Make it your own

This school year I've been running therapeutic art classes for severely emotionally disturbed kids grades 1st-8th and some of the projects we've done need to be shared. Recently I had them work on destroying a map of the city and making it their own by adding stickers or drawings or just trimming roads or neighborhoods off the map. This was a fun and super cheap project because I pick up the tourist maps that are all over the city for free and anything involving destruction=fun.

My version of San Francisco creates serious traffic delays.

Skills kids work on while engaging with this activity are:

• self expression
• fine motor skills
• self direction
• spacial reasoning
• perception 
• memory skills

Supplies that help to have on hand in addition to a map:

• markers
• stickers
• glue
• glitter
• magazines
• string
• scissors

treatment options

I've been reading House of Cards by Robin Dawes and I'm finding it helpful in my approach to working with emotional disturbed and mentally ill children. The book catalogs practices in psychology that were incredibly harmful to the patient and professionals trying to do the best for others without really considering how they might feel if the tables were turned. The major treatment that is widely spoken ill of now is the wonderful lobotomy. Doctors 60 years ago were convinced it was a great treatment for hopeless cases, being people that did not show signs of improvement after six months of other treatment at the hospital including ice baths, isolation, dangerous medications and shock treatment.
There are of course other treatments and practices that do not help patients or humans in general but I don't need to write about all of them because the practice itself isn't the issue I am taking. Sometimes I feel like mental health professionals sometimes forget the golden rule. Do unto others blah blah blah. 

If you had a rough week, month or year would you want people running around saying they know how to fix it and you then trust them because they are professionals but then they help you lock yourself in a hospital where you have close to no privacy and limited contact with your life? Some people need to be inpatient to improve while most people do not. Locking 'crazy' people up is still a common practice, especially for children.

Many times at work I see kids in rough situations with other staff and think about how I would feel as that kid. As a kid that doesn't get to watch TV without being 'on task' throughout the day, or choose nearly anything about their meals, or spend time alone in a way of their choosing. It would suck, a lot. No wonder they threw their plate when it was chicken on Tuesday again or had a tantrum when they were scolded for sitting on the floor reading in their room when they should be on their bed.

In general I think that anyone that works with kids should consider how they would like to be treated in that position. Instead of pulling out the "I'm an adult" card.

Fuck being an adult. Being an adult just means you have a few years under your belt not that you have some magical insight on life.