Drawing Tricks and Doodling Fun That Your Speech Therapy Students Will Love [Free Download]

A few years ago, a buddy of mine (hi Brian!) randomly showed me this interesting YouTube video that featured a cartoonist writing the word “boy” on a piece of paper. Then, with a few marker strokes connecting certain letters, the cartoonist turned the word “boy” into an actual cartoon drawing of a boy! It was so simple, yet so magical. After watching the video a few times, I was able to memorize the drawing trick and since learning it, I’ve shown the “boy” drawing trick to dozens and dozens of students. Kiddos seem to always get a kick out of it and they usually say things like, “Haha! So cool!”

Some students really like to draw.

When we work with children to help increase their communication abilities, it’s important for us, as speech-language pathologists, to know the likes and dislikes of our clients. Once we have this information, we’re able to create the best learning activities for our students that can perfectly coincide with their goals and objectives. Bringing it back to drawing, sometimes I’ll work with a student who truly loves to doodle. And whenever I notice a student’s love for doodling, I’ll always show him/her the “boy” drawing trick that I learned from YouTube.

Jay really liked to doodle.

One time I showed a kiddo named Jay the “boy” drawing trick. This 3rd grader was completely blown away. In fact, he was so blown away that I thought he was actually being sarcastic to me because he kept saying, “WHOA!” over and over again. But he wasn’t being sarcastic, he was serious! The drawing trick resonated with him so much that I decided to quickly go with what was exciting him in that moment. I used my spur of the moment thinking to create a therapy activity that combined the “boy” drawing trick with his current articulation goals and objectives. So for those next 30 minutes, Jay, myself, and another student, we all took turns doing the “boy” drawing trick on random index cards and then we wrote /R/ sentences that related to the “boy” cartoons we just drew. (HERE’S AN EXAMPLE)

Other doodle tricks are out there!

Ever since I’ve worked with Jay, I’ve kept my eyes peeled for other YouTube how-to videos that were similar to the “boy” drawing trick. I’ve come across a bunch recently, so I wanted to share them all with you in hopes that you might be able to introduce some of these to your students who love to doodle.

Here’s some of the coolest ones that I totally dig:

Turn the word “cat” into a cartoon cat
Turn the word “bee” into a cartoon bee
Turn the word “bear” into a cartoon bear
Turn the word “owl” into a cartoon owl
And this one YouTube account called Wordtoons is totally dedicated to these types of awesome drawing tricks
Oh, and there are some drawing tricks on YouTube where the cartoonist turns numbers into cartoons – this one’s my favorite

In closing . . .

Drawing allows all of us the opportunity to express what we’re thinking and feeling in a fun and creative way. I believe that by teaching drawing tricks to students, such as the “boy” drawing trick, kiddos have to really focus on their memory to recall the steps necessary to get from point A to point B. And if they follow and remember the directions correctly, their creation can go from a typical word to a spectacular cartoon, in no time. Seeing that transformation come to life can be something very motivating and entertaining for students on your caseload. Give this idea a go and, as always, let me know how it goes. I love hearing from each and every single one of you.

P.S. – I’ve recently created a PDF file that highlights the steps that need to be taken during the “boy” drawing trick. Feel free to download it RIGHT HERE. Use it all you want. Enjoy!