A Handbook of Play Therapy with Aggressive Children

Credits: None available.

Written by two authors with a combined experience of more than fifty years in the residential treatment of severely aggressive-and often traumatized-children, this book has proven invaluable to new as well as seasoned child practitioners. The chapters cover the nuts and bolts of play therapy with this extremely challenging clinical population, including the therapeutic alliance, aims of play therapy with aggressive children, setting limits on destructive and obtrusive behaviors, typical play themes of aggressive children, and developing distancing and displacement through playful action and through teaching, modeling, and structuring action play. Other chapters cover such topics as: how to create more mature defenses and calming strategies; the role of interpretation; the use of spontaneous drawings as a bridge to fantasy play; specific drawing techniques to create access to the inner world of children; how to teach and model pro-social skills and the language of feeling; and how to facilitate affect expression and modulation, contained reenactment of trauma, and children's ability to mourn tangible as well as intangible, unacknowledged and invisible losses. Later chapters cover the therapeutic process and techniques to facilitate termination. The authors introduce the Play Therapy Decision Grid, which is intended to guide the therapist into the levels of therapy best suited for the child at any given point based on the child's resources and the anxiety engendered by the therapy.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • List at least three specific anger modulation strategies.
  • Describe three specific ways to counter devaluation.
  • List three specific strategies to address the hidden losses suffered by many aggressive and violent children.
  • Explain clinical considerations regarding contained trauma re-enactments.
  • Discuss common countertransference feelings aroused in work with aggressive children.
  • List the two tracks of the Play Therapy Decision Grid.
  • Use techniques to access the inner world of the child.
  • Describe at least 5 specific strategies to work through termination issues.

A Manual of Dynamic Play Therapy: Helping Things Fall Apart, the Paradox of Play

Credits: None available.

Children will experience natural growth and change throughout their lives. Play, by its very nature, always results in things falling apart, often literally, and children generally find satisfaction in this process of collapse and renewal. This book harnesses the power of the reorganizing process to elicit positive and profound change in children dealing with social, neurological, developmental, health and family issues. The author clarifies the theory behind this innovative play therapy approach, and explains its practical application to a full spectrum of client needs, using inspirational, real-life anecdotes as examples. He also describes the importance of using symbols in play therapy and focuses on ways to enable children to act out their internal aggression in a safe and healthy manner. This will be essential reading for play therapists and other professionals working therapeutically with children and their families.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:
  • Skills and Methods
Learning Objectives:
  • Explain the paradox of play.
  • Describe various play materials that support the therapeutic healing of aggression in play.
  • Critique dynamic play therapy and how the falling apart of the play can lead to profound healing in a child.
  • Discuss the importance of symbols in play.

ADAPT: A Developmental, Attachment-based, Play Therapy

Credits: None available.

This manual was created to provide child and family-focused mental health professionals with information and techniques on how to address common emotional and behavioral problems exhibited by young school-age children (ages 6-9) with developmental trauma difficulties and other trauma-induced attachment difficulties. Children who have been exposed to traumatic experiences early in life tend to develop cognitive, affective, and behavioral coping strategies based on their memories, fantasies, and previous relationships within their history. As indicated above, research has demonstrated that neurological chemistry and brain development are significantly altered when trauma occurs in early childhood, leading to a biological response to events that are perceived as threatening. This further exacerbates the child’s learned methods of coping. The focus of this manual is to provide practical and effective interventions for use within a ten-week group that can be easily modified for use within individual and family sessions. In addition, this manual emphasizes working with the parents and/or caregivers of these young children, as they are instrumental in resolving and healing issues of attachment and trauma, as well as other emotional and behavioral issues.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • Describe 4 skills utilized in the ADAPT model
  • Identify 3 goals of the ADAPT model
  • Describe 7 roles of an ADAPT therapist

Advanced Play Therapy: Essential Conditions, Knowledge, and Skills for Child Practice

Credits: None available.

Current play therapy resources offer details on how to conduct play therapy, but are limited in addressing the challenges that develop when therapists conduct play therapy with real-life clients. Using the Child-Centered Play Therapy Approach, Ray has written the first book to address these complex play therapy subjects. Topics covered include: integrating field knowledge of play, development, and theory into the advanced play therapist’s knowledge base; working with difficult situations, such as limit-setting, aggression, and parents; addressing modern work concerns like measuring progress, data accountability, and treatment planning; differentiating play therapy practice in school and community settings; and addressing complicated skills, such as theme work, group play therapy, and supervision. Ray also includes her Child Centered Play Therapy Treatment Manual, an invaluable tool for any play therapist accountable for evidence-based practice. This manual can also be found on the accompanying CD, along with treatment plan, session summary, and progress-tracking worksheets.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • Recite when, why and how to set limits for children in a play room.
  • Describe key characteristics of effective play therapists.
  • Explain the historical and religious influences upon the nature and development of play.
  • Discuss the various stages of child development from the perspectives of leaders in the field.
  • Compare play therapy practice in schools to play therapy in community settings.
  • Describe the five properties of play.
  • Identify common themes in play therapy.

