This month we’re giving away five copies of Dream Up Now™: The Teen Journal for Creative Self-Discovery to one lucky reader. Using simple journal prompts and art project ideas, with plenty of room for writing and reflection, Dream Up Now is a powerful tool for navigating emotions and self-reflection.
To Enter: Leave a comment below describing how you foster creative self-expression in kids.
For additional entries, leave a separate comment below for each of the following tasks you complete:
Each comment counts as a separate entry. Entries must be received by midnight, September 18, 2020.
The winner will be contacted via email on or around September 21, 2020, and will need to respond within 72 hours to claim their prize or another winner will be chosen. This giveaway is in no way affiliated with, administered, or endorsed by Facebook, Twitter, or Pinterest. Winner must be a US resident, 18 years of age or older.
We welcome your comments and suggestions. Share your comments, stories, and ideas below, or contact us. All comments will be approved before posting, and are subject to our comment and privacy policies.
© 2020 by Free Spirit Publishing. All rights reserved. The views expressed in this post represent the opinion of the author and not necessarily Free Spirit Publishing.
My dream have dream box for sewing supply
I love to get my kids always thinking in terms of pictures and colors when we read and write in English class. These high schoolers have so much to offer, and when they’re allowed to respond in a variety of ways, whether though writing, a picture, a piece of music, it really gets them engaged and allows them to bond with the material. Thank you!!
I like to have my kids read a story or complete an assignment, then I ask them to create a picture based off what they read. They can draw, use their computer, anything to allow their creativity to flow! It’s amazing to see what my high schoolers come up with, especially the shy quiet ones! Thanks for this awesome opportunity!!
I foster creativity by letting them share and explore their interests.
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My students have free play in my sand box where they can create family groups homes and a variety of other scenes in order to express themselves. It is really therapeutic for them and they look forward to coming to my office. This year due to Covid I will have to shut the sand box down and hope that this book will provide an outlet for creativity in its place.
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Faith in the potential of children of all ages drives me to foster their self-expression through drawing, dancing, and writing their own dialogue for biographical plays. It’s important to nurture forms of expression that match their style. When adults go quiet and observe, there is a lot that can be heard from our loudly silent teens.
I help foster Creative self expression in children by instilling a sense of freedom and safety in their environment. Providing ample opportunity and resources as outlets for creativity is also important to help children with self expression.
Listen to their concerns and remember how you felt at their age.
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I am a new middle school counselor and am constantly looking for resources! This book looks like a great one!
I have used free write and free drawing while working with kids, but would love to amp things up!!
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As a middle school counselor I am always on the lookout for ideas on how to foster my student’s self expression, some of the best things I’ve done so far is having them free write or draw when they are upset and then trying to find a quote or a picture that expresses how they are feeling.
Shared on FB — I also encourage the kids to take advantage of art electives at school and to think outside the box in the assignments from those classes. We also use old books (old / used library books) and have started to turn these into art/ journal projects.
I encourage and empower my daughters to live fearlessly and that starts with the words (thoughts, beliefs, affirmations, hopes, fears, dreams) they record in their journals. We use traditional journaling, nature journaling, collage, photo journaling, wish/bucket lists (with next 3, 6, 9 month possibilities). We also have sketchbooks and doodle books.
One of my favorite places to foster creative self-expression is during class conversations. It’s one of the quickest and easiest ways to encourage many ideas, while still furthering a larger “academic” study. I am also a big fan of free-writing. It makes unpolished thoughts feel welcome, which gets rid of one of the hardest parts of expression- starting.
I foster creative self expression through art projects, writing projects and technology apps. I am lucky because I have the time and freedom to do this.
I would like to win these books to donate to my daughter’s 7th grade special ed classroom for emotionally handicapped students. For 23 years, she has been motivating and challenging her students to recognize that they are more than their emotions. Most of her students come from broken homes, homes where parents or siblings are incarcerated, or foster homes that cannot always provide much more than the basics to keep them off the streets. She shows them that they are able to acknowledge their feelings of anger, self esteem, and feeling unloved, and channel these feelings in a positive/creative way that has helped several of the students break a negative cycle. She would use these books to supplement her own tools of love and concern for the students in a creative way, focusing on the fact that all teens have these emotions but that they are more than their emotions and environment.
