Play Therapy the Art of the Relationship 3rd Edition Summary
Book review for Garry L. Landreth (2010). Play therapy: The art of the relationship (third Ed.) New York: Routledge 2010
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Sharon Duthie, Private Exercise, Victoria, Australia
Birds fly, fish swim, and children play.
Garry Landreth
The inner earth of the kid is vastly different to that of an adult'southward; children perceive, construct and interact with the world around them in a different style. The child's world is filled with color, creativity, play, symbols and imagination and so, in order to empathize their inner world the therapist needs to meet the child in that realm. Dr Garry Landreth in Play therapy: The art of relationship not only honours the kid's unique way of beingness in the world, he also writes compellingly about the inner workings of the child, kid-centred play therapy and the complexity of the therapeutic relationship.
Drawing on his years of feel and expertise, equally well as on other professionals and their research, Landreth'southward tertiary edition of this of import text is comprehensive and user friendly. The original text was written over 20 years ago and is still used in university courses throughout the earth, and in some circles fifty-fifty considered "The Bible" of child-centred play therapy. However, in this third edition Landreth reveals his fear that the written discussion may non suffice to convey the dynamic inner structure of the kid's world and the processes of play therapy. "How does i describe children's wonder, excitement in experiencing life, the fresh newness with which they approach living, and their incredible resiliency?" (p. two) He should fear non. Landreth'southward assay conspicuously reveals the inner worlds of children and eloquently explains the dynamic processes of child-centred play therapy with clear, concise and insightful linguistic communication.
Primal to the key principles of the kid-centred play therapy arroyo is that children are self-directing, forwards moving, creative and capable of self-healing. And so, by providing a space filled with the appropriate materials, children will naturally strive for growth, independence and self-acceptance themselves. As opposed to adults, children cannot be relied upon to apply words to limited themselves. Children better communicate through the use of toys, puppets, symbols and art materials in the therapeutic infinite. However, much more is needed than a well-equipped play room. Landreth stresses that the relationship betwixt the therapist and the child is the fundamental transformative ingredient.
The book includes chapters entirely dedicated to exploring the office of this relationship but throughout the entire text its importance is constantly revisited. Landreth begins the volume with a personal account of why he values children and this arroyo to working with them. He provides a chapter on the meaning of play including a useful section on play of adjusted and maladjusted children. The author and so goes on to draw the history and development of play therapy drawing on psychoanalytic theories, release play therapy and relationship play therapy. He offers an in-depth assay on child-centred play therapy, and details the work of other prominent specialists and their interest in the formation of today's child-centred play therapy model such as Anna Freud, Melanie Klein, David Levy, Clark Moustakas, Carl Rogers and Virginia Axline.
Other of import bug Landreth discusses are the role of the play therapist; the logistics of the play room and the materials needed; troubleshooting in the play room; instance studies and transcripts of children therapy. He too offers practical communication and strategies to employ in the play room and there is a thought-provoking chapter on parents as partners in play therapy which also considers ethical and legal issues. The final affiliate, entirely new to this edition, presents a dedicated and thorough compilation of research from 1995 – 2010 on controlled upshot research using child-centred play therapy. The third edition has expanded explanations of procedures and provides new material including a multi-cultural approach of kid-centred play therapy, a description of how children view the play therapy experience, and guidelines for determining therapeutic progress, also as termination procedures.
Landreth writes passionately about how children should be perceived and understood through the eyes of the child, non the eyes of an developed. Specifically, "[t]he child's behaviour must e'er be understood by looking through the kid's eyes" (p. 403). Therapists who exercise not subscribe to Rogerian person-centred therapies may struggle with some of Landreth's concepts in the child-centred model. It is a purist model which takes the standpoint that the therapist's role is to release what already "exists in the child" and not to "identify" or attempt to "set" whatsoever bug with the child's behaviour. Rather, in the child-centred play therapy model the therapist must permit the child to lead the direction of the therapeutic experience.
As an arts therapist and child counsellor, I find it difficult to cover an entirely pure play therapy model. It seems counter intuitive not to use some directive approaches combining creative arts therapy interventions inside the play room space. Is it detrimental to use some direction with children? How does it hinder the therapeutic relationship? Is it possible to use directive components and still embrace all the nearly valuable qualities of the kid centred play therapist? Unsatisfactorily, for me at least, Landreth does not address this compromise.
Despite my personal dissonance with Landreth's lack of negotiation in incorporating directive elements into the play therapy model, I am immensely pleased that there is such a clearly laid out explanation of the purist approach. A purist model gives a divers and ideal image to work within. It evokes passion and sensation. And the work nosotros exercise with children needs that. Children need to be heard, understood and affirmed. They need to be met in their world. The core message from this book is that working as a child-centred play therapist is a way of being. And, as a play therapist you lot must embrace this way of being, not only in the play therapy room, but as part of the very ethos of how you exist in the world. And that cannot be such a bad thing. For me, Landreth's pioneering text does much more outline an of import development in the way we approach therapy with children―instead, reading information technology felt similar listening to a cherished story told by a beloved grandparent. This book has that kind of experience. It emanates ease, warmth and comfortableness―the mode nosotros might hope to collaborate with our precious young clients.
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Source: https://pacja.org.au/2014/07/book-review-for-garry-l-landreth-2010-play-therapy-the-art-of-the-relationship-3rd-ed-new-york-routledge-2010-2/
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