Play Therapy
Play therapy provides children a safe and engaging way to work through their challenges while promoting optimal growth and development.
What is Play Therapy
Play Therapy is a therapeutic approach designed to help children express their feelings, resolve conflicts, and develop problem-solving skills through the natural medium of play. By creating a safe and supportive environment, play therapy allows children to explore emotions, process experiences, and build resilience in a way that is age-appropriate and non-threatening.
Key Features of Play Therapy:
- Child-Centered: Tailored to the developmental level of the child, allowing them to express themselves in ways they find most comfortable.
- Creative Expression: Uses toys, games, art, storytelling, and role-playing to help children communicate thoughts and emotions they may not yet have the words to express.
- Safe Environment: Provides a secure space where children feel supported and understood without fear of judgment.
- Insight and Growth: Helps children process difficult emotions, experiences, and behaviors while fostering self-awareness and emotional regulation.
- Parent Involvement: Often includes collaboration with parents or caregivers to reinforce progress and provide guidance for supporting the child at home.
You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of conversation.
Is Play Therapy RIght for my Child?
How Play Therapy Works:
- During sessions, therapists observe and engage with the child as they play, gaining insights into their inner world.
- Through guided activities, children learn to identify and manage emotions, improve social skills, and build healthy coping mechanisms.
- Play therapy can be directive (therapist-guided) or non-directive (child-led), depending on the child’s needs.
- Play therapy meets children where they are, using their natural language of play to help them heal and grow. Play therapy empowers children to thrive in their emotional and social development by fostering emotional resilience, self-expression, and positive change.
- At Clearview Counselling, play therapy is the way counselling support is offered to children ages 3-10 and is integrated for older children depending on their development and preference.
In Play Therapy Children Learn:
- To respect themselves
- That their feelings are acceptable
- To express their feelings responsibly
- To assume responsibility for themselves
- To be creative and resourceful in confronting problems
- Self-control and self-direction
- To accept themselves
- To make choices and be responsible for their own choices
Children may benefit from play therapy if they are experiencing struggles as the result of:
- Trauma
- Grief and Loss
- Parent Separation or Divorce
- Bullying or Social Challenges
- Learning or School Challenges
- Life Changes (such as moving, adoption, changing schools, etc.)
Therapists who work with Play Therapy: Karlynn Wakulchyk
Play is often talked about as if it were a relief from serious learning. But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.