Do computers improve the drawing of a geometrical figure for 10?year-old children?

Nowadays, computer aided design (CAD) is widely used by designers. Would children learn to draw more easily and more efficiently if they were taught with computerised tools? To answer this question, we made an experiment designed to compare two methods for children to do the same drawing: the classical ‘pen and paper’ method and a CAD method. We asked two groups of 14 children to draw a geometrical figure: the Rey-Osterrieth Complex Figure (ROCF). The first group drew it with a pen on a sheet of paper (‘paper’ group) and the second on a computer screen with CAD software (‘computer’ group). Two drawing conditions were studied: ‘Copying’ the figure and drawing from memory. Results showed that the ‘computer’ group was better at copying the figure but that both groups performed equally well when the figure was drawn from memory. These preliminary results suggest that using a CAD tool could help children while they copy a model, but that it does not improve their ability to draw the same figure using their own, internal model.