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When i was setting up my exhibition, i was a little scared at first, i had no idea what was going to happen when someone actually walked up to me, So you could expect that i was a little scared when someone actually started asking questions about my my exhibition topic.

I got lots of people coming to my station and asking me questions. I did not put my jars of coloring sheets out for people to see, those two things would take up to much space since i was dealing with such a small table. The only thing i put up was my artifact, my hand out sheets and my "draw on me" page. When someone finally came up to me and started asking questions i did not prepare for, my only option was for me to just start thinking on the spot.

I think the one thing that will help me when i progress into high school is to not over worry about whats happening.  The one thing i am proud of is that i have defintly became for confident in my self. I have completed all of my leaner profile skills and i could not be happier!

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Year 6 PYP Exhibition - 2023 Year 6 PYP Exhibition

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Year 6 PYP Exhibition - "Exploration leads to understanding, understanding leads to action, and action leads to change."

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Last term me and some of my classmates made a survey regarding our topics, I did not really know how i should feel about this. The rest of year 6 also did a survey, And then we would all do the survey set up by year 6.
I'm so sorry you have no idea what i'm talking about. You should go ask one of the teachers in the room, not me lol.

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Easily create surveys and polls to collect customer feedback, measure employee satisfaction, and organize team events.

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If you wanna know were i got my imigarws are from then just click the thing below 

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If you wanna know were i got my imigarws are from then just click the thing below 

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it was a pain to do this so please do not walk up to my desk and say that my referencing is wrong. I could not care less.

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I’m inquiring into ways art can be therapeutic 

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I’m inquiring into ways art can be therapeutic 

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I’m inquiring into young peoples mental health 

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I’m inquiring into young peoples mental health 

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This website has accurtate infomation on childrens mentel health, to 4-19 years old. I reccomend it if you suspect that your child may have some issues, read ths!

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Growing up is not easy and at each stage of development, from pre-primary, right through to the teen years, there are challenges that will test a child's emotional and mental health.

Promoting good mental health in children, teenagers and young people will help them build lasting relationships, communicate effectively, and adapt to change as they grow into adults. If your child is dealing with a mental health issue, it is important to know who you can talk to and where you can get help.

Pre-primary children and mental health

When talking about mental health in pre-primary children, the focus is not so much about looking for signs of mental illness, but rather about creating a secure environment for your child to develop at their own pace. By making sure your child feels safe and loved, you give them the best opportunity to develop the social skills they need to get through life.

As they grow and get ready for their school years they will learn how to:

express and control their emotions

communicate their needs and interests

behave the right way in different situations

form friendships and work together with others

resolve conflicts.

Encourage good mental health in your child by actively listening to them, giving them lots of free play time, rewarding good behaviour, being affectionate and also sharing your own emotions.

Where to get help

All children develop at different rates and cope differently with the challenges of growing up. Some are more anxious or shy, while others may be irritable or misbehave more than children normally do. If you are concerned about the mental health of your child because of worrying behaviour, there are places you can turn to for help.

A good place to start is to speak to your doctor or maternal health nurse about your concerns. They will be able to talk through some of the developmental issues that might be contributing to bad behaviour and will also be able to suggest further mental health support services.

For more information, make use of Victoria's various parenting helplines and websites, including:

- provides online programs for parents and carers to support children's mental health, wellbeing and development. is a program for parents of toddlers to 12-year-olds - providing tips and strategies to positively influence your child's development, emotional regulation, and wellbeing.

Primary school children and mental health

Children between the ages of five and ten go through a lot of changes as they adjust to life at school and spending long periods of time away from their parents.

If you are concerned about how your child is coping with these changes, it is a good idea to talk to them about it and get help if you do not know what to do.

Your child may be struggling with shyness, separation anxiety, peer pressure, bullying, or even a behavioural disorder such as oppositional defiant disorder (ODD), conduct disorder (CD) or attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).

Where to get help

Speak to your doctor and the school counsellor about any concerns you have. They can give you advice on other ways of communicating with your child and also refer you to mental health support services such as child psychologists or child psychiatrists if needed.

is a great option for kids who do not feel comfortable talking about their feelings to you or other family members. They can call 1800 55 1800 for free counselling and advice.

Other places to find helpful advice and information include:

- call (or for rural callers)

Australian Psychological Society, - call or .

Pre-teen children and mental health

As you move towards your teenage years and high school, you will have to deal with pressures that you might not have experienced before such as issues with your body image, social media experiences and sexual development. It can be hard to make sense of all the changes that are going on around you.

Where to get help

Sometimes you will want to talk to your family or friends about what you are going through, and other times you will want to talk to someone who isn't close to you.

