Engaging the Body in Play Therapy with Movement, Rhythm, & Sensory Play

Children who have experienced complex developmental trauma often present with unusual behaviors- both in and out of the play therapy room.  This workshop will help play therapists feel comfortable leaning into nervous system dysregulation, reframing misbehavior as opportunities to soothe the limbic system through “bottom up” body-based play therapy techniques involving movement, rhythm, and sensory play.

This innovative training will guide the attendees through the most current neuroscience research (including Bruce Perry, MD, Bessel van der Kolk, MD, Stephen Porges, MD, Peter Levine, PhD, and Daniel Siegel, MD) and demonstrate how to put theory into practice.  Examples of creative ways to use movement, rhythm and sensory play in play therapy to shift the child’s emotional state, maintain regulation, and renegotiate traumatic associations without overwhelming the client will be explained and demonstrated. Participants will learn a framework (based on the Alert Program and Zones of Regulation) to help children develop the capacity to monitor (notice) and modify (change) their state of regulation or dysregulation.

This training will include didactic and experiential learning; participants should dress comfortably and be prepared to move and play.  Activities will allow the participants to experience ways to incorporate music and movement into the play therapy process with children. Attendees will leave this training with practical tools, strategies and applications that enhance the client’s capacity to connect with others, process trauma without becoming overwhelmed, and facilitate healing.

Intentionally engaging the body through movement, rhythm, and sensory play provides valuable practice coming back into a regulated state from a dysregulated state, deepens connection and attunement between therapist and client, models for the parent how to help their child through dysregulation, brings high level brain functions back online, and enhances learning.  Movement, rhythm, and sensory play also provides clients another medium to express their inner experience while connected to a regulated, attuned therapist, allowing for integration and a renegotiation of implicitly held trauma. Attendees will be able to use movement, rhythm, and sensory play in play therapy in a purposeful way that leads to more enjoyment in their play therapy sessions and works toward therapist goals of improved regulation and ultimately trauma healing.