PLAY THERAPY TRAINING INSTITUTE
Our Play Therapy Institute introduces participants to a world unlike any other where play becomes the means to reach a child in need.
The Play Therapy Training Institute at Georgia State University strives to offer quality play therapy training through continuing education to professionals in the play therapy community. We also encourage networking, research and resources to those in this field. Our goal is to enrich and challenge each participant’s knowledge, skills and practice in the field of play therapy.
UPCOMING WORKSHOPS
THE PLAY THERAPY TRAINING INSTITUTE PROUDLY PRESENTS:
Terry Kottman, Ph.D., LPC, RPT-S
Introduction to Adlerian Play Therapy
Friday, February 7, 2025 (9 A.M. – 4:30 P.M. EST)
Online virtual format!
Description of Training:
In this fun, interactive workshop, Dr. Terry Kottman, “inventor” of Adlerian play therapy, will introduce participants to Adlerian play therapy, a method of integrating the concepts and techniques of Individual Psychology with the practice of play therapy. Participants will learn techniques for establishing relationships with clients, exploring clients’ lifestyles, helping clients gain insight into their lifestyles, and reorienting and reeducating clients. Participants will learn Adlerian tools for conceptualizing children and the significant adults in their lives.
Learning Objectives:
- After the workshop, participants will be able to explain 1 basic concept of Individual Psychology as applied to play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to list the 4 phases in Adlerian play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to describe 1 technique for building a relationship with the child in Adlerian play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to describe 1 technique for exploring the child’s lifestyle in Adlerian play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to describe 2 techniques for helping the child gain insight into his/her/their lifestyle in Adlerian play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to describe 1 technique for reorientation/reeducation of the child in Adlerian play therapy.
- After the workshop, participants will be able to explain the rationale for consulting with parents and teachers in Adlerian play therapy. Define childhood trauma.
Presenter Information: Dr. Terry Kottman developed Adlerian play therapy, an approach to working with children and families that combines the ideas and techniques of Individual Psychology and play therapy. She founded the League of Extraordinary Adlerian Play Therapists and created a certification program for Adlerian play therapy. Terry is a presenter and author who regularly teaches classes and writes about play therapy. She is co-author (with Kristin Meany-Walen) of Doing Play Therapy: From Building the Relationship to Facilitating Change and Partners in Play: An Adlerian Approach to Play Therapy, and several other books. In 2014, she was granted a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Association for Play Therapy; in 2017, she was given a Lifetime Achievement Award from the Iowa Association for Play Therapy; and in 2020, she received a third Lifetime Achievement Award from the North American Society for Adlerian Psychology. In 2024, the National Board for Certified Counselors gave Terry the Innovation in Counseling: Practice and Clinical Service Award.
Number of Continuing Education Contact Hours Offered: This is a live-online workshop and offers 6 APT Non-Contact Play Therapy credits (Includes 4 hours of Play Therapy Seminal or Historically Significant Theories and 2 hours of Play Therapy Skills and Methods)! In addition, this workshop provides 6.0 hours of continuing education credit for counselors, social workers, marriage and family therapists, and psychologists. Consistent with Rule 510-8-.02 (State Board of Examiners of Psychologists) and Rule 135-9-.01 (Composite Board of Professional Counselors, Social Workers and Marriage and Family Therapists), the accredited psychology and counseling programs in the Department of Counseling and Psychological Services provide approved continuing education programs for psychologists and counselors licensed in the State of Georgia.
Costs/Registration Fees Per Workshop:
Professional $150.00
CPS Alumni $100.00 *Please provide the year you graduated and Panther Card ID #.
Student $35.00 *Current students must complete and send the Application for Student Discount Rate (p. 4) to Katie Palmeri [email protected] qualify for the reduced fee.
Registration Website: https://secure.touchnet.com/C20797_ustores/web/store_main.jsp?STOREID=172&SINGLESTORE=true
Please note: The Play Therapy Training Institute does not accept checks.
Cancellation/Refund Policy: Cancellations must be received in writing seven days prior to the workshop to receive a refund and are subject to a $10.00 processing fee.
Questions? Please contact Marieke van Nuenen [email protected]
PREVIOUS WORKSHOPS
Jeff Ashby, Ph.D.
