Sample Activity from the Book- Following Imagination...Activities that Move, Create, and Play with the Fundamentals of Guided Imagery

Try this activity at home or hospital to help with stress, anxiety, pain management or as a tool for helping your child get to sleep at night.

Imagination Scrapbook

Ages: 7 years old-adolescence

Materials: Paper
Markers
Hole punch
Ribbon

Activity: Ask the child to write one of each of the following headings on each page or make up his own:
A place I would like to go real or imagined is…
The things I would need to bring with me are…
It looks like…
It feels like…
The things I hear are…
While there I eat…
It smells like…
The people who are with me are…
A time I want to think about my special place is…

Ask the child to then fill in each page. They can write words, draw pictures, or cut images from magazines. Encourage him to go into as much detail as possible on each page. Some pages may inspire more creativity than others. This is one way to determine the child’s strongest sense or learning style.

When the book is complete the child can create a cover and title for the book. Punch three holes down one side and tie with ribbon to hold it together.

Discussion: Talk about times when he might think about this place. How did it make him feel while he was creating the book? Did he get excited when describing it or sharing stories about the location or the people he was with? Help him to identify times of stress or anxiety for example, trouble sleeping, going to the doctor’s office, or giving an oral report in school. By thinking about his special place may help him to relax and feel in control of situations that may cause him stress.

This book is useful at times of pain, anxiety or stress to be able to say “remember when we made that book about your safe place?” “Tell me about your trip to __________ again” getting the child to focus on something that brings comfort may help a child manage stressful experiences better.


Benefits: Teaches relaxation
Distraction technique
Promotes creativity


Uses: Decreases anxiety
Pain management (acute or chronic)
Creation of safe space
Sleeping

For more activities like this one go to www.guidedimageryforchildren.com
Read more about the book in the following post Reducing Children's Stress