Expressing Emotions Through Art
The goals of this exercise are 1) to identify and develop coping and
resistance skills and 2) practice creative multi-media art or other forms
of art.
Materials: samples of professional art that communicate difficult feelings,
magazines, construction or poster paper, paints, crayons, markers, scissors,
glue
- Start out the exercise by explaining to your students that
everyone feels physically or emotionally uncomfortable at times
and that these feelings should be expressed in an appropriate
way instead of being ignored. Explain to your students that people
may use drugs (including alcohol and tobacco) to try to cover
up their feelings instead of talking about their feelings with
a friend or family member who will listen, provide sympathy, and
be of assistance to them. Tell them that using art is another
appropriate way of communicating their feelings. (If available,
show your class examples of professional artwork that communicate
difficult emotions.)
- Assign your students to select one or more negative feelings
the they have recently experienced or encountered and write them
down on a piece of paper.
- Lead your students in a discussion of of these negative feelings
that they have identified. Ask them to share with the class how
they deal with these feelings.
- Assign your students to select one of the negative feelings
they wrote down and express it artistically (drawing, painting,
collage, etc.).
- Have your students display their work to the class by posting
them on the walls and asign each piece a number. Assign your students
to go around the room and try to guess what feeling each piece
of work represents and write it down next to the number that represents
each one.
- Once your students have finsihed analyzing the work of their
classmates, ask them the following questions:
- Which type of media worked best to expressing feelings?
- Which type of media was used most by your classmates? Which
type was used the least? Why do you think that is?
- Which colors were used most? Which colors were used the least?
Why do you think people selected to use the colors they did?
- How can art help people express negative feelings? How can
art help people express all of the feelings they have?
- Ask your students to share their ideas about other alternatives
to using drugs that people can use to deal with negative feelings.
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