The purpose of this study was to develop a program based on the multiple intelligence theory to
promote children's ability of drawing expression, and to verify and analyze its effects and causes. The
program was prepared according to the Arts PROPEL model based on the multiple intelligence theory
focusing on the elements of art in order to achieve the objectives. The subjects of this research consisted of
40 five-year-old children(20 in the experimental group and 20 in the comparison group), over 20 times
during a 16 week period from May 11, 2012 to August 22, 2012. The multiple intelligence development
assessment scale of Shearer(1991) adapted by Kim(2001) and the drawing expression ability measurement of
Ji(2001) modified and complemented by Kim(2005) were used as the tools in this study. The collected data
were analyzed by the analysis of covariance to verify the effectiveness and the repeated measure analysis of
variance to examine the patterns of the drawing expression ability. The intelligence strengths and
weaknesses of the children were investigated and the discriminant analysis was used to examine the degree
of impact of multiple intelligence on the drawing expression ability and the interrelationships between the
multiple intelligence and the drawing expression ability. The results of this study were as follows: First, the
art program based on the multiple intelligence theory had a positive impact on the children’s drawing
expression ability and also on the knowledge of basic shapes, line merging, various colors, detailed
depiction, harmonious configuration, various shapes, representations related to topics, creativity of
representation, and the completeness of drawing, which are sub-areas of the drawing expression ability.
Second, based on the art program, the total score of the drawing expression ability was continuously
increased throughout the 5th to the 15th class and was maintained afterwards. Third, the multiple
intelligence was one of the variables to predict the drawing expression ability of children and the result
showed that spatial intelligence predicts the ability at the highest degree. This study indicates that the
systematic art programs focusing on art elements help children to reconfigure elements through the process
of reflective thinking. Also, results show that the element of spatial intelligence is most activated among the
intelligences related to the drawing expression in the process of thinking based on the multiple intelligences
which helps improve the drawing expression ability.