Diversity in your Playroom is essential.  Full stop.

I talk a lot about how to select diverse and representative toys for your Playroom HERE and HERE. It is essential for clients to have a wide range of available options of characters that look like them or objects to express their culture and day to day lives.  Food, religion, transportation, housing, and family structure are all important parts of this.  AND this is by no means a comprehensive list.  It is essential that as Play Therapists we consistently assess our playroom and areas for growth and representation. 

I wanted to share with you something that I overlooked a little too much, that was a bright red flashing beacon I couldn't ignore once I moved from the Twin Cities area of Minnesota to Duluth.

So, if you are a Sand Tray therapist as part of your Play Therapy practice you know what it is like to have miniature collections of hundreds and hundreds of objects.  Ugh…and if you are like me it is always carefully growing as I come across new items that I just NEED to have.  Check out more of my Sand Tray journey HERE! 

One of the objects that I love in my Sand tray is my lighthouse.  What an amazing metaphor and story creator!  It is actually a lighthouse I got on vacation when I was mayyybe 12.  More specifically it was the Bodie Island, N.C. Costal Collection 1872 Limited Edition.  I purchased it for $2.98 and I know this because the sticker is still on the bottom.  I should probably take that off right?

It is also the lighthouse that one of my teens (who had extremely limited speech in session) told me (with a sarcastic smirk) that it was a “really crappy limited edition”. This is one of the sessions that I burst out laughing (mutually of course) and always tugs on my heartstrings when I see it taken out. 

WELL, the lighthouse was one of my toys that rarely got used in the Twin Cities.  

But, when I got to Duluth - BAM!  This lighthouse was taken out all the darn time. And after a couple of months it clicked.  Duluth is home to TONS of lighthouses. There is the Split Rock Lighthouse and of course the lighthouse in Canal Park.  

To the children in Duluth lighthouses were more of a commonplace sighting, something to visit, and definitely something they were familiar with.  I hope my experience can broaden your perspective (like it did mine) of what constitutes diversity in your Playroom collection and the importance of specific regional toys.  

So, now I have to know! What are you going to rush out and add to your cart for your Playroom collection?  Let me know in a comment below! 

For me?  This year I realized (at the request of a client) that I definitely need a snow plow!

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Child Centered Play Therapy can be one of the most difficult models to “trust the process”.  

Ok, I’ll take ownership - it was the most difficult model for me to understand what I was doing, why I was doing it, and link to effectiveness.  I often had thoughts like “am I even doing anything here?” or “how is this going to help us work towards our goals?”.  

It was a hard concept to grasp coming from a grad program that had a teeny tiny sprinkle of child interventions but was nearly entirely focused on adult mental health diagnosis and treatment…which looks completely different from child therapy! AND not to mention there are many universities that don’t think that Play Therapy is an evidence based practice or at the very least don’t mention it as an effective type of therapy for children. (Learn more about how Play Therapy is an evidence based practice HERE) 

AND we also have insurance companies pushing for quantifiable goals and tracking of results.  

So, in all of this it was so much easier for me to understand that when I read The Color Monster and engage in a Cognitive Behavioral Play Therapy activity (check out this one HERE) it is really clear that I am working on goals of emotional regulation, widening the window of tolerance, emotional literacy, or some other related goal.  

It was definitely harder to connect the dots about how the facilitative statement and session skills lead to overall changes for a child’s clinical goals.  Check out my free download of the CCPT skills cheat sheet to learn more about the CCPT skills!

SO when you are used to engaging in a specific intervention as a therapist it can be difficult to understand that the facilitative statements and session structuring skills ARE the intervention. And because of that, I wanted to bust the myth of the Child Centered Play Therapy intervention. 

It. Does. Not. Exist.

Well, it doesn’t exist in the sense that you as the therapist are having no part in planning or facilitating anything. At all.  

As CCPT therapists we let the child lead the way and we are either using our session structuring skills, facilitative statements, or trying our best to play the role the child needs us to play, taking no creative liberties to put our own creative spin on it. The foundation of the model is the relationship you have with the child. 

