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Author: JuliaCrawford

Hope Circle: An Opportunity for Creative Movement

Dancing engages nearly all of the brain at once. Just participating in dance is good for the brain, but dance can also be used to intentionally target really important development areas for children. Children can come to see what they are capable of by experiencing the influence they have when they engage in creating dance. One of my favorite creative movement experiences to guide children through, and adults for that matter, is the “Hope Circle” experience. I first participated in a... Read More

Processing Social Issues Through Art-Making

This piece originally appeared on the Breakfast Club Blog on January 23, 2015. The news is often overwhelming with images of violence, objectification, and families left stunned and mourning over great loss. The need for social justice is not new. But to high school students who are just coming to understand the repetitive nature of the news…and just how nasty things in this world can be…it is new. It seems that at this tender age, high school students are beginning to identify what ... Read More

Building Positive Self-Image and Community Through the Arts

Included in this post is a basic outline for a four-session Dance/Visual Arts and Poetry workshop. The following session series is created around the poem, “Phenomenal Woman” by Maya Angelou. I have used the following experiences as a part of a curriculum for teenage girls who identified challenges with positive self-image and bullying within their peer group. As you read through the outline keep in mind the age of the children or young people you work with. Also, think about the theme or messag... Read More

I am Smart!

I was 28 before I realized I was smart. I always received good enough grades in school, which I attribute to the support of parents and the other protective factors present in my life, but I was felt like my passing grades on tests were a fluke because I never really understood the material. My critical awareness moment happened while taking a course called “Arts, Creativity, and Human Development” as a part of the Urban Studies: Community Arts graduate program at Eastern University.... Read More