Body Drawings

Suggested Group(s): Young/Middle

Purpose: To explore feelings, how and when these feelings might be experienced physically and how they were experienced related to the death and grief.

Task/need: Moving toward the pain of the loss, acknowledging the reality of the loss

Activity Setup Ideas:

• Ask, "Do you ever have a feeling, such as sadness, fear, worry, excitement or happiness that makes your body feel different from when you aren’t having this feeling?"
• Talk about a few of those feelings and their physical sensations and let the children know that they will have a chance to express more of them in the body drawing activity

Materials:

• Large pieces of butcher paper – large enough to trace the body of group members
• Markers

Description:

Note: This activity can be done individually, in small groups or with the entire group in a manageable sized group. One drawing can be used for the whole group or sub-groups can work on a drawing or each person can do his/her own.

Ask — "What are the feelings that you have?" "Where in your body do you feel them?" "What might they look like — what color might they be?"

Begin by having the child or children lie on the butcher paper and tracing the body outline on the paper. Once the outline is drawn, invite the children (either individually or as part of a group) to draw something on the body to represent the different feelings and the physical sensations that they create. To focus the children, it may be helpful to pose a few questions, such as:

• Is there a color that you associate with a particular feeling (e.g. black for sadness)
• Or a picture that best represents that feeling (e.g. butterflies in the stomach for nervousness.)
• Or a word that best fits (e.g. yuck for a tough feeling)
• Let the children add their feelings to the body tracing and discuss those feelings and physical sensations.

Activity Wrap Up Ideas:

• Invite group member to share their body drawing, the meanings of what was added to the drawing and the feelings associated with it
• "Ask when do you feel those feelings?"