Oftentimes in consultation questions will come up about CCPT interventions or I will hear therapists talk about doing a CCPT session and at the same time making a suggestion, offering an activity, or other sorts of directive approaches. And in those moments we can come back to the model and the therapist skills within the model. 

So, you miiiiight be attempting to engaging in an intervention (and therefore breaking from fidelity of the model) if you: 

• Suggest an activity at all 
• Prompt an activity or type of play 
• Give options of what the child could do 

Let’s take this example - pretend we are thinking about a session where a child has completed an art project of her big feelings.  That COULD be a CCPT session if the child spontaneously stated they were going to create art, got the supplies themselves, on their own generated the idea, and got to work! 

It would be departing from a CCPT session if the therapist did any of the following: 

• Asked the child if they wanted to use markers or crayons 
• Asked the child what they were going to draw 
• Suggested to draw about a feeling from the week 

And if you have found yourself doing any of the above - there is definitely no shame in that!  Check out my free download of the CCPT skills, get more training, or seek out supervision/consultation.  It is definitely a tough model, but one that has been proven through research to be incredibly effective for healing young people - even when we can’t directly draw the line from “intervention” to symptom.  

What has been the hardest thing for you about the CCPT model?  Have you found any good tips or suggestions to help you work through it?  Drop a comment below! 

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I’ve played everywhere, man. I’ve played everywhere.

Ok -  if that doesn’t want to make you bust out in song and channel your inner Johnny Cash, well maybe you should have a listen HERE as a lil pick me up for your day! 

But in all seriousness everywhere might be a bit of an overstatement, but not by much.  If you have ever done school based therapy you are very used to having office space that is significantly below the ideal playroom according to Garry Landreth.

Across my career I have played in small offices where there was barely any room to do a jumping jack (let alone a full on sword fight), giant conference rooms with larger than life tables, offices that were not my own (with very adult and very breakable objects), offices with a separate playroom, offices with the playroom inside the office, and offices where my “playroom” was a rolling suitcase.  

And all of that makes you get…well…creative! 

I learned as I went what the best possible ways to set up a playroom in a temporary space. I talk HERE about the 5 things you need for your Portable Playroom space! 

And over the years I have felt so validated by Gary Landreth in this book HERE as well as Terry Kottman and Kristen Meany-Walen HERE. In Landreth’s text The Art of The Relationship he has a separate area for his “must have” toys for a portable playroom AND Terry Kottman discusses how during her school based work had to make a hallway work for Play Therapy sessions. 

So, there you have it! It’s expert approved that you can, in fact, play anywhere.  

I wanted to dive into my top 5 tips for how to make a temporary space work best for Play Therapy, especially Child Centered Play Therapy. 

1. Intentional Packing and Transporting 
My first tip starts at the very beginning.  However you are transporting your Playroom make sure you are able to carry it where you need it to go and neatly pack it up when it is time to leave. There is literally nothing worse than opening your play kit or portable playroom and everything being mixed up and you have no idea where to find things. 

I have tried many things over the years but my favorite, least expensive, and easiest larger container was a rolling suitcase. However, this was not the best option for my basement office where the building had no elevator downstairs.  

Inside of the larger storage tote, bag, or container it can be SUPER helpful to have separate containers to hold all the categories of toys or groups of like toys.  I have used smaller structured totes (for miniatures or the sand tray) and have used Zip Lock plastic bags as well.  

Also, identify what are your “must haves” for your population, making sure you are including each category of toy. Assess how to make your portable playroom the leanest it can be, while still offering variety and all the things a child may need to express themselves. 

2. Create Consistency 
One of the great things about a traditional Playroom is that everything has a place so the child knows what to expect and where they can find different items, toys, or materials. When you are doing portable play therapy in a temporary space it is important to have extra time before sessions start for the setup.  This means however you are placing or displaying the toys that they need to be in as similar arrangement and setup as possible each session.  It can help to take a picture of how the toys are setup so you don’t have to remember all the details each time. 

