Stamp up!
It is not easy for children to express feelings orally sometimes, especially among young children. When they experience complicated situations, they might lack words to identify their emotions or refuse to speak out. We need to create a safe space to help them to express their feelings suitably. In my project, I mainly explored the situation of children experiencing loss and grief due to relocation.
Stamp Up is a creative art kit that promotes creative self-expression within the family setting. It sits between family free play and a clinical therapy session. The project aims to create a safe and valued atmosphere in the family situation by working together, sharing their own stories, emotions at that moment, and supporting each other. The toolbox contains three main components:
• A set of stamps allow multiple ways of usage.
• A story card consists of loss related drawing tasks.
• A drawing pad with two directions, allowing at least two people to draw separately or together.
Stamp Up provides a platform for both children and adults to communicate to express emotions through creative art and play. The six stamps, which are not purely toy-like stamps, are also tools for expressing emotions and feeling better through physical activities, like push, squeeze, make sounds, etc. It motivates children to be involved in the process, creating a feeling of play and triggering their imagination. When used together, they can guide children and adults to draw creatively, tell stories, and spark communications between family members related to the topic they want to discuss.
Stamp Up promotes positive interaction between children and adults, boosts communication, or use it as a self-therapy toolkit to prevent mental health problems (with guidance from experts).
