Sierra says children who have experienced war usually draw war scenes at first. The challenge is to get them little by little to start drawing something different and brighter.

To encourage this, Sierra and his colleagues show the children pictures by kids in Japan, where Sierra holds workshops in elementary schools, and origami, including his favorite shapes — the "jumping frog" and the "rabbit balloon."
The effect of origami on children is "amazing," Sierra says, adding that after a few sessions, children start to use brighter colors and get a sense of achievement by creating their own toys with origami, according to Sierra.

"For children, there is a kind of magic in giving life to a piece of paper or creating something that moves. Even for the kids in New York, where they have the best toys in the world, still the magic of creating toys with just a piece of paper by themselves was very obvious. The children were very happy," Sierra said.

The other effect of origami is empowering children in terms of communication, according to Sierra.