3. Easily Accessible 
The next tip is another standard practice of a traditional Playroom.  You want to make sure that however the toys are setup that they are easily accessible to the children in your office.  A lot of times that might mean setting up the majority of the toys on the floor in neat piles or areas.  However, if the children you see are Elementary students you might have the option to put some items on an available table versus if you had 3 and 4 year old children who might not be able to clearly see up on a table.

4. Create The “Just Right” Space 
For some temporary spaces this will not be an issue, however if you are playing in a larger conference room the large amount of space may not be ideal for Play Therapy.  You may want to create physical boundaries of where the play space is and have the toys set up accordingly, with enough space for play therapy activities but not too much to create dysregulation!  

5. Understand The Boundaries and Limits of Each Unique Space 
This is especially important if there are objects in your play space that are not yours. Playing in a conference room with a table and chairs is a much different situation than playing in the office of a therapist who sees adults and has many breakable decorations.  We can also see this issue arise when you may be playing in the office of another therapist who sees kids and might have toys out that you don’t have permission to play with. Understanding the potential areas where you may have to set boundaries or limits is essential before you start!

And that’s a wrap on my top 5 tips to create the most consistent and effective play space when you are paying on the go!  What about you? Leave a comment on your best portable play therapy tips below!! 

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If you ever have taken a Child Centered Play Therapy course (which I hope you have!), read a foundational text (like Play Therapy: The Art Of The Relationship), or seen a video of Dr. Garry Landreth in CCPT glory you have inevitably noticed the beautiful, pristine, spacious Playrooms.  Not a desk or office chair in sight. 

If that leaves you with a little Playroom envy, same.  There are a lot of therapists who have hybrid playrooms (including me!) or play on the go. The fact that they need a separate Playroom to do "real play therapy" is one of my Top 5 Myths About Working With Children! It’s also the reason I created this course HERE, which you should check out if you need support designing your Playroom! 

If you need some ideas about designing a playroom on the go, like now, or are looking for more inspiration for your Playroom check out my FREE resource for The Portable Playroom - full of free downloadable resources and links to all of the categories of toys for Child Centered Play Therapy! 

Sometimes Play Therapists can get caught up in having just the "right" space to play in.  I remember being so inspired when I read Terry Kottman and Kristen Meany-Whalen’s book Doing Play Therapy where Terry talks about doing Play Therapy in the corner of a secluded hallway.  Just a Play Therapy legend, doing her best, meeting kids where they are it - even if it happened to be in the hallway or a conference room! 

And at that moment I felt so seen!  I had been attempting to hold fidelity to Child Centered Play Therapy in the smallest of offices without a separate playroom for years and to hear that one of our top experts in the field (although not a CCPT) was making Play Therapy work wherever she could access children was so inspiring! 

So the real talk about my offices? I have played in the corner of conference rooms with large tables taking up the majority of the room, in an extremely tiny office that housed the custodian’s closet inside of it (like the custodian took three steps through my office to access their cart, which did disrupt play sessions from time to time - but I'll take what I can get!), an office that had floor to ceiling windows looking out at the hallway, and small offices with no windows. 

And, I have been grateful for all of these opportunities to see young people. In all of these offices and settings, with toy collections large and small, I have seen immense healing and growth.  I have seen children grow into the best versions of themselves - confident and able to regulate.

Children were able to heal just as much next to the janitor’s closet than the biggest office I have ever had. They were able to heal with my Playroom that held probably $100 worth of materials as well as in my Playroom collection (through many years) likely holds thousands of dollars in toys and play equipment. 

Here are my top 5 things needed (that you can find nearly anywhere) to do Child Centered Play Therapy: 
1. At least some toys from each category of toys in the playroom.  Check out the categories HERE!
2. A space that is confidential and private 
3. Enough floor space for some movement
4. Enough space to have the toys accessible to the child 
5. You! 

That's it! 

I hope this encourages you that you are enough without a fully stocked play room.  The relationship you provide to the child is enough. AND that it is possible to have fidelity to CCPT with a small amount of toys and a less than ideal setting.

Now - go play on!!!

AND - I would love to hear from you!  What is the most creative or challenging office you have played in?  Drop it in the comments below!! 

