Best Adolescent Art Therapy Activities (9+ Unique Exercises)
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The Optimistminds editorial team is made up of psychologists, psychiatrists and mental health professionals. Each article is written by a team member with exposure to and experience in the subject matter. The article then gets reviewed by a more senior editorial member. This is someone with extensive knowledge of the subject matter and highly cited published material.
The current blogspot will be based on the question “what are adolescent art therapy activities?”. We will discuss the various art therapy activities that are related to adolescent art therapy. We will also elaborate the various adolescent art therapy activities of adolescents art therapy sessions.
What are adolescent art therapy activities?
The adolescent art therapy activities are various therapeutic techniques that are based on art and play inorder to help the adolescents to overcome their emotional insecurities and underlying conflicts in a lighter manner that does not include confrontations and is not based on challenging the adolescents client .
Art therapy helps the adolescents through the use of positive psychology skills. The adolescent therapy activities are useful in developing a positive self image among adolescents and boost their confidence by helping them regulate their emotions effectively.
The use of creative interventions and artistic techniques in art therapy helps adolescents to be more aware of their inner processes and get connected to their feelings that are mostly unaddressed and unidentified. The adolescent art therapy also enables adolescents to overcome the trauma related feelings associated with their childhood.
Adolescent art therapy helps the adolescents to enhance their psychological well being and focus on their subjective well being. They are better able to focus on their personal growth and resolve their identity crisis.
Art therapy is defined by the American Art Therapy Association as an integrative human service and mental health profession that is enriched with the individual and group life of humans across all age groups and is based on active art making, creative processes, applied psychological theory and experiences of the individual within a professional psychothera[eutic relationship.
The various art therapy activities in adolescent counseling are as follows:
- Journaling
- Mask making
- Photographing
- Being the DJ
- Collage activity
- Coloring the mandala
- Gratitude jar
- Anger sculpture
- Emotion painting
- Postcard activity
Journaling
Journaling is an adolescent art activity that helps the adolescents to vent out their negative thoughts and feelings related to daily life events. Journaling also helps adolescents to keep an eye on the positive and pleasant happenings of their life rather than just focusing on the negative events and consequences.
Mask making
Mask making is an adolescent art activity where adolescents make masks to represent the various feelings that they feel. The masks can be made for both pleasant and unpleasant feelings. Mask making helps the adolescents to easily share their feelings without feeling defensive.
The therapist later asks questions related to the masks so that the adolescents feelings can be probed in detail.
Photographing
Photographing is an adolescent art activity that is based on capturing the good and pleasant memories through the camera lens. Photographing helps the adolescents to collect the memories that they can look upon to relax in times of distress.
Being the DJ
Being a DJ activity is a type of adolescent art activity that is based on music and dance. This helps the adolescents to channelize their hyperactivity and impulsivity. Adolescents get to enjoy music and dance themselves to the point of balancing their negative energy. The adolescents can play a mix of their favourite music while being with their friends or play their favourite instruments.
Collage activity
Collage activity is based on collecting the favourite pictures and photographs in order to make collages of their favourite memories. Further collage activities can also be done in adolescent art therapy sessions bh filling in blank designs with pieces of colored newspaper to make them appear colored.
Coloring the mandala
Mandalas are circular designs with geometric patterns. Mandalas are meant to make the adolescents feel more in the present moment and focus on being in the here and now. Adolescents color in the mandala designs during the art therapy sessions while the therapist probes their feelings and facilitates them to connect better to their inner self.
Gratitude jar
A gratitude jar activity is an activity based on a daily collection of blessings and positive moments in a jar. An adolescent daily writes positive happenings on a piece of paper and fills it in the jar. The adolescents can mention all the aspects of their life for which they feel gratitude for.
The gratitude jar can be painted and decorated by the adolescent with their names on it. The gratitude jar helps adolescents connect better to the positivity in their life.
Anger sculpture
Anger sculpture is an adolescent art therapy technique that is based on moulding materials. Anger sculpting is based on moulding a shape from plaster of paris or quick sand that best represents the anger feeling of adolescents.
Making sculptures helps the adolescents to better connect with their negative feelings, helps them channelize their negative feelings and facilitates them in expression of their anger.
Emotion painting
Emotion painting is a form of adolescent art therapy activity. Emotion painting focuses on painting emotions in an abstract manner or drawing something to symbolize the emotions. Emotion painting enables the adolescents to get rid of their reactivity and hyperactivity.
Emotion painting often helps adolescents to manage their anger, anxiety and irritability without behaving negatively.
Postcard activity
Postcard activity in adolescent art therapy is related to self discovery and self awareness. The postcard activity enables the adolescents to create, draw or print their own postcards. Postcard activity helps the adolescents to post their unpleasant events in life on a postcard in the form of drawing. The back side of the postcard is kept blank t write the unpleasant feelings related to unpleasant event whereas the front side contains the representation of unpleasant life event in the form of art and paints.
Frequently asked questions : adolescent art therapy activities
What are some art therapy activities?
Some of the art therapy activities include the following :
- Draw or paint your emotions
- Create an emotion wheel
- Make a stress painting
- Put together a journal
- Make sock puppets
- Use line art
- Design a postcard you will never send
- Create a sculpture of your ange
What are some therapeutic activities?
Some activities that can be therapeutic for you are as follows:
- Watching a movie
- Going for drive
- Going for walk
- Eating together with family
- Playing favourite games
- Shoping
- Dairy writing
- Listening to music
What are the 5 modalities of art therapy?
The 5 modalities of art therapy are as follows :
- Photography
- Dance
- Drama
- Art
- Music
What are art therapy techniques?
The art therapy techniques are interventions based on art and drama that include activities based on music, drama, play and colors in order to fulfill the therapeutic goal. The art therapy techniques are used to build a strong rapport with the client and are useful specifically for defensive and resistant clients.
Citations
Art Therapy Activities PDF (5)
https://www.counseling.org/docs/default-source/vistas/vistas_2006_moon2.pdf?sfvrsn=11
https://www.therapistaid.com/therapy-worksheets/art/adolescents
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