Children's Peace Theatre Information

The mission of Children's Peace Theatre is to create a culture of peace by engaging children and youth through the practice of theatre. Children's Peace Theatre has developed an arts-based approach that deals with entrenched social problems with the children and youth who are our future leaders. Programs and productions are collaborations between the finest professional artists and young people, resulting in compelling art, which arises directly from their concerns and fears. Theatre is a natural mode in which to explore conflict. It invites participants to step into the shoes of the other, to develop empathy and understanding. Children's Peace Theatre, in a safe space, engages children and youth in a powerful, transformative process that helps them recognize how they are part of and affected by patterns of social behaviour, and how in turn they contribute to, or break free of those patterns. There is a natural progression from this personal understanding of conflict, to the communal, and the global aspect of our work, and many of our productions focus on issues that affect the young people in our world. Our work is unique. It has the power to transform individuals, and to make the unspeakable heard. The collaborative experience of creating theatre on subjects of importance to them gives children and youth the understanding to develop their own moral compass and further the cause of peace in their lives, in this troubled community, and in the world.