Talk to your school counsellor or local doctor if you need help. Your conversations with them are private and they will be able to direct you to further support if you need it.

If you need to talk to someone right away, contact The Kids Help Line on , 24 hours a day, seven days a week. For online counselling and email support, visit the .

Teenagers, youth and mental health

Some teenagers experience mental health issues and illness. Teenagers can experience bouts of depression and anxiety, have problems with bullying, peer pressure or drugs and alcohol. The most important thing is to have someone to turn to when you need help.

Where to get help

Start by talking to your family and friends about what you are feeling. If you would rather speak to someone you do not know, try talking to your school counsellor or local doctor. Your conversations with them are private and they will be able to direct you to further support, through mental health support services such as a psychologist or psychiatrist.

If you are living with, or caring for, a family member with a mental illness, contact on or visit the website for information and support.

For crisis support, phone and web counselling, and mental health information contact one of the mental health support services listed below:

- Headspace is the National Youth Mental Health Foundation providing early intervention mental health services to 12-25 year olds.

- visit their website for information, tools and support for young people with mental health issues.

- call for free telephone counselling or visit their website for information, resources and support for young people with depression or anxiety.

Pop-up community mental health services are opening across Victoria, providing a first point of call for those looking for mental health counselling and wellbeing support. The helpline is currently supporting access to the pop-ups. If you, a friend, or family member needs support call .

Where to get help

Your

Your counsellor

Telephone helplines

Internet forums

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Children, young people and mental health services

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Growing up is not easy and at each stage of development, from pre-primary right through to the teen years, there are challenges that will test a child's emotional and mental health.

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I know that this website is all the way in america, which is a very long way from Australia, but i think that this is a good example on how art is a good way for children to heal.

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Designed to help heal psychological wounds and taught by 12 mental health professionals, the Share and Care program is a resource for kids who have witnessed or experienced gang violence, bullying, loss and grief, domestic abuse, suicide, homelessness, drug abuse, and other trauma.

Classmates who are indirect victims of these incidents are also welcome. Through the program, kids learn various coping strategies, including anger management and valuable interpersonal skills.

The Share and Care program reaches kids in part through art therapy that helps them discuss and deal with upsetting life events. Art therapy teaches kids how to express and understand emotions through art. It can be especially beneficial for children who are unable to verbalize their feelings.

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Designed to help heal psychological wounds and taught by mental health professionals, the Cedars-Sinai Share and Care program is a resource to help kids who have experienced trauma.

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I'm planning to create a sculpture. I will get some air dry clay and show how I can express emotions through art, mainly criticism

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During the holidays i actually finished my artifacts, The only problem is that its at my house. I tried doing a drawing explaining what it looks like it detail.

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For my table, I want to take reference from "artist alleys" I thought it looks kind of cool. I don't want to bombarded my table with posters. I want it to have a modern and more minamulist vibe towards my table.

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I’m inquiring into how we can express emotions through art 

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I’m inquiring into how we can express emotions through art 

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The main objective of criticism is to improve someones work. But to much criticism can ruin someones self esteem and confidence, this could hurt a child so much that they can start seeing there work a mess.
When a child takes time on a research document, the best thing you can do is praise them, I think its good giving people feedback, however its no good saying that someones work is under the limits of a child in there grade. Saying to a child that they can do better in there grade can make a child feel even worse about them selves.

This could impacts the child's future in a bad way. They might doubt there selves and there work. I thought that they work that there doing is not good enough. Lets say your a child who is not as smart as the other students in your class, and you had a assessment that you were actually passionate about, Once you finally finish the assessment, you show it to your classmates. And the only thing they really say to you is "You can do better" All in different words. The more a child progress through there lives that though might be surrounding that persons head.
The best thing you can do is give advice when they ask.

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How Does Art Therapy Heal the Soul? | The Science of Happiness

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Children can see lots of things in there lives, that might be having a good laugh or seeing someone get attacked by a bin chicken. Funny moments like those that shape peoples childhood.
What happens when i a child sees something that might scare them, i don't mean like seeing a scary movie.  Seeing someone getting hurt in a grusome way, or seeing there house fall apart. The moments the stick to people. The bad moments that stick like glue in a child's brain. That is a example of what trauma is.
How can one heal from trauma? One of the few ways is actully my exhibition topic, art thearpy!

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Words have a big impact, more specifiable on children. Being exposed to violence of harm can affect the child for a long time. It can get so bad that the hurtful words start to define who they are as a person. In this video you can see child like handwriting with hurtful words. I'm guessing that this is coming from bad parents, And warning parents that what they might say to there child can last a long time.

