The shades of my world: Inside out!

TIME

16.00 – 17.30, 2 September

GOAL

The workshop aims to connect arts, play, and education for children’s and young adults’ wellbeing – to help them manage the emotional imbalance and mitigate possible post-trauma.

CHALLENGE

Current studies (Brooks et al., 2020, Grabbe et. al., 2020) have shared concerns on the urgency to focus on children’s well-being and mental health that may be influenced by the social isolation during lockdown.

Based on the result of rapid peer reviewed study, it shows that the separation periods of children with their friends (and deprived of play sessions) could lead to the loneliness feeling. The study shows the association of the duration of loneliness with the potency of future mental health of children or young people that could last for at least 9 years (University of Bath, 2020). There is also high possibility for children or young adults to grow a post-traumatic disorder after the lockdown. Reports of mental health issues mention that the fact of hiding emotions, the lack of listening and interaction can increase the mental health problems of children.
Expressing deep emotions, anxiety and scare in different ‘languages’ and sharing as well as empathising with others’ feelings and thoughts are the aim, also the main challenge of the workshop. Arts and play are used as the healing tool for possible trauma that may appear during and after the lockdown periods.

OBJECTIVE

1. To help participants acknowledge and express their emotions in different ‘languages’ through artworks and playful behaviors. To manage imbalance emotions, participants need to identify their current emotions and what have been affecting their current situation – things, people, situation, and so on.
2. To feel and accept the emotions. Behind each arts work is the world of thoughts and feelings. Emotions are natural and always there in our life, even sometimes they can bring uncomfortable feelings. Therefore, it is suggested to listen to and accept emotions as a fundamental part of our life.
3. To experience diverse perspectives to see a problem and different emotions. Behind each arts work is a perspective and feelings. Reading a poem or enjoying a painting or listening to a song is a way of interaction, listening to others’ points of views and emotions.
4. To understand the principle of ‘no penalty zone’ for arts work, meaning that each arts work is respected and listened to.
5. To put oneself in other shoes, in the feelings and thinking of other arts work.
6. To be able to work together in team.

OUTCOMES

TANGIBLE

There are some takeaways that participants can get from this workshop, one of them is the artworks. The artworks they produce during the session. This artwork will remind them about the process of acknowledging and accepting feelings /and perhaps the challenges they face during the process itself.
The workshop can help to create a local online gallery or a gallery in a council, schools, and churches where children can share their emotions and thinking.

INTANGIBLE

The knowledge that participants gain from the workshop include the idea that ‘arts as no penalty zone’, ‘the six thinking hats’, and ‘the mobility and play spaces mapping’. The participants will discuss about the role of arts with education, especially for children’s wellbeing and mental health; and how to promote arts for children to improve their wellbeing.

BRIEF OUTLINE / METHODOLOGY

A. Opening – 10 minutes

B. Main part:
Session 1 (Individual work): Topic and medium selection – Arts work (30 minutes).
Expressing different topics with natural and waste resources.

1. Chooses one topic, resources to express their thoughts and feelings, or events that are reminded from the topic.
2. Show arts products.
3. Write three words that they imagine from the artwork that they like. Imagine that behind each artwork is a story related to a character. The three words are the three objects that can define the characteristics or personality of the character in the story.
4. Build a story with the words together in the whole group.
5. Share their impression, the feelings and thoughts when seeing each artwork.
6. Then the author of the artworks explains about it.
7. Discussing about ‘arts as no penalty zone’ and how to promote it.

Session 2 (a family group-work): Design your holiday home or a lockdown party. (30 mins)
Each participant is encouraged to invite family members to join the activity. In a team, locate each of family member’s favourite spaces. What do they usually do there? With whom? What do they feel when they spend time there? Then make a map description.

Additional information for participants

The participants who would like to join the workshop are expected the to have prior knowledge of using any collaborative-design/draw applications (e.g. Jamboard and Google White-board).

AUDIENCE

The participants of this workshop are primary pupils, secondary pupils, and teachers especially for the ones who love arts and want to share emotions and thoughts inside themselves.