How Do Children Heal Themselves through IDAM?

The readers will journey with the author through seven case stories, each of which enlivened both a player-child and audience-children. The author presents and explains the four purposes of IDAM with the case stories that illustrate them: (1) expressing feelings and achieving catharsis with cases of “Shut up! You fool!”, “Let’s tear up the textbooks!” and Going on a date at a barbershop!?, (2) fostering imagination, creativity, and improving self-esteem with cases of “You can ride a Nozomi bullet train to your heart’s content!”and “Bring my husband back to life!”, (3) realizing what participants cannot do in real life with such cases like “I want to quarrel with my mom!” and “Let’s kill the neighbors!”, (4) experiencing empathy with peers and a pleasant sense of unity. The author emphasizes the need for differentiation between dramas whose world should be brought back to real life and those whose world should not be brought back to real life. She also explains IDAM from the perspective of “Healing Drama” by Kawai.