Student Contributor -H. Larson
Art With Heart helps children who have experienced trauma express and deal with their emotions through creative expression. This organization provides tools and resources for children, adults, and even communities that need healing. Through artistic expression, this organization helps children in need of a therapeutic, healing experience.
Art with Heart helps students and communities by providing resources and artistic tools to help kids get through trauma. Specifically, they have created therapeutic activity books that children can draw in. These books have different coloring pages that encourage self-expression and allow kids to put their feelings down on paper. By partnering with this organization, teachers who work in schools with high levels of trauma can have access to a great therapeutic tool for their students, and can help make a truly great difference in a student’s life. For teachers who don’t experience a school with high trauma levels, they can still be helpful in an individual child’s life by allowing students to express their feelings through art, which can be a very beneficial thing to do.
Teachers could partner with this organization during Mental Health Awareness Month. Having students work on the activity books will help them see the importance of mental health and how we can use art to express and deal with our feelings. As a whole-school activity, this would build a greater sense of community while also teaching students to remember we all have feelings that are capable of being hurt.
