Children’s Identity Construction Through Drawing Colloquium Presentation

Prof. Josephine Deguara, from the Department of Early Childhood and Primary Education within the Faculty of Education, presented a paper at the International Colloquium on Children’s Rights to Participation: Children’s Voices – People Today, Not Tomorrow, held in Mdina from 19–21 November 2025. Her paper, “I drew me as a girl”: Exploring children’s identity construction through their drawings, examined how children use drawing as a powerful medium for expressing identity, agency, and emotional or existential concerns.

The presentation highlighted how children’s drawings reveal processes of gender construction and fluidity, and how they demonstrate children’s philosophical and meaning-making capacities. Prof. Deguara emphasised the importance of pedagogical listening, valuing drawings as part of children’s diverse communicative repertoires and fostering gender-inclusive practice that enables free and authentic self-expression.

The paper called for educators and other professionals working with young children, to move beyond diagnostic or normative readings of children’s drawings and instead engage in dialogic interpretation: to observe, listen, and engage with children’s meaning-making rather than categorising or judging their work.