Art therapy courses for Art Therapists are rapidly becoming an international trend, spreading from the United States clear to Northern Ireland. But in the United States alone, the bulk of art therapy education is located on both coasts only. In the U.S. College Search, only 42 Art Therapy Colleges and Universities are listed, as contrasted with 53 for Music Therapy.

The AATA, or American Art Therapy Association, Inc., has a catalog of credited schools they personally have approves for a specific period of time, not going over seven years. And the AATA recognizes long distance learning, providing they follow the same standards of approval that relate to all programs.

The student applying for the Art Therapy courses is necessary to have a bachelor’s degree from any accredited institution in the United States to be valid for Master-level Art Therapy courses. Another alternative is to be already accepted into a bachelor-master duel degree program in art therapy. But if the student is coming into the United States from another country, an academic preparation that is comparable from the out-of-country institution is obligatory.

Each student requires having a portfolio of their unique artwork to the school so as to be admitted to the art therapy courses. The purpose is to show their competence of using the art materials in their work. Once they are admitted, they are required to finish in twelve months:

1.       Minimum of 18 credit semester hours of study with studio art, using a variety of materials and assorted processes.

2.       Minimum of 12 credit semester hours of study in psychology, including developmental psychology and abnormal psychology.

In order for the art therapy courses to be relevant to a Master’s degree, 48-graduate semester credits are required to meet the graduate level art therapy education standards. Some states may entail 60-graduate semester credit for licensing or clinical education standards.

There are several compulsory content areas to be eligible for admittance to the art therapy courses:

1.       Minimum of 24 semester credits in art therapy content

2.       History and theory of art therapy

3.       Techniques of practice in art therapy

4.       Application of art therapy with people in different treatment settings

5.       Group work

6.       Art therapy assessment

7.       Ethical and legal issues of art therapy practice

8.       Standards of practice in art therapy

9.       Cultural and social diversity

10.   Thesis or culminating project

11.   Required related content areas

12.   Psychopathology

13.   Human growth and development

14.   Counseling and psychological theories

15.   Cultural and social diversity

16.   Assessment

17.   Research

18.   Studio Art

19.   Career and lifestyle development

20.   Practicum and Internship

21.   Minimum of 100 hours of supervised art therapy practicum

22.   Minimum of 600 hours of supervised art therapy internship over a minimum of two academic terms

When the art therapy programs have been selected in the Art Therapy school of choice, students should have by now acknowledged this their major primary field of study, which is considered the most significant decision they will ever taken. According to one college, the Ursuline College Graduate pre-requisites, many prerequisite courses will have been by now finished in college to be eligible for upper-level courses, with a Bachelor’s degree in art, psychology, behavioral science, social science, or a associated field already attained before they can embark on art therapy programs.

Schools that lecture on art therapy programs need the student to show proof of their ability to do graduate work in the art therapy field. Not a simple field, this requires a 3.0 grade point average or above, which is based on a 4.0 system. The basis for this is because anything as a high school freshman (or 9th grade) and on up will be added to the cumulative GPA, which will affect the outcome of the schools looking for entry to, and the scholarships being applied for. When applying to a school which teaches art therapy programs, this will have immense impact on whether or not the student will be taken in.

Art therapy programs have several prerequisites, which make art therapy classes easier to appreciate and to apply to one’s ability to be trained. One such set of prerequisites to art therapy programs is a completed minimum of 18 semester hours in studio art–drawing, painting, clay or sculpture. One more is a minimum of 12 semester hours in Psychology, a prerequisite that entails four areas: General Psychology, Developmental Psychology, Personality or Counseling Development, and Abnormal Psychology or Psychopathology. And last but not least is some experience in a human service context field working with people on some level.

U.S. News has a partial list of 26 Art Therapy Schools which have excellence art therapy programs under a national listing of the top “America’s Best Colleges 2008″ list. When opting for the college major for a future in art therapy, working with people of different ages, and backgrounds will be part of the job description.  Working in art therapy uses visual artistic expression by the client to permit them to safely put across hidden emotions and to discover their personal troubles. The end result can permit them to attain positive change in their lives, combined with personal development. The major difference in art therapy, as contrasted with traditional psychological therapies, is that it consists of a three-way method. This method is combination of efforts between the client, therapist, and the artwork itself. 

