You didn't think I'd miss this thread, did you?
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The lure of the easy path is seductive, and I fear too many will be lulled enough that they'll lose the impetus to strive beyond the limits such paths place of your development. I don't know if I'd actually "teach" tracing, but I can see the validity of it's use in an ongoing evolution, providing you DO evolve.
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That's it
EXACTLY. To trace to learn, and only that, is one thing. It may have great validity. But I have met more than a few artists who have been "lulled" into thinking that the attractive results they achieved are theirs, and they never go beyond that. They don't evolve. And when they are confronted with this (not by me, or other artists, mind you, but confronted by their own limitations) they become angry and defensive, and more fixed in their resolve that they don't
need to evolve.
I am one of those "purists" who learned how to draw young. Drawing isn't that painful. I don't really understand all this emphasis on "struggle" and "suffering". I'm not saying that there isn't an element of frustration to learning any new skill, but drawing and painting is a joy. I don't want to spend less time with it, I want to spend more time with it. I don't want to take "short cuts", I want to draw. The more I draw, the faster I get, and the more accurate I get. I don't see how tracing would have helped me in this process.
I noticed that I usually finish my projects in art class faster than the students who traced. I don't think that was because I was more "talented", I just practiced more. Their tracing didn't give them any edge in speed. That's because they didn't practice drawing - they didn't have a sketchbook with them wherever they went. They didn't LOVE it enough. It was a chore, and they wanted to get out of it.
I learned by freehand drawing faces that I tend to make the noses too short, the mouths too wide, and the jaws too broad. I learned to correct this tendency. I think I had a better chance of learning to correct the tendency by drawing instead of tracing. But I guess that's not the area that tracing is supposedly helpful in. I'm not sure.
I attended many an art class with "older" people who were sort of "newbies". Under the right instruction, they progressed well without tracing. It is all about practice, practice, practice. I don't see how any of us can get out of that.
(I know this is long-winded. And I want to emphasize, I am not really contradicting the usefulness of tracing for certain people. But I personally am not a fan!)