Animal Assisted Play Therapy

Credits: None available.

This book is the culmination of the authors combined 75 years of experience working with animals as a part of their therapeutic practice. Professional practitioners, as well as the paraprofessionals who work in tandem with them, will find this book of enormous value. While the focus is on mental health professionals, the approach and methods covered can easily be adapted for use by allied health professionals, such as physical, occupational, speech, and recreational therapists as well as those in the educational field such as teachers and school counselors. Animal Assisted Play Therapy™ (AAPT) adds the elements of playfulness, humor, and lightness to the therapeutic process, and can be helpful for clients of all ages. It focuses heavily on relationships: how the relationship between therapist and animal must be developed in positive, mutually respectful ways in which the animals have a voice and choice whenever possible. This in turn provides a model for clients to help them strengthen their own relationships, not only with therapy animals and their own companion animals, but within the human relationships in their families and communities. The authors demonstrate how the techniques can be readily applied for dogs, horses, cats, and other animals. Many illustrative case examples are included.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:
  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • Review the historical and theoretical background of Animal Assisted Play Therapy and animal types and characteristics most often utilized
  • Address common misconceptions regarding the use of animals in therapeutic settings
  • Identify the training requirements/ethical considerations required to become an Animal Assisted Play Therapist
  • Develop an understanding of the unique characteristics which define and structure the therapist/animal relationship
  • Identify how AAPT is beneficial with culturally diverse populations for assisting with child, adult and family constellation and needs
  • Identify non-directive and directive Play Therapy interventions most commonly used in AAPT

Applications of Family and Group Theraplay

Credits: None available.

Applications of Family and Group Theraplay is rich in content and practical ideas guided by current research in attachment and neurobiological research. Most chapters are illustrated with a case study, including agendas from beginning, middle, and end sessions with an extensive appendix describing each activity, to help translate theory into practice. Theraplay, a research based therapeutic model that has gained increasing attention worldwide, is described in this book from its theory (based on attachment theory), research, to its underlying dimensions (structure, challenge, engagement, nurture) applied to a wide diversity of populations and formats. The book describes activities that have underlying goals of increasing parental attunement, creating a caring, accepting environment and co-regulating the child. It replicates normal parent/child interactions that are playful, physical, and fun. Applying Theraplay to a wide variety of populations (dysregulated, resistant, aggressive, impulsive, adopted, autistic, traumatized) and cultures (Aboriginals, American, Asian, German, Finnish) is included, as well as integrating Theraplay with other treatment methods. It also describes group Theraplay with father/son dyads and with troubled adolescents and offenders. This book will not only lead to a greater understanding of Theraplay, but will also stretch the reader's skills in the application of this very effective play therapy model.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:
  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • Present an overview of the main tenants of Theraplay.
  • Explain applications of Theraplay to a wide variety of populations including those coming from cross cultural contexts.
  • Describe case studies illustrating the beginning, middle and end sessions of Theraplay.
  • Discuss modifications of Theraplay integrating other treatment modalities.
  • Illustrate family and group Theraplay formats as a way of enhancing parent/child attachments.
  • Describe the sequential nature of brain development.
  • Compare traditional play therapies with Theraplay.

Art of the Relationship, Theory and Application of Child-Centered Play Therapy an Evidence Based Approach 4th Ed.

Credits: None available.

Dr. Landreth has done it again. This book defines and illustrates the history, meaning, and application of Child-Centered Play Therapy (CCPT). This updated edition is ideal for both the novice play therapist who is just entertaining the idea of joining the play therapy world, as well as the expert play therapist pursuing some new information or refining skills. Landreth (2023) states that children use the toys in the playroom as their words and the act of playing as their natural language. Play is developmentally sensitive and allows children to access pertinent information to the therapy process on a level that may not been accessible otherwise. Landreth’s tome is an excellent manual for understanding children, applying developmental theory to practice, and building skills to become child-centered in your approach with children. He offers case examples as well as defining specific play materials and categories to guide a play therapist. The fourth edition builds upon the previous version with new chapters and topics, new play therapy transcripts and case examples, and 13 new rules of thumb to better define and clarify the CCPT relationship. Some of the new chapters and topics address cultural responsibility, supervision and training, meaning in play therapy, short-term play therapy, silence in session, infant relational ability, and research in support of CCPT. Furthermore, this book incorporates recent research studies related to the use and benefits of CCPT as an empirically sound modality for use with children and their families.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Seminal & Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills & Methods
Learning Objectives:
  • Identify the therapeutic role of play in the treatment of children.
  • Outline the developmental and unique considerations of working with children.
  • Define the historical factors related to the field of Play Therapy.
  • Articulate the key ingredients of CCPT when it comes to the theory, the role of the Play Therapist, clinical training, involvement of the caregivers, and the specific play materials.
  • Review the specific ways of being a CCPT in ways of the relationship, response, limit setting, therapeutic process, and termination.
  • Examine the empirical evidence surrounding the therapeutic use of CCPT and youth.

