ART THERAPY

What are the benefits of Art Therapy for children?

Art making offers a very natural form of communication for most children. As such, art therapy is often considered useful in helping children with a variety of challenging presentations such as personality and emotional disorders, speech and language disorders, childhood trauma, abuse and deprivation, grief and loss.

Some of the main benefits to using an art therapeutic approach with children include:

·  Emotional Safety - it can offer children a safe way to share their story in a non-confrontational manner.

·   Art Space - the actual space can offer children a place to explore, experiment, test boundaries, make a mess, let go, process unconscious and conscious material and reflect it back in an acceptable manner.

·  Metaphor - the use of art materials also lends itself to metaphor and symbolic language, and can be a very powerful way for children to externally express their internal feelings and sensations. Having the opportunity to externalise these feelings in a safe therapeutic space is not only playful but also allows insight into a child’s unconscious world, which would otherwise have remained hidden.

·  Tangible Reference - Creating something tangible within the sessions allows the experience to be retained and referred to later in the therapeutic process if necessary.