Elin MacKinnon, LCSW, presents a brown bag lunch for the CCC – Healing Gardens: Horticultural Therapy – on April 4th in the large conference room at SCEC from 11:30 am to 1 pm.  Elin will provide a brief history and introduction to the profession of horticultural therapy – how it works and where it’s practiced.  The focus of this Brown Bag learning session will be on how participants can explore, encourage and support healing garden activities in all kinds of settings and will all kinds of clients.  We’ll end with a fun hands on activity.

Elin has incorporated healing garden activities into her work with children and families since 1992 when she developed a community garden project for children in treatment foster care.   For over 15 years she has taught a course to graduate social work students at the University of Maine about the benefits of expressive and experiential therapies with a focus on horticulture.

Links to resources on Horticultural Therapy

Websites:

American Horticultural Therapy Association

The Northeast Horticultural Therapy Network

Canadian Horticultural Therapy Association

Poisonous and Non-poisonous Plants

Activities and ideas for HT

Videos:

Missouri Botanical Garden video clip on their Therapeutic Horticulture Programs

Chicago Botanic Gardens video clip on the healing power of plants for Veterans

Container Gardens for HT video

Theme Gardens for Kids video

More Resources (Google Drive Folder)