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For Child Centered Play Therapy there isn’t really any “session prep” in the traditional sense.  No books, activities, topics, or materials to prepare.  Preparing involves you authentically showing up as yourself - regulated, open, and willing to support the child through play, CCPT skills, and facilitative responses. 

AND sometimes you might find yourself wondering if you should do more.  Have a structured session.  Engage in another modality of Play Therapy with a child. 

I would hope that most Play Therapists are prescriptive in nature, meaning you have several core theories you are trained in and during your intake process you assess what theory, modality, or combination might be right for the child that is presenting in your office.  

Sometimes for a client whose parents are getting divorced you might put CCPT aside for a session or two to engage in some Cognitive Behavioral Play Therapy or Bibliotherapy around the topic of divorce.  The same is true for other things that may happen in a child's life like grief and loss or even a major event like the pandemic.  Other times when doing trauma work you may pause the CCPT work and engage in Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) or combine EMDR with Play Therapy.  

Now, Child Centered Play Therapy purists would say that this might rarely need to be done. AND sometimes in our clinical work with children the specific situation a child is presenting necessitates us to go a little (brace yourself) directive. 

I wanted to share with you my three tips for when you need to pause the course of Child Centered Play Therapy and engage in a more directive session: 

1. Understand the purpose - what are you hoping to accomplish with a directive session or other Play Therapy modality? What are the specific goals you are hoping to achieve and what are the reasons these goals cannot be achieved with CCPT?  A great example of this is a child whose parents are divorcing that may not have adequate information about what divorce means and what the process will be.  It may make sense to take a session to read a book or do an activity about divorce and psychoeducation. 

2. Clearly communicate the session structure - If you are going to dedicate an entire session to another modality communicate that to the child at the session prior (including the structure of the session) as well as right at the beginning of the directive session.  If you are going to engage in two modalities within the same session be clear if the child will have the CCPT time at the first or last portion of the session.  

3. Use a transition statement - if you are engaging in two modalities within the same session (ie a CCPT session for the first portion and a CBPT session for the last portion) use a clear transition statement that the Child Centered Play Therapy portion of the session has ended and you are beginning a new modality, technique, or theory. That might sound like “Our special playtime is over for the day, and now we are going to spend the last part of this time being in charge together and reading this book!”. This transition statement safeguards us from using directive approaches during our CCPT time. 
And there you have it!  These are the three ways that I use when I am utilizing a different Play Therapy modality or approach with a child who has typically only had Child Centered Play Therapy Sessions!

What did I miss? What other tips do you have for having a directive session with the course of Child Centered Play Therapy? Drop them in the comments below! 

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In Child Centered Play Therapy the intervention is the relationship as well as the specific set of skills that help a therapist know what to say about the play and when (check out my free download of all of the Child Centered Play Therapy Skills HERE).

But….then how do you make sense of it all? What were they actually communicating? How do you know if they are making progress?!

Whew… those are all excellent questions.  Let’s start with the great news - you do not need to know exactly why a child is playing a specific way or what their play actually means. We can still be effective therapists by focusing on the relationship and the CCPT skills and facilitative responses within the session. 

In Gary Landreth’s text Play Therapy and the Art of the Relationship there are 4 pages dedicated to themes in play therapy in a 403 page text book. In Child Centered Play Therapy by Rise VanFleet, Andrea Sywulak, and Cynthia Caparosa Sniscak there are 14 pages out of a 223 page text.

In short - the thing that I wanted to know MOST about when I started doing Child Centered Play Therapy doesn’t exactly have a ton of information I could dive into.  I think over the years of doing CCPT this is why I have gravitated to CE courses, texts, and trial and error to hone this skill in the Playroom as much as I could. 

On the other hand, it probably isn’t the best idea to throw the idea of themes out the window completely.  That's probably why your reading, right? I am a strong believer that understanding a child’s play themes helps us to be a more effective play therapist by having more accurate and on target facilitative responses.

