ART AT NEW PARK

At New Park, we value the emotional needs of our children and young people and offer therapeutic art to all children in all year groups.  Therapeutic Art is a form of psychotherapy that uses art-making as a form of expression and communication for young people experiencing difficulties in their lives. The teacher supports the art-making process without necessarily directing what the child does, but helps the individual gain insight into feelings through observing and reflecting. By working through complex feeling therapeutic art can help children and young people gain an insight into issues which trouble them.  This can help them resolve concerns, develop their understanding and manage their feelings. This will reduce stress, improve self-esteem and help children and young people feel better about themselves.

Therapeutic Art is used with pupils to assess and treat:

• Anxiety, depression and other mental/emotional problems
• Mental illness
• Substance abuse and other addictions
• Family and relationship issues
• Abuse and domestic violence
• Social/emotional difficulties related to disability or illness
• Personal trauma, post-traumatic stress disorder and loss
• Physical, cognitive and neurological problems
• Psychosocial difficulties related to medical illness
• Improve concentration and academic achievement

Therapeutic art sessions take place on a weekly basis for an initial period of 6 weeks but can be extended if required, in a safe and supportive environment. Through art-making pupils are able to explore their feelings and concerns that may find to be confusing and hard to put into words so by encouraging play and experimentation with art materials this will lead to self-expression and development of a trusting relationship where the child feels safe enough to think about and explore changes that they would like to make.

Below are some examples of the pupils work :-