{"id":12158,"date":"2025-05-15T15:25:48","date_gmt":"2025-05-15T19:25:48","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/stationsme.ca\/ressource-personnel\/dramatherapy-intervention-at-college-montmorency\/"},"modified":"2025-06-30T06:42:49","modified_gmt":"2025-06-30T10:42:49","slug":"dramatherapy-intervention-at-college-montmorency","status":"publish","type":"member-resource","link":"https:\/\/stationsme.ca\/en\/staff-members\/tools-for-staff-members\/dramatherapy-intervention-at-college-montmorency\/","title":{"rendered":"Dramatherapy intervention at Coll\u00e8ge Montmorency"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Dramatherapy is one of the creative arts approaches used in psychosocial intervention, alongside music therapy, dance therapy and art therapy. This approach can give students the chance to tell their stories and express their emotions through various drama-related media: character creation, exploration of metaphor, gestural expression, storytelling, object theatre or different forms of writing. In all cases, the artistic experiences that result from dramatherapy are designed to respect each person’s rhythm and limits, without any pressure to perform aesthetically. <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

In line with measure 4.1 of the Student Mental Health Action Plan<\/a>, the psychosocial team at College Montmorency wanted to diversify its mental health support services by including dramatherapy. This complementary approach currently takes three forms:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  1. Individual intervention<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Group workshop<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Intercultural transition support group<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n

    The Station SME team met M\u00e9lodie B\u00e9rub\u00e9, drama therapist at College Montmorency, to find out more about the interventions in place.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    Dramatherapy during an individual intervention<\/strong> <\/h3>\n\n\n\n

    The dramatherapy offered to students as part of an individual follow-up enables them to externalise and project an emotional issue in an artistic form (a character, a story, a movement, an object, an image, a monologue, etc.). This projection provides an emotional distance from the issues presented by the student, enabling them to explore their relationship with them. To achieve this, the student and the drama therapist will take the time to question, explore perceptions, confront, encourage, create meaning, clarify, empathise with or normalise the externalised work as required.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    The aim is to raise the student’s awareness, to initiate a transformation through art, and then to encourage the integration of this process into his or her personal life. This may take the form of the smallest step possible, for example, self-compassion, an emotional regulation strategy, expressing a limit, a step towards acceptance, etc. <\/p>\n\n\n

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    Exercise example<\/p>\n <\/i>\n <\/i>\n <\/div>\n

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    A student creates a character, and then a monologue, representing his or her anxiety. Through this personification, the student explores the idea that he or she is not his or her anxiety, but rather has a relationship with it. A dialogue can then be established between this anxiety persona and a “future self”, enabling fears, hopes or internal resources to be addressed.<\/p>\n\n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

    Dramatherapy in a group workshop<\/strong><\/h3>\n\n\n\n

    Dramatherapy tools can also enrich group workshops. These one-off workshops combine psychological education with playful exercises derived from drama therapy. Artistic expression then becomes a way for participants to link theory and experience, to explore concepts such as stress or self-talk and to open up space for introspection. The advantage of dramatherapy in a group context is that it allows the individual to limit the information shared if they so wish. As creativity often manifests itself in the form of metaphor, the participant can use artistic tools to create meaning with the theory and offer him or herself a moment of introspection without being obliged to share the meaning with the group as a whole. \u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n

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    Example of a group workshop<\/p>\n <\/i>\n <\/i>\n <\/div>\n

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    Two workshops aimed at taming stress using dramatherapy tools are being offered to all students at Coll\u00e8ge Montmorency.<\/p>\n