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"Word Pictures" Child Abuse PSA Ad Council 1989

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i wish i could have both of the prints (◞‸◟ㆀ)

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Abstract

Art therapy, as a non-pharmacological medical complementary and alternative therapy, has been used as one of medical interventions with good clinical effects on mental disorders. However, systematically reviewed in detail in clinical situations is lacking. Here, we searched on PubMed for art therapy in an attempt to explore its theoretical basis, clinical applications, and future perspectives to summary its global pictures. Since drawings and paintings have been historically recognized as a useful part of therapeutic processes in art therapy, we focused on studies of art therapy which mainly includes painting and drawing as media. As a result, a total of 413 literature were identified. After carefully reading full articles, we found that art therapy has been gradually and successfully used for patients with mental disorders with positive outcomes, mainly reducing suffering from mental symptoms. These disorders mainly include depression disorders and anxiety, cognitive impairment and dementias, Alzheimer's disease, schizophrenia, and autism. These findings suggest that art therapy can not only be served as an useful therapeutic method to assist patients to open up and share their feelings, views, and experiences, but also as an auxiliary treatment for diagnosing diseases to help medical specialists obtain complementary information different from conventional tests. We humbly believe that art therapy has great potential in clinical applications on mental disorders to be further explored.

Keywords: painting, art therapy, mental disorders, clinical applications, medical interventions

Introduction

Mental disorders constitute a huge social and economic burden for health care systems worldwide ( Zschucke et al., 2013; Kenbubpha et al., 2018). In China, the lifetime prevalence of mental disorders was 24.20%, and 1-month prevalence of mental disorders was 14.27% ( Xu et al., 2017). The situation is more severely in other countries, especially for developing ones. Given the large numbers of people in need and the humanitarian imperative to reduce suffering, there is an urgent need to implement scalable mental health interventions to address this burden. While pharmacological treatment is the first choice for mental disorders to alleviate the major symptoms, many antipsychotics contribute to poor quality of life and debilitating adverse effects. Therefore, clinicians have turned toward to complementary treatments, such as art therapy in addressing the health needs of patients more than half a century ago.

Art therapy, is defined by the British Association of Art Therapists as: "a form of psychotherapy that uses art media as its primary mode of expression and communication. Clients referred to art therapists are not required to have experience or skills in the arts. The art therapist's primary concern is not to make an esthetic or diagnostic assessment of the client's image. The overall goal of its practitioners is to enable clients to change and grow on a personal level through the use of artistic materials in a safe and convenient environment" ( British Association of Art Therapists, 2015), whereas as: "an integrative mental health and human services profession that enriches the lives of individuals, families, and communities through active art-making, creative process, applied psychological theory, and human experience within a psycho-therapeutic relationship" ( American Art Therapy Association, 2018) according to the American Art Association. It has gradually become a well-known form of spiritual support and complementary therapy ( Faller and Schmidt, 2004; Nainis et al., 2006). During the therapy, art therapists can utilize many different art materials as media (i.e., visual art, painting, drawing, music, dance, drama, and writing) ( Deshmukh et al., 2018; Chiang et al., 2019). Among them, drawings and paintings have been historically recognized as the most useful part of therapeutic processes within psychiatric and psychological specialties ( British Association of Art Therapists, 2015). Moreover, many other art forms gradually fall under the prevue of their own professions (e.g., music therapy, dance/movement therapy, and drama therapy) ( Deshmukh et al., 2018). Thus, we excluded these studies and only focused on studies of art therapy which mainly includes painting and drawing as media. Specifically, it focuses on capturing psychodynamic processes by means of "inner pictures," which become visible by the creative process ( Steinbauer et al., 1999). These pictures reflect the psychopathology of different psychiatric disorders and even their corresponding therapeutic process based on specific rules and criterion ( Steinbauer and Taucher, 2001). It has been gradually recognized and used as an alternative treatment for therapeutic processes within psychiatric and psychological specialties, as well as medical and neurology-based scientific audiences ( Burton, 2009).

The development of art therapy comes partly from the artistic expression of the belief in unspoken things, and partly from the clinical work of art therapists in the medical setting with various groups of patients ( Malchiodi, 2013). It is defined as the application of artistic expressions and images to individuals who are physically ill, undergoing invasive medical procedures, such as surgery or chemotherapy for clinical usage ( Bar-Sela et al., 2007; Forzoni et al., 2010; Liebmann and Weston, 2015). The American Art Therapy Association describes its main functions as improving cognitive and sensorimotor functions, fostering self-esteem and self-awareness, cultivating emotional resilience, promoting insight, enhancing social skills, reducing and resolving conflicts and distress, and promoting societal and ecological changes ( American Art Therapy Association, 2018).