And at the same time, two children could play out similar play sequences and have it mean completely different things.  The two text above are what I have used as my guide as a Child Centered Play Therapist, and from these foundational texts I wanted to share with you 3 ways you can tell in the Playroom if a child is playing out a theme in Child Centered Play Therapy: 


There is a sudden change in intensity in the play 
A child may shift play to a higher level of intensity or become very focused on the specific play. This is why it is so necessary to be in tune with your nervous system to be able to be present and attuned to the child’s nervous system in the Playroom. 

There is repetition of the play sequence 
This could either be a repetition between sessions or multiple courses of the same play within sessions. Think battle sequences that repeat or feeling like you are seeing the same moving 1,000 times in the playroom! 

Play that continues from session to session
This is when the child comes in and picks right back up where they left off.  The amazing part about this is during the pandemic when children had been playing virtual for a year and a half when they returned to my Playroom they picked up the same play they had left off with in our last in office session! 


This is definitely not a comprehensive list AND it is also important to note that whatever facilitative responses you are making with the play themes in mind - the goal is to help move the child forward in play! 

What other things do you notice that indicates your clients are in a play theme?  Drop a comment below! 

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Child Centered Play Therapy is a theory and modality of Play Therapy that is pretty darn different from other theories. Grab my FREE cheat sheet download of CCPT skills and facilitative responses HERE. Also see the difference between Child Centered Play Therapy and Child Led Therapy HERE! 

So one of the biggest defining differences are that the “intervention” is the relationship you hold with the child and the facilitative responses you give during play. No therapist led or directed activities.  No therapist led or directed content…well…except for some structuring skills and limit setting - but that’s it! 

Centering the child and letting the child fully lead is wonderful, effective, and amazing to watch the process unfold in your Playroom.  However, most play therapists become stuck on this one question - How do I know that CCPT is working? When are clients done? Am I doing enough? Am I even being helpful here? 

Okay, that was four questions. Fair.  But the theme is that you might struggle without the specific skills teaching or activities to know if you are even moving the needle for their therapeutic care.

It can be hard, but with CCPT you really need to fully trust the process or you won’t be able to be authentically present in the playroom in the way the child needs you to be to hold fidelity to CCPT.  If you don’t fully trust the process you will likely feel the urge to give it a little nudge.  AND this is when CCPT therapists go from having fidelity to CCPT to making it something else that is therapist led. 

I wanted to share with you my FREE Downloadable Effectiveness Cheat Sheet to help you understand the top 7 things I look out for to know that I look for to understand how CCPT is working! ​

“I’m so glad that Ainsley will finally have someone to talk to about her problems”.
 
Well what if Ainsley (not a real client!) is four and you as her therapist are going to be doing Child Centered Play Therapy? 
 
AND what if her parents are concerned that you are “just playing” and “not doing the real work” if she isn’t sitting across the room from you, hands crossed articulating every emotion from her week and clearly identifying her cognitions and triggering events and then evaluating her behavioral options? 
 
Along with the help of Andrew and Andres there are 3 things I like to share with parents to help them understand the value (as well as developmentally appropriateness) of Child Centered Play Therapy. 
 
Child Centered Play Therapy is an evidence based practice 
The Association for Play Therapy has an excellent Evidence Based Practice statement and tons of research and resources that distinguishes Child Centered Play Therapy as one of the Evidence Based Practices according to the National Registry of Evidence-Based Programs and Practices! 
 
I like to share with parents that this means that there has been a lot of research that goes into what types of therapy are effective, and that enough academic studies have been completed for Child Centered Play Therapy that we can be sure it is an effective way to help young people heal from the difficulties that bring them into therapy. 
 
Straight talk therapy isn’t developmentally appropriate for children 
Children’s brains are amazing and the development that is happening in childhood is so fascinating.  If I cut right to the chase (because I could talk about neuroscience and brain development for hours) children don’t have the abstract reasoning abilities and verbal processing skills to engage in talk therapy alone.  They are also significantly more right hemisphere developing (which holds their emotions and picture centers) so even if they wanted to they just aren’t able to process as “mini adults”.  Because they aren’t….they are children!  
 