Art, Play, and Narrative Therapy: Using Metaphor to Enrich Your Clinical Practice

Credits: None available.

Moschini (2019) eloquently illustrated the numerous benefits of metaphor, story-telling, sandtray, and the use of art. She provided well-defined techniques that were easily understood for the novice to the seasoned play therapist. Additionally, she described the play therapy techniques thoroughly and offered visual representations to tap into auditory, visual, and kinesthetic learning. The book also offers best practices for play therapists when considering treatment planning by evaluating the client’s response mode (e.g., visual, auditory, kinesthetic, or tactile), reaction (e.g., what they observe, what they are told, feelings in the body, and what they experience), and lastly, the learning process (e.g., feeling, listening, moving, and doing, Moschini, 2019; Table 1.1, p. 15). By considering these specific modes of communication a play therapist can better tailor not only the treatment plan, but the play therapy methods and modalities to work more effectively with youth clients. The creative use of art in both a group setting and individually to work on anger, grief, and loss is also addressed. Overall, this book is an easy read that is rooted in research, and supplies a plethora of hands-on techniques that are play therapy practice ready.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Skills & Methods
Learning Objectives:
  • Analyze the use of metaphors as a mode of communication to explain internal bothers in the form of external representations in a play therapy setting
  • Identify the impact of one’s developmental stage which also includes their relationships, identity formation, personality, moral development, and the deficits in development as a way to process presenting symptomology.
  • Compare the different theoretical orientation’s view of the use of creative arts in a play therapy setting with clients.
  • Demonstrate the power of therapeutic storytelling, myth, metaphors, and the characters in between that provide a less threatening way for client’s to explore their issues and try out new skills.
  • Utilize sandtray and the miniatures as way to process internal conflicts through external representations, which may also create a safe distance to the issue discussed.
  • Explains creative and art-based ways to effectively process anger and grief with loss in both an individual play therapy session and within the group process.

Attachment Centered Play Therapy 

Credits: None available.

Attachment Centered Play Therapy offers clinicians a holistic, play-based approach to child and family therapy that is presented through the lens of attachment theory. Along the way, chapters explore the theoretical underpinnings of attachment theory to provide a foundational understanding of the theory while also supplying evidence-based interventions, practical strategies, and illuminative case studies. This informative new resource strives to combine theory and practice in a single intuitive model designed to maximize the child-parent relationship, repair attachment wounds, and address underlying symptoms of trauma.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • Special Topics
Learning Objectives:
  • Analyze attachment theory as it applies to play therapy to provide integrated therapeutic treatment.
  • Evaluate the four key concepts of attachment theory and how these concepts apply to attachment centered play therapy.
  • Analyze various family systems through the lens of attachment theory to strengthen clinical assessment skills.
  • Conceptualize attachment patterns that impact parent-child relationships to further advance your play therapy practice.
  • Implement play therapy interventions to foster engagement with parents in family play therapy in order to repair and enhance the parent-child relationship.
  • Determine the developmental stages of attachment needs and behaviors to identify most appropriate attachment-based play therapy interventions with children and families.

Child-Centered Play Therapy

Credits: None available.

Highly practical, instructive, and authoritative, this book vividly describes how to conduct child-centered play therapy. The authors are master clinicians who explain core therapeutic principles and techniques, using rich case material to illustrate treatment of a wide range of difficulties. The focus is on non-directive interventions that allow children to freely express their feelings and take the lead in solving their own problems. Flexible yet systematic guidelines are provided for setting up a playroom; structuring sessions; understanding and responding empathically to children's play themes, including how to handle challenging behaviors; and collaborating effectively with parents.

Play Therapy Primary Areas:

  • History
  • Seminal / Historically Significant Theories
  • Skills and Methods
Learning Objectives:
  • Explain the background and relevance of CCPT.
  • Discuss CCPT Techniques and playroom logistics.
  • Describe how to appropriately involve parents and school personnel.
  • Recite the appropriate ways to handle and document touch in CCPT.
  • Discuss studies which show empirical support for CCPT and FT.