How to Draw a Dog
When kids are too young to draw very well but old enough to WANT to draw, making even the simples shapes can be frustrating. It doesn’t have to be this way.
Understanding how to draw a dog can best be accomplished by seeing it as a series of small sketches rather than an attempt to capture an entire picture at once. Children have trouble drawing things like dogs, because they have complicated facial features — for some reason, a dog’s mouth is particularly hard to draw for kids.
Drawing Dogs & Puppies
Drawing dogs & puppies doesn’t have to be a hassle — here is a simple method for drawing a cartoon dog in just eight steps.
- Start your drawing of a dog by drawing a small stick figure (with small legs and no arms) in the center of your paper. This “stick figure” will become the nose and mouth after a few details are added. Teaching a child to draw a dog using simpler examples is the best way to go about it, as they don’t get overwhelmed or too caught up in drawing an “accurate” dog.
- Next draw three dots on each side of the stick figure. These dots will eventually represent the dog’s whiskers. In general, the three dots form a triangle shape on each side of the dog’s nose, though you can be creative and put as many whiskers in as many places as you want.
- Now it is time to draw the dog’s muzzle. This is a large circle that will become the dog’s entire “face”. Draw a big circle around the stick figure and dots, making sure that none of the stick’s body parts or dots touch the bigger circle.
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To draw your dog’s eyes, draw two half circles attached to the top of the main circle. For a clearer explanation — these half circles will represent “eyes”, and should be almost touching each other but not quite. They will look something like headstones sticking out of the top of the dog’s circular “head”.
- The dog’s head needs a top, so draw a semi-circle around the “eyes” you’ve just drawn. This will be the top of the head and the rest of the dog’s face.
- You can’t see without pupils, so it is time to add pupils to your dog’s face. Make two small dots in the center of the dog’s eyes for pupils. You can make them any color or size you want.
- What else is missing? The dog’s ears! Dog’s ears are the msot fun part — you can put any kind of ears you want on your dog — point, floppy, big, little, anything you want. Dog’s ears come in all shapes and sizes, so be creative.
- You can add a few special touches to your dog if you want — a waggly tongue, spots, extra whiskers, maybe even a collar and a leash or a bone to play with. Use your imagination.
Now that you’ve learned to draw a dog, practice other animals using the same principles. Soon you’ll have an entire barnyard of animal friends.