Do you remember the story of the blind men and the elephant? Each man felt a certain part of the elephant and thought the elephant consisted only of the part he felt. If you want a refresher on the story, watch this video:

You can draw all kinds of moral lessons from this little fable, but that is not what we are going to do today. Just like the blind men in the story who only “saw” one small part of the elephant and let their imaginations fill in the description of the elephant, you are going to receive one small part of an image and let your imagination help you fill in the rest of the picture!

I started with a drawing of an object or animal and removed parts of the image to only reveal a portion of the whole. When you look at the part that is left, you can try to guess what the original picture was and then draw in your version of the rest of it. Even if you think you know what it started out as, you can let your imagination fly and see what you could make out of the portion drawn.

I don’t want to show you all the drawings that we made because I want your imagination to be free to create. But here is an example of one. This is the partial image:

What was this? what else could it become?

Here is what Melinda made of it:

Do you know what she drew? It is a Newton’s Cradle! I will tell you that was not what the original picture was, but it is a very creative interpretation. Way to go, Melinda!

Below is an image with all of the partial pictures. However, you can download these pdf files and print them from your computer to draw on. Each page has two partial images.
Mystery Drawing 1
Mystery Drawing 2
Mystery Drawing 3
Mystery Drawing 4
Mystery Drawing 5

Some will be easy to figure out, some may be harder. Grab your pencils! Use your imagination and have fun creating!

After you have finished your drawings, you can take a peek at the rest of the drawings Melinda and Ninja Boy made.