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Creative Approaches
Tree of Hope and Goodwill
In late fall of 2019, in preparation for the mid-winter break festive celebrations, Dr. Schwind invited her then graduate student, Emma MacGregor, to create a “Tree of Hope and Goodwill”. This artful installation was intended to be a more inclusive and engaging feature of the school’s holiday celebration and was supported by the then Social and Wellbeing (SWELL) committee.
Participatory art installation inviting people to provide responses to what they could be thankful for, and their hopes for the future.
Participatory art installation inviting people to provide responses to what they could be thankful for, and their hopes for the future.
To that end, Emma, who values natural beauty, used a real tree branch to create an interactive artistic installation. Included beside the tree branch was an invitation to the whole community to write, on the provided pieces of paper, what they could be thankful for, and their hopes were for the future. These notes also served as tree decorations, giving the tree its meaning and authenticity, unique to our school. Many community members participated both in writing and in reading the note decorations.
The installation was intended to stay in place for the full upcoming year. However, in March 2020 the sudden shutdown, due to the pandemic, placed this interactive art installation into stasis. It was not until August 2022 that we were able to access the tree with all its comments left hanging, waiting to be re-read and embraced once again. At that time, with permission from the school, using only the comments found hanging on the tree, we crafted the following poetic prose and presented it to the school community at its fall meeting, where it was warmly received.
Concept Mapping
The following is a time-lapse video of what is often an internalized process for scholars. Concept mapping is an embodied approach to analysis, making explicit the process. Here, Emma MacGregor engages with literature cognitively, emotionally and somatically, leading to threads of meaning as she considers the concept of curriculum.
Photo Gallery
Featured here are examples of work completed as part of the Arts-Informed Narrative Inquiry activities. All work was created by participants to locate themselves in a person-centered care environment.
