Welcome back GUT peeps!
Last week we kicked off our games series with two kinds of collaborative circles—drawing one circle together and then taking turns drawing an object as we circled around it. How did it go??
Wrangling a group isn’t easy, but always worth the effort. From the pics in the chat, it looks like a lot of folks had fun drawing together, winning over reluctant family members and potentially creating new traditions. Those who tackled our solo variation also came up with inventive ways of playing with multiple perspectives. Awesome jobs everyone!
Now it’s onto our next game!
Draw Back!
When you were little did you ever use your finger to draw letters or shapes on a friend’s back and had them guess what you drew? How much of it did they get right and wrong? Did you end up in giggles every time? What happened when they drew on YOU? So silly, right?
Turns out the game has a name: Back Draw. (also, Back Pictionary, Draw on The Back Game, and my personal favorite, What The Heck Is That?) Part of what makes Back Draw so fun is the disconnect between what seems entirely obvious to the person doing the drawing, and how completely unclear the image is to the guesser.
I got curious about what makes it so hard to translate those physical feelings into mental shapes. And the science is fascinating!
The science behind a childhood game
We have sensory receptors all over our bodies, but some areas have a greater concentration than others. Meaning we feel more in some areas than others.
Scientists test this by touching people with two prongs at the same time and seeing how far apart those prongs need to be before we can tell they are two distinct points (rather than sensing them as one when they’re closer together). In our fingertips and lips, all it takes is for the prongs to be 2 to 8 millimeters apart. Tiny! But in less sensitive places, like the back, we might not tell the difference until there are gaps of 30-40 millimeters (just over an inch to 1.5 inches)! We literally feel more in our fingers than we do in our backs.
If you want to rope a friend or family member into a science experiment, you can try this out at home. Get two toothpicks or a pair of tweezers and use the tips to test different parts of each other to see when you start to feel the gap between the two points. If you do, report back with the results! And while they’re there with you, see if they want to do this week’s drawing game together.
For this week’s group game, you’ll need some paper, a pen, another person. A finger will come in handy, too. Also, this is a great game to play with kids! Ten out of ten, highly recommend.
Assignment: Back Draw!
We’re taking that simple childhood game and now making sure that everyone draws! This week’s game requires a partner. Of course, if you have more folks you want to invite, you all can split up into pairs or take turns.
Here’s how to do it, the DrawTogether way:
