Thursday, July 16th
Session 1: Lions Tigers and Parents Oh My: Making the Most of Play Therapy Parent Consultations
Jasmine Berger, LCSW, RPT-S
Play therapy with children requires intentional and skillful collaboration with parents. While this can feel daunting, this workshop explores how to use play therapy theories, themes, and best practices to structure effective parent consultations. Participants will learn how to translate play therapy sessions into information that makes sense for parents. Participants will learn to integrate attachment-based play therapy approaches into parent meetings, and protect confidentiality while discussing progress. Through discussion and role play, clinicians will strengthen their ability to apply play therapy skills beyond the playroom to enhance parent understanding, empathy, and therapeutic outcomes.
Learning Objective 1: Describe how to use play therapy themes and conceptualization to guide parent consultations while maintaining the child’s confidentiality
Learning Objective 2: Demonstrate play therapy-informed strategies for teaching parents child-centered and attachment-based play therapy skills to strengthen the parent-child relationship.
Learning Objective 3: Analyze play therapy themes and sessions in order to communicate progress to parents
Session 2 BREAKOUTS
2A: Little Clients, Big Worries: Using Child-Centered Play Therapy to Reduce Anxiety
Susan Kelsey, MS, LMFT(CA), RPT-S
The CDC reports that anxiety is one of the most common mental health concerns among children globally, and its prevalence continues to rise. Resent research shows a marked increase in anxiety symptoms in children following the COVID-19 pandemic, indicating the urgent need for effective treatment. Child-Centered Play Therapy provides children with a developmentally appropriate avenue to express emotions, resolve anxieties, and build coping skills (Ray, 2024). We will discuss causes of childhood anxiety, common anxiety disorders in children, Child-Centered Play Therapy strategies, and current research.
Learning Objective 1: Identify and distinguish between major anxiety disorders in children
Learning Objective 2: Assess research supporting the efficacy of Child-Centered Play Therapy in treating childhood anxiety
Learning Objective 3: Apply 5 Child-Centered Play Therapy strategies in the treatment of childhood anxiety
2B: Play Therapy Supervision through a Relational Cultural Theory Lens
Dr. Emily Brown, LPC, RPT-S, NCC
Relational Cultural Theory (RCT) is a counseling framework that emphasizes growth-fostering relationships grounded in connection, authenticity, and mutual empathy, while intentionally attending to culture, power, and resilience. Play therapist supervisors can draw on RCT to cultivate supportive supervision relationships that promote supervisee development and professional growth. This session will explore the core tenets of RCT and examine how they inform play therapy supervision.
Learning Objective 1: Identify the tenets of relational cultural theory
Learning Objective 2: Explain how relational cultural theory principles can be applied within play therapy supervision
Learning Objective 3: Apply a relational cultural theory informed play therapy supervision approach to a supervisee case example
Session 3 BREAKOUTS
3A: Holding Safety: Ethical Play Therapy With Students in Foster Care
Jennifer Keutzer, MSW, LCSW, RPT
Students in foster care face unique challenges in the academic environment, including struggles with focusing on academics while experiencing trauma and changes in caregivers. Play therapy is an ideal tool to utilize with students in foster care because play therapists facilitate strong relationships with students, allowing them an opportunity to explore safety at school. This training will explore the unique challenges students in the foster care system face at school, ways to advocate ethically for students at school, as well as unique interventions for use in the school play therapy setting.
Learning Objective 1: Describe the unique traumatic struggles students in foster care face.
Learning Objective 2: Identify at least three play therapy techniques to address the complex trauma that students in foster care experience.
Learning Objective 3: Develop skills to ethically collaborate with teachers, foster parents, and guardians to support consistent interventions.
3B: I Can Do It! Using Child-Centered Play Therapy to Connect Children With Their Own Competency
Susan Kelsey, MS, LMFT(CA), RPT-S
Child-centered play therapy is valuable in helping children discover their own competency because it allows them to make choices, solve problems, and express themselves in a safe and supportive environment. Through child-centered play therapy, children gain confidence in their abilities and learn to trust their judgment, which is essential for developing self-efficacy. Current research highlights that child-centered approaches foster autonomy and resilience, enabling children to build skills and coping mechanisms that translate to other areas of their lives (Ray, Bratton, & Rhine, 2015; Lin & Bratton, 2022).