However, despite the above advantages, published systematically review on this topic is lacking. Therefore, this review aims to explore its clinical applications and future perspectives to summary its global pictures, so as to provide more clinical treatment options and research directions for therapists and researchers.

Publications of Art Therapy

The literatures about "art therapy" published from January 2006 to December 2020 were searched in the PubMed database. The following topics were used: Title/Abstract = "art therapy," Indexes Timespan = 2006-2020.

A total of 652 records were found. Then, we manually screened out the literatures that contained the word "art" but was not relevant with the subject of this study, such as state of the art therapy, antiretroviral therapy (ART), and assisted reproductive technology (ART). Finally, 479 records about art therapy were identified. Since we aimed to focus on art therapy included painting and drawing as major media, we screened out literatures deeper, and identified 413 (84%) literatures involved in painting and drawing ( Figure 1 ).

As we can see, the number of literature about art therapy is increasing slowly in the last 15 years, reaching a peak in 2020. This indicates that more effort was made on this topic in recent years ( Figure 1 ).

Overview of Art Therapy

As defined by the British Association of Art Therapists, art therapy is a form of psychotherapy that uses art media as its primary mode of communication. Based on above literature, several highlights need to be summarized. (1) The main media of art therapy include painting, drawing, music, drama, dance, drama, and writing ( Chiang et al., 2019). (2) Main contents of painting and drawing include blind drawing, spiral drawing, drawing moods and self-portraits ( Legrand et al., 2017; Abbing et al., 2018; Papangelo et al., 2020). (3) Art therapy is mainly used for cancer, depression and anxiety, autism, dementia and cognitive impairment, as these patients are reluctant to express themselves in words ( Attard and Larkin, 2016; Deshmukh et al., 2018; Chiang et al., 2019). It plays an important role in facilitating engagement when direct verbal interaction becomes difficult, and provides a safe and indirect way to connect oneself with others ( Papangelo et al., 2020). Moreover, we found that art therapy has been gradually and successfully used for patients with mental disorders with positive outcomes, mainly reducing suffering from mental symptoms. These findings suggest that art therapy can not only be served as an useful therapeutic method to assist patients to open up and share their feelings, views, and experiences, but also as an auxiliary treatment for diagnosing diseases to help medical specialists obtain complementary information different from conventional tests.

Art Therapy for Mental Disorders

Based on the 413 searched literatures, we further limited them to mental disorders using the following key words, respectively: Depression OR anxiety OR Cognitive impairment OR dementia OR Alzheimer's disease OR Autism OR Schizophrenia OR mental disorder. As a result, a total of 23 studies (5%) ( Table 1 ) were included and classified after reading the abstract and the full text carefully. These studies include 9 articles on depression and anxiety, 4 articles on cognitive impairment and dementia, 3 articles on Alzheimer's disease, 3 articles on autism, and 4 articles on schizophrenia. In addition to the English literature, in fact, some Chinese literatures also described the application of art therapy in mental diseases, which were not listed but referred to in the following specific literatures.

TABLE 1

Type of diseases/author and year

Country

Number (painting)

Treatment

Subjects

Main results

Depression and anxiety

Cognitive impairment, and dementia

Alzheimer's disease

Autism

Schizophrenia

Depression Disorders and Anxiety

Depression and anxiety disorders are highly prevalent, affecting individuals, their families and the individual's role in society ( Birgitta et al., 2018). Depression is a disabling and costly condition associated with a significant reduction in quality of life, medical comorbidities and mortality ( Demyttenaere et al., 2004; Whiteford et al., 2013; Cuijpers et al., 2014). Anxiety is associated with lower quality of life and negative effects on psychosocial functioning ( Cramer et al., 2005). Medication is the most commonly used effective way to relieve symptoms of depression and anxiety. However, nonadherence are crucial shortcomings in using antidepressant to treat depression and anxiety ( van Geffen et al., 2007; Nielsen et al., 2019).

In recent years, many studies have shown that art therapy plays a significant role in alleviating depression symptoms and anxiety. Gussak (2007) performed an observational survey about populations in prison of northern Florida and identified that art therapy significantly reduces depressive symptoms. Similarly, a randomized, controlled, and single-blind study about art therapy for depression with the elderly showed that painting as an adjuvant treatment for depression can reduce depressive and anxiety symptoms ( Ciasca et al., 2018). In addition, art therapy is also widely used among students, and several studies ( Runde, 2008; Zhenhai and Yunhua, 2011) have shown that art therapy also significantly reduces depressive symptoms in students. For example, Wang et al. (2011) conducted group painting therapy on 30 patients with depression for 3 months, and found that painting therapy could promote their social function recovery, improve their social adaptability and quality of life. Another randomized clinical trial also showed that it could decrease mean anxiety scores in the 3-12 year painting group ( Forouzandeh et al., 2020).