Ethical Decision Making in a Changing World Online Workshop
Friday, June 21, 2024 (8:30 A.M. – 4 P.M.)
Online virtual format!
Description: Ongoing clinical practice often contributes to a kind of ethical “drift”. In addition, the internet, social media, telehealth, artificial intelligence, and other technological changes have offered new ethical challenges for mental health clinicians. Using case examples, discussion, and lecture, participants in this workshop will consider how the ethical codes apply to the changing world of clinical practice. Special emphasis will be placed on developing clinicians’ understanding of decision-making processes used in arriving at ethical courses of action in the context of a changing world. The workshop will highlight issues of informed consent, competence, confidentiality, and boundaries/multiple relationships. Using case studies and vignettes, clinicians will be invited to consider what might be the best course of action in a variety of scenarios presenting ethical dilemmas.
Learning Objectives:
- Discuss the assumptions and theories behind ethical decision-making models,
- Identify and explain a practical model for ethical decision-making,
- Explain how ethical decision-making models can apply to issues of informed consent,
- Explain how ethical decision-making models can apply to issues of competence,
- Explain how ethical decision-making models can apply to issues of confidentiality,
- Explain how ethical decision-making models can apply to issues of dual relationships.
Presenter Information: Dr. Jeff Ashby is a Professor in the Department of Counseling and Psychological Services at Georgia State University. He is a licensed psychologist, a Diplomate of the American Board of Professional Psychology, and the Co-Director of the GSU Center for the Study of Stress, Trauma, and Resilience. Dr. Ashby has taught ethics at the graduate level for over 20 years and has served as Chair of the Ethics Committee of the International Association of Play Therapy, an ethics content expert with the State of Georgia Psychology Board, and is a current member of the Georgia Psychological Association Ethics Committee. He has made over 150 presentations at professional conferences and authored/co-authored more than 120 articles in refereed journals, numerous book chapters, and three books.
Number of Continuing Education Contact Hours Offered: This is an ONLINE workshop and offers 6.0 hours of continuing education credit for counselors, social workers, marriage and family therapists, and psychologists.
Consistent with Rule 510-8-.02 (State Board of Examiners of Psychologists) and Rule 135-9-.01 (Composite Board of Professional Counselors, Social Workers and Marriage and Family Therapists), the accredited psychology and counseling programs in the Department of Counseling and Psychological Services provide approved continuing education programs for psychologists and counselors licensed in the State of Georgia.
Tiffany McNary, Ph.D., LPC, CPCS, RPT-S
Treating the Traumatized Child: Integrating Play Therapy and the Expressive Arts
Friday, April 26, 2024 (9 A.M. – 4:30 P.M.)
In-Person
Georgia State University – Alpharetta Campus
3775 Brookside Parkway
Alpharetta, GA 30022
Description: Increasingly, most applied psychology practitioners and mental health therapists are responsible in their workplaces for providing specialized care for children exposed to trauma, though are not being trained in developmentally appropriate ways to provide such care. This workshop is designed to help fill this gap by presenting theory, techniques, and issues related to counseling traumatized children and adolescents using play therapy and the expressive arts. The theme of this training is to explore the expanding trauma, play therapy and expressive arts therapy literature base and present trauma anchored, play and expressive arts informed, developmentally appropriate techniques and strategies. This training will consist of lecture, video presentations, experiential activities, and case studies.
Learning Objectives:
1. Define childhood trauma.
2. Identify what trauma symptoms look like in children and adolescents.
3. Explain attachment, attachment styles, and attachment behaviors as they relate to trauma informed work with children and adolescents.
4. Identify and explain three distinct stages of Trauma Recovery
5. Explain the Neurosequential Model of Therapeutics.
6. Identify how play therapy is naturally a trauma informed treatment modality.
7. Explain how the expressive arts can complement a Neurosequential approach to treating traumatized children.
8. Identify developmentally appropriate treatment modalities grounded in trauma and recovery staging.
Presenter Information: Tiffany McNary, Ph.D., LPC, CPCS, RPT-S is the Founding Director of the Advanced Center for Play Therapy and Expressive Arts where she provides clinical supervision, consultation, and training for mental health professionals. She has taught and supervised since 2009 in the Department of Counseling and Psychological Services at Georgia State University both as a part time instructor and clinical assistant professor. She is a Licensed Professional Counselor, a Certified Professional Counselors Supervisor, and a Registered Play Therapist Supervisor. She earned her Doctoral degree in Counselor Education and Practice in 2009 and her master’s degree in Expressive Arts Therapy and Counseling in 2002.