Art therapy programs have professionals to teach the prospective art therapist to work in many diverse ways. Some of these ways are to work with other professionals as a team; evaluate the individual needs of the client; pay attention to them and provide direction; work creatively with them in a therapeutic setting; permit the client themselves to discover their own creativity, their art work, and its process; and most significantly, uphold the latest research and new ideas regarding the latest progress of art therapy.  

Child art therapy comprises different practices in education, rehabilitation and psychotherapy.  A successful field nowadays where art is included into the psychotherapy, child art therapy is used as revenue for children and their art therapist to not only looks into the unconscious but to ultimately be acquainted with it on a conscious level as well. Utilized to encourage healing, art on a therapeutic level is used in lots of settings to help the child get better.

One of these key settings entails the school, where the art therapist assists the child with inner conflicts, making use of the child’s artwork to put into some kind of positive action through inner change. Child art therapy does not just entail the art therapist, but the teaching and counseling staff as well as the child’s parents and family members.

Most of the times, the concerned students within the art therapy setting are special education students who are facing difficulty. In this instant, the child art therapy is used for conditions for instance learning disabilities, emotional problems and disturbances, behavior disorders, and even physical handicaps that are the consequence of impaired motor control.

Child art therapy entails a Masters level in education, which makes them proficient in recognizing the six stages of growth in children’s drawings besides being able to bond intellectual growth in the child, their psychosocial stages of development, and this correspondence to the six stages of growth in the child’s drawings. These six stages fall within certain age groups:

1.       The Scribble Stage – occurs 18 months to two years of age

2.       This age demonstrates the ability to be aware of patterns, utilizing hand-eye coordination.

3.       The Pre-Schematic Stage – occurs four to seven years

4.       The child may draw human figures with circles,

5.       and two dangling lines for legs.

6.       The Schematic Stage -occurs seven to nine years

The distinctiveness of this age group show what the child is thinking opposed to what they are essentially seeing.

1.       The Dawning Realism – occurs nine or two years

2.       Demonstrating how things “really look” become important, which causes excessive frustration

When using child art therapy, the child is typically given five or six art directions by the art therapist. They will correspond to the child’s perception of themselves, their family, their school, or any facet of their environment. When this is completed, they will be assessed by the art therapist as well as looking at the child’s academic history, their personal growth, and their family. Many things need to be examined–the child’s culture, their home life, or their financial situation, as drawings differ across the spectrum.  One thing that has been observed is when learning disabled children are found to have low intelligence measurements on standardized tests, they are considerably more advanced in creative and visual intelligence. A change for instance adding a visual element may be required to augment their learning abilities.

The way art therapy activities are structured depends a great deal on the type of individual that it is being performed on. Remembering that the objective of art therapy is based on each individual client’s diagnosis, their particular capabilities, individual needs, and their personal interests – an emphasis on the creative development is placed along the path rather than the final finished assignment.

As a rule, adults do not respond as well to art therapy activities as do children, requiring a certain degree of convincing that they have creative aptitude. There is an excited enthusiasm about children (and certain adults) when they see paint, pencils, colored paper, and clay. This is why they can respond so well to art therapy activities in a therapeutic sitting as compared to adults. In fact, most adults would have a preference to articulate their own creative side in the solitude of their home in order to diminish stress. But there are times when more serious problems necessitate the assistance of professional help -for instance with an art therapist.

Art therapy activities thrive because they have the capacity to move the mind from the trouble itself, in hopes of achieving happiness and peace. The Dalai Lama once said, “In the final analysis, the hope of every person is merely peace of mind.” This attainment can be achieved with a agreeable state of conscious, on the condition there is a correlation with reality. With art therapy and art therapy activities, reality can be moved and altered for a few minutes, as art can take a person’s mind off what is the dilemma, allowing the subconscious to come forward and speak in another language that is kinder and much more gentler.

When creating with art therapy activities, the body and mind attains a certain flow about it, almost as if it was in a near-meditative status. Over the centuries, philosophers have been conscious that meditation has the capacity to blank the mind out of what is currently going on around it. In reality, the visualizations that build up through this form of creativity have the capacity to build tomorrow’s desired reality, if the art is permitted to be formed in a thoughtless state of pure automation.

This mind-set works fine with art therapy activities, as not all children and adults can correctly verbalize about how they feel what is going on within their mind or their body, especially if something traumatic has occurred. Not in touch with the reality of emotions and inner feelings, the mind is not free to understand the present which is where we are, but is buried in the past with hidden memories that cannot break away.