Arts Therapist & Education Specialist

Louise has worked extensively as a primary school teacher, with a particular love for literacy, the creative and expressive arts, and inquiry learning. During her experience within schools all over Melbourne, she has worked with children and adolescents with varied needs, learning styles, backgrounds, and strengths. Louise loves supporting young people to develop confidence, resilience, optimism, self-efficacy, and healthy connections. Her teaching background allows her to identify and plan for specific goals, develop supportive strategies, proffer explicit feedback, and assist clients in experiencing ownership and agency over their achievements and growth.

Louise has a Masters qualification in Creative and Expressive Arts Therapy from MIECAT. In her role at Crisalida, she brings both the arts and education together, to best support clients in meeting their individual social, learning, and wellbeing goals. Arts therapy is increasingly recognised as offering non-verbal opportunities for accessing and expressing emotions, needs and values through embodied and creative explorations. It differs from art teaching, in that creative and expressive modalities are conduits to exploring overall wellbeing and relational bonds. Arts skills are not explicitly taught nor required. The emphasis is on playful, emergent, multimodal inquiry, supporting the development of interpersonal skills, attachment, friendships, emotional wellbeing, self-regulation, and increased self-awareness. Both whole-child and person-centred, Louise creates a calm space as she supports clients to access the tools and insights that can allow them to experience efficacy, connect, learn, and thrive.