Studies have shown that distress, including anxiety and depression, is related to poorer health-related quality of life and satisfaction to medical services ( Hamer et al., 2009). Painting can be employed to express patients' anxiety and fear, vent negative emotions by applying projection, thereby significantly improve the mood and reduce symptoms of depression and anxiety of cancer patients. A number of studies ( Bar-Sela et al., 2007; Thyme et al., 2009; Lin et al., 2012; Abdulah and Abdulla, 2018) showed that art therapy for cancer patients could enhance the vitality of patients and participation in social activities, significantly reduce depression, anxiety, and reduce stressful feelings. Importantly, even in the follow-up period, art therapy still has a lasting effect on cancer patients ( Thyme et al., 2009). Interestingly, art therapy based on famous painting appreciation could also significantly reduce anxiety and depression associated with cancer ( Lee et al., 2017). Among cancer patients treated in outpatient health care, art therapy also plays an important role in alleviating their physical symptoms and mental health ( Götze et al., 2009). Therefore, art therapy as an auxiliary treatment of cancer is of great value in improving quality of life.

Overall, art painting therapy permits patients to express themselves in a manner acceptable to the inside and outside culture, thereby diminishing depressed and anxiety symptoms.

Cognitive Impairment, and Dementia

Dementia, a progressive clinical syndrome, is characterized by widespread cognitive impairment in memory, thinking, behavior, emotion and performance, leading to worse daily living ( Deshmukh et al., 2018). According to the Alzheimer's Disease International 2015, there is 46.8 million people suffered from dementia, and numbers almost doubling every 20 years, rising to 131.5 million by 2050. Although art therapy has been used as an alternative treatment for the dementia for long time, the positive effects of painting therapy on cognitive function remain largely unknown. One intervention assigned older adults patients with dementia to a group-based art therapy (including painting) observed significant improvements in the clock drawing test ( Pike, 2013), whereas two other randomized controlled trials ( Hattori et al., 2011; Rusted et al., 2016) on patients with dementia have failed to obtain significant cognitive improvement in the painting group. Moreover, a cochrane systematic review ( Deshmukh et al., 2018) included two clinical studies of art therapy for dementia revealed that there is no sufficient evidence about the efficacy of art therapy for dementia. This may be because patients with severely cognitive impairment, who was unable to accurately remember or assess their own behavior or mental state, might lose the ability to enjoy the benefits of art therapy.

In summary, we should intervene earlier in patients with mild cognitive impairment, an intermediate stage between normal aging and dementia, in order to prevent further transformation into dementia. To date, mild cognitive impairment is drawing much attention to the importance of painting intervening at this stage in order to alter the course of subsequent cognitive decline as soon as possible ( Petersen et al., 2014). Recently, a randomized controlled trial ( Yu et al., 2021) showed significant relationship between improvement immediate memory/working memory span and increased cortical thickness in right middle frontal gyrus in the painting art group. With the long-term cognitive stimulation and engagement from multiple sessions of painting therapy, it is likely that painting therapy could lead to enhanced cognitive functioning for these patients.

Alzheimer's Disease

Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a sub-type of dementia, which is usually associated with chronic pain. Previous studies suggested that art therapy could be used as a complementary treatment to relief pain for these patients since medication might induce severely side effects. In a multicenter randomized controlled trial, 28 mild AD patients showed significant pain reduction, reduced anxiety, improved quality of life, improved digit span, and inhibitory processes, as well as reduced depression symptoms after 12-week painting ( Pongan et al., 2017; Alvarenga et al., 2018). Further study also suggested that individual therapy rather than group therapy could be more optimal since neuroticism can decrease efficacy of painting intervention on pain in patients with mild AD. In addition to release chronic pain, art therapy has been reported to show positive effects on cognitive and psychological symptoms in patients with mild AD. For example, a controlled study revealed significant improvement in the apathy scale and quality of life after 12 weeks of painting treatment mainly including color abstract patterns with pastel crayons or water-based paint ( Hattori et al., 2011). Another study also revealed that AD patients showed improvement in facial expression, discourse content and mood after 3-weeks painting intervention ( Narme et al., 2012).

Schizophrenia

Schizophrenia is a complex functional psychotic mental illness that affects about 1% of the population at some point in their life ( Kolliakou et al., 2011). Not only do sufferers experience "positive" symptoms such as hallucinations, delusions, but also experience negative symptoms such as varying degrees of anhedonia and asociality, impaired working memory and attention, poverty of speech, and lack of motivation ( Andreasen and Olsen, 1982). Many patients with schizophrenia remain symptomatic despite pharmacotherapy, and even attempts to suicide with a rate of 10 to 50% ( De Sousa et al., 2020). For these patients, art therapy is highly recommended to process emotional, cognitive and psychotic experiences to release symptoms. Indeed, many forms of art therapy have been successfully used in schizophrenia, whether and how painting may interfere with psychopathology to release symptoms remains largely unknown.

A recent review including 20 studies overall was performed to summary findings, however, concluded that it is not clear whether art therapy leads to clinical improvement in schizophrenia with low ( Ruiz et al., 2017). Anyway, many randomized clinical trials reported positive outcomes. For example, Richardson et al. (2007) conducted painting therapy for six months in patients with chronic schizophrenia and found that art therapy had a positive effect on negative symptoms. Teglbjaerg (2011) examined experience of each patient using interviews and written evaluations before and after painting therapy and at a 1-year follow-up and found that group painting therapy in patients with schizophrenia could not only reduce psychotic symptoms, but also boost self-esteem and improve social function.

What's more, the characteristics of the painting can also be used to judge the health condition in patients with schizophrenia. For example, Hongxia et al. (2013) explored the correlation between psychological health condition and characteristics of House-Tree-Person tests for patients with schizophrenia, and showed that the detail characteristic of the test results can be used to judge the patient's anxiety, depression, and obsessive-compulsive symptoms.

Most importantly, several other studies showed that drug plus painting therapy significantly enhanced patient compliance and self-cognition than drug therapy alone in patients with schizophrenia ( Hongyan and JinJie, 2010; Min, 2010).

Autism

Autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is a heterogeneous neurodevelopmental syndrome with no unified pathological or neurobiological etiology, which is characterized by difficulties in social interaction, communication problems, and a tendency to engage in repetitive behaviors ( Geschwind and Levitt, 2007).

Art therapy is a form of expression that opens the door to communication without verbal interaction. It provides therapists with the opportunity to interact one-on-one with individuals with autism, and make broad connections in a more comfortable and effective way ( Babaei et al., 2020). Emery (2004) did a case study about a 6-year-old boy diagnosed with autism and found that art therapy is of great value to the development, growth and communication skills of the boy. Recently, one study ( Jalambadani, 2020) using 40 children with ASD participating in painting therapy showed that painting therapy had a significant improvement in the social interactions, adaptive behaviors and emotions. Therefore, encouraging children with ASD to express their experience by using nonverbal expressions is crucial to their development. Evans and Dubowski (2001) believed that creating images on paper could help children express their internal images, thereby enhance their imagination and abstract thinking. Painting can also help autistic children express and vent negative emotions and thereby bring positive emotional experience and promote their self-consciousness ( Martin, 2009). According to two studies ( Wen and Zhaoming, 2009; Jianhua and Xiaolu, 2013) in China, Art therapy could also improve the language and communication skills, cognitive and behavioral performance of children with ASD.

Moreover, art therapy could be used to investigate the relationship between cognitive processes and imagination in children with ASD. One study ( Wen and Zhaoming, 2009; Jianhua and Xiaolu, 2013) suggested that children with ASD apply a unique cognitive strategy in imaginative drawing. Another study ( Low et al., 2009) examined the cognitive underpinnings of spontaneous imagination in children with ASD and showed that ASD group lacks imagination, generative ability, planning ability and good consistency in their drawings. In addition, several studies ( Leevers and Harris, 1998; Craig and Baron-Cohen, 1999; Craig et al., 2001) have been performed to investigate imagination and creativity of autism via drawing tasks, and showed impairments of autism in imagination and creativity via drawing tasks.

In a word, art therapy plays a significant role in children with ASD, not only as a method of treatment, but also in understanding and investigating patients' problems.

Other Applications

In addition to the above mentioned diseases, art therapy has also been adopted in other applications. Dysarthia is a common sequela of cerebral palsy (CP), which directly affects children's language intelligibility and psycho-social adjustment. Speech therapy does not always help CP children to speak more intelligibly. Interestingly, the art therapy can significantly improve the language intelligibility and their social skills for children with CP ( Wilk et al., 2010).

In brief, these studies suggest that art therapy is meaningful and accepted by both patients and therapists. Most often, art therapy could strengthen patient's emotional expression, self-esteem, and self-awareness. However, our findings are based on relatively small samples and few good-quality qualitative studies, and require cautious interpretation.

