The necessity of including physiological exercises in thearchitecture curriculum to strengthen freehand design

Architectural design is the main course of the architecture field. Manyintroductory courses are prerequisites for the architectural design workshop. Themost central course for this purpose is “freehand” drawing and design, whichdevelops the skills of the beginner architecture student for sketching andrendering. In the “freehand drawing” workshops, we introduce the student to howto move the hand and wrist to find the most optimal and easiest way to hold thepencil and move it on the paper. These movements start from the way the fingersare placed on the pencil and the movements of the wrist and arm, and to drawlonger lines, the bending of the shoulder and waist and finally, the whole body ofthe designer is involved. On the other hand, in the field of physical nurture, wehave a field called “exercise physiology”. Physiology of physical activity throughthe science of exercise states that there are specific exercises to strengthen thephysical activities of people in various sports fields. This feature is called the“exercise specificity principle”. For example, these exercises for football playersare different from those for basketball players. Since skill fields such asarchitecture and music also deal with hand and body movements, it can behypothesized that specific physiological exercises can develop the sensory andmotor characteristics of architects for freehand drawing, and these exercises maybe different for musicians. This article conceptualizes the strengthening of thesensory and motor components of the hands of beginner architecture studentswith the help of sports science and points out the necessity of includingphysiological exercises specific to the field of architecture in their curriculum.The present research begins with a descriptive-analytical method and finallyreaches conclusions by interviewing the professors of architecture and exercisephysiology.