Virtual Art Therapy Classes for Children (WFWP Ukraine)
Written by: Anna Kalmatskaya
In the last several months, WFWP Ukraine has been organizing online art therapy workshops for large families, internally displaced children and people from the “gray zone.” Children from the capital, Kyiv and Kyiv region, as well as from Krasnohorivka and Marinka in the Donetsk region, participated in a series of weekly meetings.
Practical advice, combined with creativity, enables children to learn to deal positively with different life situations and the consequences of the psychological crisis in their lives. Art helps children learn to understand and harmonize their emotional state, to develop emotional intelligence, creative thinking and self-expression. It eases the process of overcoming negative phenomena that have occurred or are present in life. Especially during the pandemic, art therapy is an effective means of preventing and combating the effects of a psychological crisis that continues to affect different categories of society.
The project started in July 2021 with six children and finally reached 28 participants, attracting more and more interest every month. At one of the classes, children were choosing their favorite sweets and presenting themselves, communicating, repeating movements with both hands together with psychologist Mrs. Olga Vysotskaya. At the next session on a safety topic, called “Magic Pond,” participants were creating their favorite place. They were also working with balls of thread and learned to overcome insults, anger and injustice towards them.
Another class called "Emotions - Let’s Be Friends" helped children, together with psychologist Mrs. Anna Razumova, identify the reasons for aggression, anger, fear and anxiety, and how to properly perceive and overcome such emotions. After that, children were creating flying paints and personal recipes for happiness.
At one of the last classes, art therapist Mrs. Victoria Voloshenko taught children how to make a thread doll assistant. With the psychologist of the Kyiv Municipal Family Center, Mrs. Tatiana Gudenko’s children were creating plasticine stories, a circle of desires and compositions out of magical threads.
WFWP Ukraine strives to listen to parents’ feedback in order to improve our arts events and increase children’s interest. WFWP Ukraine plans to further develop activities in this area, cooperate with psychologists and provide art therapy to those who are in need.
