel like I got enough from class to figure out what \u201cgesture\u201d was so I did what my students do \u2013 google! I get it now, why they do that. AND I’m also aware that what I’m finding on google might not be what this particular teacher defines as gesture. So I’m practicing, but am I practicing what I am supposed to be practicing?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Impact on understanding teaching and learning<\/strong>. This portrait illustrates the intense emotions of beginning a new course. I experienced confidence from my fluency with classroom<\/em> scripts, and comfort talking to (fellow) students. Yet asked to perform an unfamiliar discipline undermined that confidence severely, leading to intensely negative emotions. I criticized myself because I felt incapable, in part because classmates appeared confident. So often I have reminded students that classmates\u2019 appearances of confidence does not mean they are doing any better, that they might be feeling just as uncertain. Yet my confidence, too, was shaken by trying something, feeling like I was failing, and looking to others who seemed to know more. The impact on my motivation \u201cto back away\u201d was real. I didn\u2019t, perhaps because I\u2019ve learned over time that negative emotions of fear and insecurity are part of the learning process, and the worst thing to do for my future learning is to avoid practicing. Then a curious thing happened. My teacher had not given me more resources to understand, so I channeled my fragile motivation to search the internet. How often have I cautioned against internet searching, because students might find something that steers them off (my) course? Yet my motivation was there, and tenuous. If I didn\u2019t find some sort of support, I may have avoided practice out of frustration. What I found online (especially LineofAction<\/a>) became a life-line of hope by offering more detailed instructions and practice prompts. Can the textbook be that for students? What about the list of resources I have curated?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n\n\n\n
Meaning for my Practice. <\/strong>This experience (and reflecting on it) has helped me re-appreciate how important those first few days can be for students emotionally, with consequences for their beliefs about their ability, motivation to persist through the messy first steps of learning, for social dynamics in the classroom, and for resources. What has become routine and even pleasantly familiar for me is, of course, not at all routine for my students. I will re-examine my pre-class outreach and lesson plans and supplemental resources for care for the potentially widely varied and consequential emotional experiences students may have during those first days. Do and can I build in students a sense of competence and belonging from Day 1? How might I counter inclinations for demotivating self-criticism from social comparison?<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

This post is part of a series beginning with Tales of a Sabbatical: On Becoming a Student of Drawing, Part 1. For February and March 2026, I was a student in\u00a0CDSR 100 Introduction to Drawing\u00a0(Continuing Studies) at Emily Carr University Continue reading On Becoming a Student of Drawing, Part 2: Emotional Beginnings<\/span>→<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":679,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[676942,4044,4828,4144,4279,9017,5927],"class_list":["post-1901","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-drawing","tag-excitement","tag-motivation","tag-novice-expert","tag-personal-experiences","tag-sotl","tag-textbook"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/679"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1901"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1906,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1901\/revisions\/1906"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1901"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1901"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ubc.ca\/catherinerawn\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1901"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}