CoM UPH Holds Play, Music and Art Seminar for Health and Wellbeing

This reflects the current situation. There are lots of gadgets that make parents busy without any special connection and communication with their children. In fact, a child needs mirroring from a parent who should be responsive to their children. A lot of play together session in the process of the child development will make them happy and can express freely.

Responding to the explanation, Felina, one of the participants who work as a drawing teacher, poses an appropriate experience for the pre-school students who do not express freely when they are playing together in the classroom.

Yudi responded by emphasizing the importance of playing especially in the ?golden age? of the child.

“At the age 0 to 5 years, give the children widest opportunity to play. If parents not aware of this, eventually the child does not get a chance. Instead, the parents usually use the gadgets to calm the child. The gadget is not real. While mirroring with a smiling mother, that is the real thing. It will stimulate the brain to produce better communication. Healthy attachment is the most basic that children should get”, he explained.

Subsequently, the Art Therapy session was hosted by Mutia Ribowo, an art therapist graduate of the Lassale College of The Arts, Singapore. Mutia specializes in treating children from ages to adults who have mental disorders, depression, trauma, and dependence.

He opened his session by inviting everyone to make a scribble or doodle on a piece of paper, which was then transferred to the person sitting next to him to be asked to continue the scribble that had been made by the first person.

This activity at first confused the participants, but at the end, they felt challenged to continue the doodling from the person next to him.

Responding to these reactions, Mutia explained that for some people they will feel unable, difficult and frustrating at first. There also someone who wants to give up on the challenge. There are those who fear of being judged and make a wrong drawing.

“But it is not the result that we want to see, but the process. What do you feel about this activity? Usually, this is used to see the resiliency of the client. Resilience. This is evident from how one solves the problem. If for example, you are frustrating, it reflects the resiliency of yourself “, explained Mutia.

So from that point art is useful, besides can be joyful, art is also useful as a tool for the self-existence, and more importantly as a therapy especially for those who are difficult to communicate verbally, which can be caused of a certain conditions or trauma.

The seminar was attended by participants? of various backgrounds, from students, housewives, teachers, musicians to other professions. One of Imelda Murti’s participants, Graduate of UPH Faculty of Arts, 2002, who is also a housewife and a private music teacher, expressed the reason why attending this seminar is a curiosity about how this method of therapy can be used to deal with special needs children.

As a music teacher, there are some of my students with the special needs. And I need the special knowledge to handle such children. Moreover, I also want to take a course or secondary school for this therapy, ” he said.

While Monica Subiantoro sees all these three areas -play, music, and art are the fields that are mutually exclusive. The collaboration of these three areas is very effective for the therapeutic processes. Therefore, he actively collaborates with experts in the field of play and art through joint seminars or workshops, so that the public gain knowledge and broader insight about the utilization of these three areas in the use of art, music, and play in therapy. Our hope through this seminar is to attract the interest of people who want to learn this field and the profession of the creative arts therapy. (tm / rh).