Our Schools Project

Every school term we have a class of students join us in the Hospice Day Service.  They attend for four weeks, working on a Creative Arts project with the patients. They also get the opportunity to learn more about different roles and services in the Hospice.   

This Monday was the first session for Year 5 from Brenchley and Matfield Primary School at the Hospice.  The children were eager to get started on their art project!  Last week Nell Mellerick, our Creative Artist, went to visit the class to discuss any concerns and talked about a poem.  The poem is called ‘The Elephant in the Room’, written by Terry Kettering and it forms the start of our art project.  It goes as follows….

‘There’s an elephant in the room.

It is large and squatting,

So it is hard to get around it.

Yet we squeeze by with,

‘How are you?’ And, ‘I’m fine’

And a thousand other forms of trivial chatter.

We talk about the weather;

We talk about work;

We talk about everything else

Except the elephant in the room.

There’s an elephant in the room.

We all know it is there.

We are thinking about the elephant

As we talk together.

It is constantly on our minds.

For, you see, it is a very big elephant.

It has hurt us all, but we do not talk about

The elephant in the room.

Oh, please, say her name.

Oh, please, say Barbara again.

Oh, please, lets talk about

The elephant in the room.

For if we talk about her death,

Perhaps we can talk about her life.

Can I say, Barbara to you

And not have you look away?

For if I cannot,

Then you are leaving me alone

In a room with an elephant.’

The children were each given a line from the poem and for half the session worked with the patients in the Hospice Day Service to produce a pictorial design representing that line of poetry.  They will be painting their designs next week on large pieces of wood.  At the end of the four weeks this artwork will be on display in the reception of the Hospice, please come and have a look!

One student reported ‘It was much better than I thought it was going to be, less scary’.

Another reported ‘I can’t wait to work with Hayley next week!  She was the patient I designed my artwork with’.

The other half of the session was spent with Liza Waller, our Chaplain, who explained about the use of the Quiet Room and the importance of Spirituality within the Hospice.  At the end of the session the children were able to colour a butterfly for someone they were thinking of and put it on our butterfly tree.  Some of the children took the butterflies back to the Day Service and gave them to the patients!  Next week the students and patients will spend the second half of the session with our Music Therapist, Rachel Harris.

The importance of the Schools Project is to de-mystify the Hospice for the children, to open up to the wider community and to facilitate open and honest conversations about death and dying.