THE PLAY THERAPY TRAINING INSTITUTE
Previous Workshop
Terry Kottman, Ph.D., RPT-S, NCC, LMHC
Thursday, May 18, 2023
Creative Play Therapy Interventions
Thursday, May 18, 2023, 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Description: In this fun and experiential workshop, you will learn practical play therapy intervention techniques for building a relationship, exploring clients’ lifestyles, helping clients gain insight, and facilitating them making changes in their behavior, thinking, and feelings. You will learn a model for metaphor design, therapeutic storytelling, art techniques, and structured play activities, you can use in your play therapy sessions for assessing clients and facilitating movement in their therapeutic process.
Learning Objectives:
- Describe one play therapy technique used to build a relationship with clients.
- Describe one play therapy technique used to explore clients’ lifestyles.
- Describe one play therapy technique to facilitate clients making changes in patterns of thinking, feeling, and/or behaving.
- Describe 1 method for designing therapeutic stories in play therapy.
- Explain one art technique for use in play therapy.
Presenter Information:
Terry Kottman, Ph.D., RPT-S, NCC founded The Encouragement Zone, a center in Cedar Falls, Iowa, where she provides play therapy training and supervision, life coaching, counseling, and “playshops” for women. Terry developed Adlerian play therapy, an approach to counseling children that combines the ideas and techniques of Individual Psychology and play therapy. She regularly presents workshops and writes about play therapy, activity- based counseling, school counseling, and life coaching. She is the author of Partners in Play, Play Therapy: Basics and Beyond, and several other books.
If You Can’t Beat ‘Em, Join with Them…Play Therapy Interventions Based on Video Games
Thursday, July 20, 2023, 9:00 AM – 12:00 PM
Description: Many play therapy clients are avid video gamers. Instead of fighting a losing battle trying to convince them to stop, meet them where they are. Many play therapists are video game novices–or even video game haters. And video games are here to stay–with many of our clients. You can disapprove of video games, ignore them and hope they go away, or you can learn to use your knowledge of video games in your play therapy sessions. In this experiential workshop, participants will learn play therapy interventions based on the characters and plots of selected video games for building relationships with gamer play therapy clients. Workshop participants will learn techniques to help gamer clients gain insight into their self-defeating patterns of thinking, feeling, and behaving and help them experiment with more adaptive patterns. You will leave with practical strategies you can use in your play therapy sessions to develop strategies for connecting, communicating, and intervening with gamer clients.
Learning Objectives:
- Describe three video games commonly played out in play therapy sessions and explain why certain play therapy clients might be attracted to them.
- Describe two play therapy interventions based on video games you could use to build a relationship with gamer clients and/or help gamer clients gain insight into maladaptive patterns of thinking, feeling, and/or behaving.
- Describe two play therapy interventions based on video games you could use to help gamer clients practice more appropriate ways of interacting with others.
- Develop an original intervention based on a video game one of your clients currently plays and describe how you could generalize the development process to create other video game-based interventions.
Presenter Information:
Terry Kottman, Ph.D., RPT-S, NCC founded The Encouragement Zone, a center in Cedar Falls, Iowa, where she provides play therapy training and supervision, life coaching, counseling, and “playshops” for women. Terry developed Adlerian play therapy, an approach to counseling children that combines the ideas and techniques of Individual Psychology and play therapy. She regularly presents workshops and writes about play therapy, activity- based counseling, school counseling, and life coaching. She is the author of Partners in Play, Play Therapy: Basics and Beyond, and several other books.
These are IN-PERSON workshops and offer 3 APT Contact Play Therapy credits!
