Dancing in the darkness: Creative approaches to working with grieving children and youth

Play, creativity and the arts have a unique capacity to respond to human suffering. They can offer experimental spaces for the exploration of ideas, feelings and questions around the experiences of death and grief.

This webinar emphasizes supporting participants with a theoretical foundation in children’s grief and bereavement. The goal is to help them build their toolkit and confidence in creatively engaging with grieving children and youth.

During this experiential, day-long training, participants will explore play-based, arts-based, and other creative approaches to both psychoeducation and counseling/psychotherapy. This training will share ways to use these approaches for grief education and support in schools. It will also address methods for virtually supporting grieving children and youth. We will present many easy-to-use (and modify) creative techniques for working with grieving children and youth. Participants will have the opportunity to engage in safe, experiential activities to better understand the process of using creative approaches. No art experience is required.

Learning objectives:

• Creative approaches to supporting children and youth who are grieving the dying or death of someone in their life.
• Art and play-based strategies for those with a foundation in children’s grief and bereavement.
• Strategies for supporting grieving children and youth in school.

Please note: This webinar is module 5 of the Children’s grief and bereavement certificate program; however, participants can also register for it as a stand-alone training to enhance their skills in supporting grieving children and families.