Organizing and leading the creation of a student art-based group such as Peer Project Poetry, helps us learn and apply skills to lead, connect, and create:

• Lead – Grow skills needed to support guiding others and modeling healthy, prosocial behaviors
• Connect – Practice inclusivity by bringing your peers together to align behind a shared goal, feeling, or vision
• Create – Use art to design or produce something new that represents your feeling, experience, perspective or culture

By using art, like poetry, to organize and advocate for a student group, we can reach people with our message in a more inclusive way. When done through the lens of a peer leadership project, it allows us the opportunity to grow our self-reflection, personal agency, confidence, and communication skills, while building new relationships and exploring new outlets for creativity.

Give the opportunity to lead, connect, and create by organizing a student-led poetry group of your peers or creating a classroom group poetry project.

This activity is a part of Connecting the Dots: Health as Art. Learn more about how the arts improve social determinants of health, support child development, foster health-promoting behaviors, and discover new resources and activities that connect the dots between social-emotional health, physical activity, and nutrition through art at school and at home!