Georgia State University
College of Education & Human Development
30 Pryor Street, SW, Room 150 Atlanta, GA 30303
THE PLAY THERAPY TRAINING INSTITUTE
Previous Workshop
Claudio Mochi, M.A., RPT-S and Isabella Cassina, M.S., CAGS
Friday, October 14, 2022
Description of Training:
This interactive workshop provides an overview of an innovative model for intervention in crisis and potentially traumatizing contexts, “Coping with the present while building for the future” (CPBF). Emphasis will be placed on the role of play, play therapy, and expressive arts in a process-oriented approach targeting children, families, and professionals.
What does it mean to deal with trauma in crisis contexts? When is the appropriate time to do so? What should be done before and after? After getting into the subject matter by sharing theoretical assumptions, images, and videos from the field, the presenters will invite participants to reflect by engaging in creative activities and group discussions.
Learning Objectives:
• Discuss the relevance of a process-oriented approach in crisis contexts.
• Describe the main phases of the “Coping with the present while building for the future” (CPBF) model.
• Contextualize the treatment of trauma in crisis work.
• Analyze the role of play and expressive arts in the treatment of trauma in and out of the playroom.
Presenter(s) Information:
Claudio Mochi, MA, RP, RPT-S is a Clinical Psychologist, Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist, and Registered Play Therapist Supervisor. He specializes in emergency interventions and trauma treatment with twenty years of international field experience in disaster mental health. He has presented and trained on play therapy-related topics across six continents and in over twenty countries. Claudio is the founder of the Association for Play Therapy Italy (APTI) and the President and Director of the training program of the International Academy for Play Therapy Studies and Psychosocial Projects in Switzerland.
Isabella Cassina, MA, TP-S, CAGS is a Social Worker and specializes in international cooperation (IHEID Geneva) and migration. She is a Registered Therapeutic Play Specialist with the Italian Association for Play Therapy Italy (APTI) and has significant experience as a humanitarian worker focusing on the use of Play Therapy and Expressive Arts modalities in crisis interventions.
Psychological Interventions in Complex and Dynamic Settings: Lessons from the Front Lines
Previous Workshop
Claudio Mochi, M.A., RPT-S and Isabella Cassina, M.S., CAGS
Friday, October 14, 2022
Summary:
How can mental health professionals intervene in a world that appears increasingly complex and dynamic, in which situations of intense stress and trauma surround them and others? Presenters share key insights from their work in crisis contexts across 4 continents including videos and images and emphasizing the relevance of play and expressive arts as elements of psychological interventions.
About the presenters:
Claudio Mochi, MA, RP, RPT-S is Clinical Psychologist, Child and Adolescent Psychotherapist, and Registered Play Therapist Supervisor with the Association for Play Therapy (APT). He specializes in emergency interventions and trauma with twenty years of international field experience in disaster mental health. He has presented and trained across six continents and in over twenty countries. Claudio is the founder of the Association for Play Therapy Italy (APTI) and the President and Director of the training program of the International Academy for Play Therapy Studies and Psychosocial Projects in Switzerland.
Isabella Cassina, MA, TP-S, CAGS is a Social Worker and specializes in international cooperation (IHEID Geneva) and migration. She is a Registered Therapeutic Play Specialist with the Italian Association for Play Therapy Italy (APTI) and has significant experience as a humanitarian worker focusing on the use of Play Therapy and Expressive Arts modalities in crisis interventions.
Contact Us
Contact
Dr. Jeff Ashby, Director
Phone: 404-413-8170 Fax: 404-413-8013
E-Mail: [email protected]
Katie Lowry, Department Business Manager
Phone: 404-413-8012 Fax: 404-413-8013
E-Mail: [email protected]
Play Therapy Training Institute – Georgia State University
Dr. Jeff Ashby, Director
Katie Lowry, Department Business Manager
Phone: 404-413-8012
Fax: 404-413-8013
E-Mail: [email protected]
Physical Address
Play Therapy Training Institute – Georgia State University
College of Education & Human Development
Department of Counseling & Psychological Services
30 Pryor Street, SW, Room 950
Atlanta, GA 30303
Mailing Address
Play Therapy Training Institute – Georgia State University
College of Education & Human Development
Department of Counseling & Psychological Services
P.O. Box 3980
Atlanta, GA 30302-3980