The Application Prospects of Art Therapy

With the development of modern medical technology, life expectancy is also increasing. At the same time, it also brings some side effects and psychological problems during the treatment process, especially for patients with mental illness. Therefore, there is an increasing demand for finding appropriate complementary therapies to improve life quality of patients and psychological health. Art therapy is primarily offered as individual art therapy, in this review, we found that art therapy was most commonly used for depression and anxiety.

Based on the above findings, art therapy, as a non-verbal psychotherapy method, not only serves as an auxiliary tool for diagnosing diseases, which helps medical specialists obtain much information that is difficult to gain from conventional tests, judge the severity and progression of diseases, and understand patients' psychological state from painting characteristics, but also is an useful therapeutic method, which helps patients open up and share their feelings, views, and experiences. Additionally, the implementation of art therapy is not limited by age, language, diseases or environment, and is easy to be accepted by patients.

Art therapy in hospitals and clinical settings could be very helpful to aid treatment and therapy, and to enhance communications between patients and on-site medical staffs in a non-verbal way. Moreover, art therapy could be more effective when combined with other forms of therapy such as music, dance and other sensory stimuli.

The medical mechanism underlying art therapy using painting as the medium for intervention remains largely unclear in the literature ( Salmon, 1993; Broadbent et al., 2004; Guillemin, 2004), and the evidence for effectiveness is insufficient ( Mirabella, 2015). Although a number of studies have shown that art therapy could improve the quality of life and mental health of patients, standard and rigorous clinical trials with large samples are still lacking. Moreover, the long-term effect is yet to be assessed due to the lack of follow-up assessment of art therapy.

In some cases, art therapy using painting as the medium may be difficult to be implemented in hospitals, due to medical and health regulations (may be partly due to potential of messes, lack of sink and cleaning space for proper disposal of paints, storage of paints, and toxins of allergens in the paint), insufficient space for the artwork to dry without getting in the way or getting damaged, and negative medical settings and family environments. Nevertheless, these difficulties can be overcome due to great benefits of the art therapy. We thus humbly believe that art therapy has great potential for mental disorders.

In the future, art therapy may be more thoroughly investigated in the following directions. First, more high-quality clinical trials should be carried out to gain more reliable and rigorous evidence. Second, the evaluation methods for the effectiveness of art therapy need to be as diverse as possible. It is necessary for the investigation to include not only subjective scale evaluations, but also objective means such as brain imaging and hematological examinations to be more convincing. Third, it will be helpful to specify the details of the art therapy and patients for objective comparisons, including types of diseases, painting methods, required qualifications of the therapist to perform the art therapy, and the theoretical basis and mechanism of the therapy. This practice should be continuously promoted in both hospitals and communities. Fourth, guidelines about art therapy should be gradually formed on the basis of accumulated evidence. Finally, mechanism of art therapy should be further investigated in a variety of ways, such as at the neurological, cellular, and molecular levels.

Author Contributions

JH designed the whole study, analyzed the data, and wrote the manuscript. JZ searched for selected the studies. LH participated in the interpretation of data. HY and JX offered good suggestions. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.

Conflict of Interest

The authors declare that the research was conducted in the absence of any commercial or financial relationships that could be construed as a potential conflict of interest.

Publisher's Note

All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article, or claim that may be made by its manufacturer, is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.

Footnotes

Funding. This study was financially supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (2019YFC1712200), International standards research on clinical research and service of Acupuncture-Moxibustion (2019YFC1712205), the National Natural Science Foundation of China (62006220), and Shenzhen Science and Technology Research Program (No. JCYJ20200109114816594).

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Articles from Frontiers in Psychology are provided here courtesy of Frontiers Media SA

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Art Therapy: A Complementary Treatment for Mental Disorders

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Art therapy, as a non-pharmacological medical complementary and alternative therapy, has been used as one of medical interventions with good clinical effects on mental disorders. However, systematically reviewed in detail in clinical situations is lacking. ...

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I think that what this orgnazation is very kind, it always children who have dealt with trauma to express how they feel. I honestly think that its nice to see people taking care of upset children

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An arts non-profit organization offers therapeutic programming for child victims of natural disasters.

is a nonprofit organization based out of Joplin, MO that works with children in classrooms and uses art as a developmental device for education and expression. The organization works in two distinct capacities: As a permanent program in their hometown as well as a developer; and as a distributor of therapeutic art lessons typically used as a trauma response curriculum for natural disasters.