Your child will be extremely bored and likely not want to come to therapy if we don’t incorporate play 
Okay - see note above that straight talk therapy is developmentally inappropriate for children. Well….. so is physics.  If we asked a 4 year old to do complex physics problems (even with an expert like Einstein as her teacher) she would feel overwhelmed, anxious, distressed and probably like a failure.  
 
AND those are the same feelings that will likely come up if we are putting pressure on children to do things that are outside of their scope and ability.  And when kids feel like this? Well, the last thing they want to do is come into your therapy office for another 45 minutes to an hour of feeling overwhelmed and like a failure! This leads to kids refusing to come to therapy and, well, if they aren’t in your therapy office they can’t do the work (or serious play) of therapy! 
 
In a recent consultation session one of my consultee's said "I just want to see how Ann does it, like in real life", so I thought you might want to hear how it sounds "in real life" too! 

So if you want in - swipe my script and check out this absolutely free short video of how I explain Child Centered Play Therapy to parents in my therapy practice! 
 
AND when I share this information with parents, 99.99% of the time they are absolutely on board and engaged in the Child Centered Play Therapy process! 
 
What else are your biggest struggles with explaining Play Therapy to parents? Drop a comment below! 

P.S. Please don't judge the 1,000 tabs I have open.  This is my life, literally every day! 

Check out the Child Centered Play Therapy Skills Cheat Sheet HERE! 

Let's Connect - click here to join my email list!​

Most therapists want to honor the requests, wishes, and desires (within reason) of children in the Play Therapy room.  
 
Yes we can play Uno! No you can catapult yourself off my couch like a rocket ship to the chair across the room.
 
Putting the child in the center of the therapy process allows children to have autonomy, independence and buy-in to their therapy experience. It also allows you as a therapist to build rapport and relationship with your client - which is the number one factor for client change! 
 
All of this sounds great right? BUT where does the line come in between Child Centered Play Therapy and child led therapy? 
 
This is such a common question and issue that pops up in the consultation and supervision part of my practice. Usually it is during a case consultation or video review when someone has identified their theory for a case as Child Centered Play Therapy but then in the process discusses significant questions they are asking the child OR talking about some sort of directive activity or suggestion for play they are giving the child. 
 
First things first - before trying any new theory or technique it is so important to get adequate training.  For Child Centered Play Therapy I definitely recommend the following texts of Play Therapy and The Art of The Relationship OR Child Centered Play Therapy as well as taking a foundational course.  
 
Now, on to the differences! 
 
Child Centered Play Therapy is a theoretical model complete with it’s own theory of personality, therapeutic phases, and therapeutic conditions that are unique to Child Centered Play Therapy.  This means there is a set of specific things a therapist will say and not say, do and not do, and a specific way of being in the Playroom - all to facilitate therapeutic change. There are also specific toys a Child Centered Play Therapy room will have and not have that is true to the Child Centered Play Therapy model. 
 
Some things that are not included in the Child Centered Play Therapy model? Asking the child questions - with a few exceptions and use of the “whisper technique”. Also, structured activities, interventions, or games. 
 
So when I have someone who is sharing their orientation is Child Centered Play Therapy but in case conceptualization will talk about an activity and questions they persistently asked during session - this is where I get really clear on re-assessing theory and orientation. 
 
Sometimes when clinicians hear the phrase “Child Centered Play Therapy” they can mistake it (and understandably so) for a type of therapy that places the child’s desires, wishes, and wants for their therapy session in the front and center of the therapy process.  More like a collaborative therapy process. 
 
And this concept - while it is absolutely necessary for rapport building and engagement with children, is not Child Centered Play Therapy. 
 
We can place the child’s needs and desires at the front of the therapy process AND be another Play Therapy orientation such as Cognitive Behavioral Play Therapy.  If I am engaging in a CBPT therapy session I can absolutely ask questions and structure activities.  I can also have the child engage collaboratively on a project, activity, or game! 

BUT if we are using the phrase Child Centered Play Therapy that means we have specific training and are engaging in the model of Child Centered Play Therapy. 
 
Hopefully this can highlight the difference between child led therapy and Child Centered Play Therapy and help us get clearer as a field about how we are showing up in Play Therapy and why we are doing the things we do in session!