I use art and journal activities as much as possible with my students! Utilizing these two modes to process tough emotions are my favorite!
The respondents who come through Teen Court (ages 11-17) are required to compose a Life Plan Essay meeting 7 specific points, and along with that they must create a Vision Board which reflects the dream for their life about which they wrote. It’s been interesting to find out how many have no idea what a Vision Board is! Anyway, last year, I opened up a space where anyone could come and work on their boards once a month; I provide magazines, newspapers, glue, tape, markers, scissors and internet access and encouragement. The dreams expressed on their boards never cease to amaze me!
I’m working on a program for adolescents to teach emotional intelligence through interactive activities, journaling, mindfulness…and learning The Hustle!
Our Prevention Coalition sponsored a Quaran”teen” Virtual Art project. Students could send in photos of any art that they made during the Pandemic. It is still on going.
I’ve used journals and coping skills boxes.
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When I read, I like to ask open-ended questions with no right or wrong (If you could be the hero in this story, what would you do.”
As a School Social Worker, I love implementing creative arts expressive interventions to help students manage emotions and solve problems in their lives. It helps keep students engaged and active as well as own the process for themselves.
I love to encourage my students to use any form of expression to turn in assignments in which they can choose their form of project. I help them to come up with ideas based on their interests and talents and help them find resources and materials if they need something they don’t have to complete the project. Thanks for the giveaway opportunity!
multimedia forms of expression. Could be art, writing, or acting. They just need to get their message across.
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I did a lesson with students using the book Dream by Susan V. Bosak. I read the book to a group of students. We discussed it’s contents, then made our 3-d stars decorating with words, colors and pictures or combinations related to individual dreams that inspired each student without actually telling the actual dream or goal chosen. We hung these stars up by the students’ desks. We also created ladders with five rungs to identify the steps each person needs to take to climb the ladder and reach their individual dream or goal.
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I like to use sentence starters and incorporate art projects with my students.
I am hoping to encourage students to do more journaling and to have discussions in our live sessions, where students can feel comfortable sharing and support each other. It would be wonderful to have this resource.
To foster creative self-expression in kids:
– I have students create their own spoken word and arrange for a school-wide performance and have judges (peers and teachers) collaborate to get winners.
– I have a voice box in the classroom where students can express any idea or thought they wish.
– I also have them create a video with a structured guide (for scaffolding and differentiation) and rubric to present to their community and the world. The topic usually correlates to the unit of study. They can get crazy and creative with guest speakers, music, text, animations and their own edits. They love this!
To foster creative self-expression in kids:
– I have a voice box in the classroom where students can express any idea or thought they wish.
– I also have them create a video with a structured guide (for scaffolding and differentiation) and rubric to present to their community and the world. The topic usually correlates to the unit of study. They can get crazy and creative with guest speakers, music, text, animations and their own edits. They love this!
I have my 7th graders create personal mission statements using a wordart digital program. The program turns their statment into a word cloud and we laminate and post these on lockers and in a display case.
I find the best way to foster a student to be creative is to not set any real judgement on them. They need to be able to express themselves in many different mediums. I love giving them a bag of recyclable throw aways and then create something that is of a theme such as a machine, clothing, and what have you. then I have them write about what they have created and how it fits into the theme and how you would use it. This book will help to explore different avenues. I am in hopes to win a copy.
I try to foster creativity in my students by giving them opportunities to choose how they want to demonstrate understanding and / or mastery of whatever content we are currently working with.
When I want to inspire creative expression in children, I encourage them to rely on themselves, to have confidence in their own ideas, and I urge them to rely on their intuition and to be spontaneous. I give them freedom to experiment, problem-solve, and time for unstructured imaginative play. And more importantly a space with lots of STUFF to do those things with.
I would love to foster more creative writing with my students. I would use this as “Ticket In” or as a “Ticket Out” with my students.
I think fostering creativity requires a teacher to recognize opportunities to ask the right kind of open-ended questions to motivate and encourage creative thinking! Setting up learning activities that encourage creativity is also a way to help develop students’ skills in this area. They can’t always show their creativity unless there are opportunities!!
I have a box of “Loose Parts” that the children can use in any way they wish.