Art Feeds was born from the needs of a single student. Founder Meg Bourne-Hulsey was working with a student who was having issues with communication and showed signs of anxiety. Working with the student through art lessons, she found out that he wasn't able to eat when he was away from school. She continued to work with the student, noting that art was nourishing him in a way that was just as essential as food. Bourne-Hulsey started to raise money for supplies and created programming that could be used by groups of students considered at risk. From this starting point, support for this effort grew, and Art Feeds' first chapter was established in Joplin. Now, 16 schools and three children's organizations in Joplin receive free creative education sessions in their classrooms. Each lesson is facilitated by trained community volunteers and includes activities not limited to painting, drawing, storytelling, dancing, and mural making. In this city alone, 14,000 children have been impacted.

When an EF5 tornado struck Joplin in 2011, the Art Feeds staff quickly realized that the programming would need to change form to ensure every child could have an outlet to cope with the trauma they were facing. Art Feeds shifted from small focus groups to all-inclusive, school-wide programming. Staff realized that students already struggled with various forms of trauma and obstacles prior to the disaster, which were then amplified by the storm. This was the start of the trauma curriculum outreach. The program provided free packs of supplies for each lesson to every child.

Volunteers are screened and trained in the program before heading to shelters, child care facilities, summer schools, and temporary class locations to bring the lessons to the students. When other disasters devastated other communities in the nation, Art Feeds moved quickly to extend their support. They've provided curricula and thousands of art supply packs to students affected by tornados in Oklahoma, as well as flooding in Colorado and in New Jersey. They have also partnered with Touch a Life foundation to reach out to students in Ghana.

In the communities where Art Feeds distributed this therapeutic art curriculum, the response further revealed a necessity for art programs in schools. Moore, OK has a public school system where, out of 24 elementary schools with approximately 11,000 students enrolled, only 10 had faculty whose primary job and focus was to teach visual arts in the classroom. Neither school affected in the 2013 tornado had an established art specialist, and therefore no formal art program.

However, Art Feeds did not come into the schools because there was a need for art in the classroom; rather, there was a need for healing. Their mission statement reads, "Art Feeds believes all children are artists. We exist to feed creative development and facilitate emotional expression in children through art and community. To do this, we provide free therapeutic art and creative education programs within schools & children's organizations by mobilizing teams of community members to bring all forms of art into classrooms."

This small organization has reached over 24,000 children with their resources, and continues to grow. Bourne-Hulsey began with a single student in need and has since reached tens of thousands more through art. Perhaps nothing speaks to their impact more than the numbers. Schools with Art Feeds programs boast a 100 percent return rate. They also report that 90 percent of their teachers say that the program is valuable in decreasing fear, stress, and anxiety; and 86 percent of students reported loving Art Feeds programming more than recess and lunch.

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Art Feeds Offers Therapy to Treat Childhood Trauma

# data[].attributes.attachment_link.description
An arts non-profit organization offers therapeutic programming for child victims of natural disasters.

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Worry dolls is a app that comforts me sometimes. If you have something that has been interrupting your thoughts, you can create a doll so that the doll can worry about the thoughts that have been troubling you.
I know that its not as helpful. I just think that its a small thing that someone is willing to help others around the world with there personal issues by creating a small app.

i think this is some of the few examples that proves that you don't need to donate to a charity to help people.

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You can also make notes about your worry. If it gets worse, if something changes, if you told someone about it and now you feel a bit better. It is just good to write things down sometimes. Plus, it gives you a journal you can look back on and learn from.

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You can also make notes about your worry. If it gets worse, if something changes, if you told someone about it and now you feel a bit better. It is just good to write things down sometimes. Plus, it gives you a journal you can look back on and learn from.

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At my exhibition table i would like to have three jars, One of the jars has little pieces of paper with writing on it, Those pieces has either good or bad feedback. The two other jars has Good and bad writin on it, Depending on what the reader reads, Deterims on what jar it goes into, If the reader thinks the advice is good, then they would put it in the good jar, The same rule applys on the bad side

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credits to miss Debbie =^-^=

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Its no surprise that people go through things that can change them, whether that being trying a new food, or maybe making a new friend. But what happens when something impacts you for the worse? That is called trauma.

a deeply distressing or disturbing experience.

"a personal trauma like the death of a child"
- Oxford language
Its a big thing in society, Its one of the resones people become the person they are today, There's no real way people can actually recover from things like this. Not even medicine can help with something like this! In this section of my padlet, Im looking at how art can sooth trauma.

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I want to do exactly what they did in the library with the maker. I would like to use different pieces of paper and let each class draw on it! I think it would be very fun!

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Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health

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How can art be used to process trauma and improve mental health?

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This website is dedicated to fixing mental health by using creativity. The creative part is not only limited to art, it can use music, dancing etc.

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Creativity in Therapy - Inspiring therapists and counselors to be more creative

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Inspiring therapists and counselors to be more creative