Assignment: Support of play therapy.

Assignment: Support of play therapy.

RESPONSE 1

Respond to at least 2 colleagues by expanding on evidence in support of play therapy.

Colleague 1: Christine

There are many ways play therapy can benefit children and in this case 6 year old Claudia. As children experience trauma service providers may also have difficulty with young children and self disclosure. Here is the list that I came up with after reviewing this discussion resources in relation to how this approach can benefit:

1) Creating a safe space to explore with safety can hold children accountable for responsible behaviors while developing successful insight to harness positive strategies to cope.

2) Children can also benefit as they learn new solutions toward dealing with issues while learning skills to express new and old emotion.

3) There can be a gained awareness to self; understanding thoughts and emotions.

4) Children can learn new social skills as they work with their provider and how to relate to self through creativity. Also, gaining communication skills as they use various forms of play therapy.

5) Children may also develop an awareness toward new and old abilities using a strength-based approach toward therapy.

Another form of play therapy that I am fond of while working with children is storytelling. It isn’t for all children specifically concentrating on those that feel comfortable opening up and speaking to others. Storytelling has been beneficial to me while working with children in the past as it has revealed fear and anxieties. Utilizing different platforms of storytelling, self disclosure can build various survival strategies in children as they explore different situations through actions, movements, and changes. (Chiesa, 2012, pp 5)

Overall I feel strongly play therapy in all forms whether it be art therapy, role playing, non-directive/directive play, can promote healing, through self expression of feelings. It can also encourage children to build creative ways to deal with current and future trauma, and allow the development of healthy decision-making.

Chiesa, C, (2012). Scripts in the sand; Sandplay in transactional analysis psychotherapy with children. Transactional Analysis Journal. pp. 5 Retrieved from Walden Library databases. 

Colleague 2: Tiffany

Play therapy can be beneficial because Claudia is a young child who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time and saw a mugging which caused her to be fearful, and develop anxiety. Play therapy helps the child to relax and the child is interested in playing with the toys in the sand. The sand can help the child relax and the toys can help the child create her own world. Usually, children will repeat behaviors or experiences during play. This can help the social worker assess the magnitude of trauma or abuse the child has experienced. This also makes it easier for the child to talk about their trauma or experiences. Play therapy helps children address and resolve their own problems. Play therapy helps to communicate with others, express their feelings, modify behaviors, develop skills to help them solve problems, and they can also learn other ways of relating to others.

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If I worked with Claudia  I would use play therapy with the use of a little town or city with people in it. This would help Claudia tell her story. I would ask Claudia to create her family and support out of a few of the characters, I would then ask Claudia to choose characters that she felt were bad. I would then work with her on the bad characters by using strengths of her supports to build a safe environment and reassure Claudia her environment is safe by adding the police and security guards to the characters to reassure her she is protected and safe.

References

Plummer, S.-B., Makris, S., & Brocksen, S. M. (Eds.). (2014b). Social work case studies: Concentration year. Baltimore, MD: Laureate International Universities Publishing. [Vital Source e-reader]. Working with Children and Adolescents: The Case of Claudia (pp. 15–17)

Taylor, E. R. (2009). Sandtray and solution-focused therapy. International Journal of Play Therapy, 18(1), 56–68.