I used a variety of ways such as finish the sentence, what would you do, If ..and I encourage students to use markers, crayons, magazines to create and write their ideas as a way to express their thoughts.
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I foster creativity with my students by allowing them to do more personal assignments when comparing their culture and life with those in Spanish-speaking countries. I also incorporate things they use everyday and are familiar with.
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My daughter has a blank comic book. She can create her own comics about anything. I love to see her ideas. My 4 year old son loves Legos. He will spend hours in his room just creating the most random things and we love it. The things he imagines comes to life in his creations.
I encourage kids to dance like no one is watching!
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Add art to lessons and creative writing.
Through art, journaling, stories, role plays, creative outlets, and in conversation with students, I encourage them to show their self-expression.
I teach a creative writing course with two days for students to choose topics and genres in which they are interested. This affords the opportunity for self-reflection and expression.
Art is an excellent form of self expression for teens such as painting, music, writing. Gardening also
I encourage students to dream about their future and gather as much information as possible to make those dreams a reality. A dream without an action plan is just a dream. Dreams need plans in order to become a reality..
I encourage kids to draw their feelings with the colors that correspond to what emotion they are currently experiencing. It offers me a “glimpse” into their world via coloring.
I am a Girl Scout Leader and we use art and time in nature to help kids have time to dream. We do collages and other fun art activities that allow kids to think about their dreams.
I try to allow for individual creativity and self-expression in design challenges in my Makerspace classroom. Students are allowed to choose their passion project and are able to use their creative expression to complete those projects and others.
I use guided imagery, music and art together to help foster creativity in my students:)
I encourage teenagers and others to enjoy reading creatively, not just for accumulating facts, but for experiencing other cultures, other languages, other emotions, other appearances. For this kind of reading, time is needed, recreational time, not just “time on task.” I avoid making reading into an assignment or an opportunity for testing. I encourage reading and writing for deep learning and questioning and sharing of ideas.
I work with youth on probation in the community as well as in a detention facility. I try to get the youth to think about other options to spend their free time and we do writings and art for them to get their feelings out, as well as different activities that allow for them to express themselves.
I allow my kids to follow their interests wherever they lead and to try new things without fear of failure – which is just learning!
I have lots of paint, rocks and canvas for the girls to express themselves
I encourage kids to write about their feelings- using words: stories, poems, commentary or drawing. Anything to get their feelings and thoughts down.
To foster creativity in kids I make sure to always have materials for them to use open-endedly. I also like providing a lot of art materials, writing materials, etc. so that children are able to use their preferred materials.
I teach my students to be critical and creative thinking through the assignments we have in class. I’m a family and consumer science teacher so I’m able to do that as we do labs and create projects related to food, clothing, housing, etc.
Great opportunity! With my daughters, as well as when I was teaching children yoga classes, I would put on a relaxing song and present them each with a variety of items: feathers, flat marbles, sticks, etc., and invite them to create whatever they felt like expressing with the items. It is always a very cool experience.
Allow them time and creativity to explore, design and create both with indoor and outdoor items. Model please and thank you, active listening. Asking questions and providing time/examples of checking in with themselves.
I ask my stepdaughter open-ended questions that are specific, practice active listening, and ask her to tell me more! I encourage her to express her creativity through art and music as well as speaking and writing.
Encouraging a lot of journaling- especially now to memorialize this time in their life, their feelings, the reactions of those around them as well as to take time to simply be present with nature and with life and write or draw about what they see in their environment in creative ways.
Good morning, I’m a school psychologist and I use puppet play (Tucker the Turtle) to encourage my elementary students to engage in sharing of their feelings. Very effective for my bilingual students as well as those who are typically very anxious about speaking.
This will be an awesome addition to our school. If I win I will share with my co-workers. It’s an great asset for our Middle schoolers.
Sorry for typos everyone! at work and typing fast!!! LOL!!
I have done box journals. Kids get journal and write whatever they want and place in box. I do not read them until they give me the okay. There are no limits to their writings and expressions. And for the most part it helps relieve frustrations which in turn enhances their will to learn as they tend to let go of a lot if issues bottled up inside. and if you can tell from my post, I work with a lot of low income students. I learn a lot from their but my own personal (painful) experiences being raised in the same area as them, allows me to encourage and lead them towards better days to accomplish all they can just as I have.