Postpartum Depression, a Family Disorder: The Immense Impact on Attachment and Child Development

Identification: W3

Credits: None available.

In this workshop play therapists will learn how maternal mental health, specifically Postpartum Depression/Anxiety, affects attachment processes and the social - emotional development of the child. Attendees will learn to incorporate specific play therapy techniques to utilize in the treatment of the family as a whole.

Learning Objectives:

  • Assess for, and recognize the symptoms of, the Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders, including an understanding of the difference between the baby blues and postpartum depression in your play therapy practice.
  • Utilize Filial Therapy to strengthen the mother/child attachment, as well as reduce the negative impact of Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders on the family.
  • Utilize new tools and play therapy interventions when working with families that have been impacted by Perinatal Mood and Anxiety Disorders.
  • Describe how maternal mental health impacts the attachment and development of the infant and family as a whole, as well as long lasting effects into childhood.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics

Healing Wounded Hearts - Attachment Centered Play Therapy

Identification: W5

Credits: None available.

Trauma, abuse, grief, and loss impact the bonds of attachment within family relationships. Attachment Centered Play Therapy creates a new framework for understanding and treating families who have experienced these issues using expressive, experiential, and interactive play therapy techniques.

Learning Objectives:

  • Describe how attachment theory applies to play therapy and to view family systems through the lens of attachment.
  • Identify attachment patterns that impact parent-child relationships.
  • Utilize effective evidence-based play therapy techniques that can be used immediately with their client populations.
  • Apply skills in becoming more competent and confident in engaging parents in family play therapy.
  • Identify how attachment patterns manifest themselves within and between family systems
  • Utilize new concepts and play therapy interventions in their practice

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics

Engaging Men in Play Therapy: What, When, Why, Where, How

Identification: W7

Credits: None available.

This workshop examines how to develop and maintain a therapeutic alliance in your play therapy sessions with men that encourages growth between fathers and their children. Careful attention is given to cultural context and the family of origin experiences of the client and the therapist.

Learning Objectives:

  • Identify challenges fathers face in developing emotional attachments to their children.
  • Describe how to develop and maintain a therapeutic alliance with fathers in your play therapy practice.
  • Identify and use family systems theory and play therapy techniques for promoting parent-child attachment between men and their children.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics

Play Therapy in the Multidisciplinary World of Child Abuse & Maltreatment

Identification: TH2

Credits: None available.

Working in the child abuse field creates unique challenges for play therapists. This workshop will explore applying trauma principles and emerging neuroscientific research into practice as well as trends for collaboration with protective services, law enforcement, and our legal system.

Learning Objectives:

  • Discuss 1-2 strategies for applying play therapy in clinical work with abused and maltreated children.
  • Identify 1-2 core treatment components for treating abused and maltreated children.
  • Discuss 1-2 ways that play therapy can be utilized to access and reprocess traumatic experiences.
  • Discuss 1-2 variables that influence the welfare of victims who testify.
  • Define their scope of practice when working in the child abuse and maltreatment field.
  • Articulate 1-2 differences between play therapy intervention and forensic intervention.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics

2, 4, 6, 8, This is How We Regulate!: Play Therapy Mindfulness Interventions to Increase Emotion Regulation in Children

Identification: TH12

Credits: None available.

Research indicates practicing mindfulness results in increased executive control and decreased emotional reactivity; two areas that are beneficial towards improved emotional regulation. This workshop teaches Play Therapy mindfulness interventions to help foster a calmer, more focused and regulated child.

Learning Objectives:

  • Articulate how the Seven Attitudinal Factors of Mindfulness Practice can be incorporated in the play therapy room.
  • Describe three positive benefits of high emotion regulation in children.
  • Identify three play therapy mindfulness interventions to be used with children.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics

Understanding the Deeper Meaning of Children's Play - A Jungian Analytical Play Therapy Perspective

Identification: F3

Credits: None available.

This workshop is intended to provide advanced play therapists a cursory understanding of Jungian Analytical Play Therapy with the intention to provide them with a relevant model and structure by which they can deepen their understanding of children's therapeutic play.

Learning Objectives:

  • Describe the development of a child's psyche.
  • Describe the development of a complex and proto-complex in play therapy.
  • Analyze the archetypal material involved in complex formation.
  • Discuss the symbolic nature of toys in play therapy.
  • Identify the connection between the thematic application of the toys and the child's complex related issues in play therapy.
  • Analyze a child's work and the process of transformation.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods

Theraplay: How to Increase Family Attachments and Reduce Aggression

Identification: F7

Credits: None available.

Theraplay®, an attachment enhancing model of play therapy, is effective in reducing aggression across a wide age range. This workshop will cover the fundamentals of Theraplay, related brain and touch research and a case illustration with an aggressive child.

Learning Objectives:

  • Identify some of the fundamentals of Theraplay.
  • Describe how to involve parents in Theraplay.
  • Describe some of the factors important in working with aggressive, dysregulated children.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics

Adlerian Play Therapy: Applying the Principles

Identification: F5

Credits: None available.

Adlerian play therapy is a fun and practical approach to working with children and families. In this interactive session, participants will learn Adlerian concepts, practice conceptualizing, and create interventions that meet their clients’ needs.

Learning Objectives:

  • Identify the four phases of Adlerian play therapy.
  • Identify at least three domains of the lifestyle conceptualization.
  • Intentionally create play therapy interventions that respond to the child’s treatment plan.
  • List and describe four goals of misbehavior.
  • List and describe four Crucial Cs
  • List and describe four Personality Priorities

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods

Difficult Clinical Cases and Issues in Child-Centered Play Therapy

Identification: F13

Credits: None available.

Focus is difficult play therapy cases, and play “messages” that indicated children’s process. Play therapy video excerpts highlight issues: aggressive child with Reactive Attachment Disorder; terminally ill child coping with dying; child witnessed infant sibling’s death; abused/homeless and other cases.

Learning Objectives:

  • Describe two new insights into themselves related to their difficult cases.
  • Articulate two new insights about one of their difficult clinical cases in play therapy.
  • Describe two positive facilitative ways to respond to children who experience emotional blocks by becoming silent and inactive.
  • Identify the three steps in the ACT therapeutic limit setting process.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics

Let's Talk about Sex, Baby: Tackling Touchy Subjects through Play

Identification: S1

Credits: None available.

When working with sexually abused children, and/or children who engage in problematic sexual behavior, a host of difficult content lies before us. Come learn a variety of play therapy games that aid in accomplishing sex-related treatment goals with developmental nuance.

Learning Objectives:

  • Describe the typology of treatments for children who have been sexually abused with and without reactive sexual behavior and for children with problematic sexual behavior with/without documented abuse history.
  • List five play therapy games used to help children and families define body boundaries.
  • Describe four play therapy mediums that can assist sexually abused children in creating their trauma narratives.
  • Describe five play therapy games that help clients identify cognitive distortions and rehearse replacement self-talk.
  • Explain three play therapy interventions that target the amplification of child's voice in body safety/recovery work.
  • Explain what is meant by "containment" as it relates to the role of the therapist in working with children with sexual abuse histories.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics