Using Big Empathy Drawing with Children and Teenagers

Overview

This training day focuses on using big empathy drawings with children, teenagers, and adults. It is a key intervention to help people process painful life events in a safe, engaging, and creative way. Mental health problems result from painful experiences that haven’t been properly processed - felt, reflected on, put into words, or made sense of.

The big empathy drawing is a collaborative sense-making tool (see Psychological Formulation, British Psychological Society) that conveys empathic understanding visually, using images and metaphors. Studies show that engaging in the meaning-making process in this way can help the child or teenager ‘name it to tame it’ and ‘feel it too heal it’ both key for the process of transformational therapeutic change.

Typically, the big empathy drawing is used when a child or teenager wants to talk about their life. There will also be guidance on using the intervention with children who do not want to talk directly about the painful life experiences that are causing distressed behaviour and mental health problems.

Please note: These days are very much an introduction to the use of the therapeutic arts to enhance your listening skills and creative ways of connecting with children and young people. If you're interested in further training, please see TISUK and IATE for professional programs.

About the presenter

Ellie Baker

Expert in arts therapy and child psychotherapy, supervision, illustration, parenting.

Integrative Arts Psychotherapist/Supervisor (UKCP). Work included: Lead Supervisor - Adolescent Psychiatric Unit (Education), Clinical Lead Foster Care Support Multi-Disciplinary Assessment Treatment/Therapy Service. Head of Psychological Health and Wellbeing, Wave Multi Academy Trust. Artist Lead for Arts Lab Project (secondary education settings), Therapeutic Lead Attune Research Project (ACEs/Trauma-Informed Practice Oxford, Falmout and Kent Universities). Delivered parenting courses for decades. Chair for The Centre for Child Mental Health for 15 years.