Learning Objective 1: Describe 3 ways Child-Centered Play Therapy helps children discover their own competency
Learning Objective 2: Identify the 2 skills play therapy provides that are essential for children to develop self-efficacy
Learning Objective 3: Discuss the current research in child-centered approaches and their role in helping children connect with their own competency
Session 4: Case Conceptualization of the Client within their Family System using Adlerian Sand Tray Play Therapy
Jennifer Stephens, MEd, LPCC (KY), LMHC (FL), Licensed Behavior Analyst (KY), BCBA, RPT
Dr. Tracy Lenavitt, LPCC-S (KY), LPCC (OH)
This presentation provides an applied overview of Adlerian Play Therapy case conceptualization with an emphasis on understanding the child within the family system. Participants will examine the benefits of case conceptualization in play therapy, including family systems, one’s sense of belonging, and elements of the family lifestyle. Through directed sand trays, participants will practice integrating Adlerian play therapy techniques to strengthen their ability to clinically conceptualize a client within the family and engage in evidence-based practices.
Learning Objective 1: Identify 3 benefits of conceptualizing the client within the family system using Adlerian Play Therapy.
Learning Objective 2: Describe 3 components of the child's lifestyle in Adlerian Play therapy.
Learning Objective 3: Apply 3 components of Adlerian Play therapy to conceptualize the child within the sand tray.
Friday, July 17th
Session 5: Culturally Sensitive Artmaking in the Playroom
Dominique Begnaud, MA, LPC (MO), LCPC (IL), ATR, RPT, NCC
This presentation examines attachment-informed play therapy with gender-diverse children and adolescents across changing and sometimes restrictive systems of care, including family, foster care, school, and community contexts. The framework integrates attachment theory, child-centered play therapy, family systems theory, and interpersonal neurobiology to understand how caregiving stability, affirmation, and service access influence attachment security, identity development, and emotional regulation.
Participants will learn how play therapy supports processing disruptions in affirming care, strengthens caregiver attunement, and promotes identity safety. Practical interventions and brief case examples illustrate strategies that support emotional expression, co-regulation, relational repair, and resilience while maintaining culturally responsive, ethically grounded play therapy practice.
Learning Objective 1: Use art-based interventions to explore personal cultural impacts that may appear in the playroom
Learning Objective 2: Discuss art making techniques to promote cultural recognition and pride in play therapy
Learning Objective 3: Identify ways cultural appropriation can appear in art making in play therapy sessions
Session 6 BREAKOUTS
6A: Attachment-Informed Play Therapy with Gender-Diverse Youth Across Changing Systems of Care
Bridget Dixon, MSW, LCSW (KS), RPT-S
This presentation examines attachment-informed play therapy with gender-diverse children and adolescents across changing and sometimes restrictive systems of care, including family, foster care, school, and community contexts. The framework integrates attachment theory, child-centered play therapy, family systems theory, and interpersonal neurobiology to understand how caregiving stability, affirmation, and service access influence attachment security, identity development, and emotional regulation.
Participants will learn how play therapy supports processing disruptions in affirming care, strengthens caregiver attunement, and promotes identity safety. Practical interventions and brief case examples illustrate strategies that support emotional expression, co-regulation, relational repair, and resilience while maintaining culturally responsive, ethically grounded play therapy practice.
Learning Objective 1: Analyze how attachment theory and play therapy-related models explain the impact of changing systems of care on attachment, identity development, and emotional regulation in gender-diverse youth.
Learning Objective 2: Identify play therapy indicators of attachment stress, relational disruption, and systemic instability in gender-diverse youth, including those involved in foster care or other system-impacted settings.
Learning Objective 3: Demonstrate attachment-informed play therapy strategies that strengthen caregiver-child relationships while navigating systemic barriers to affirming care.
6B: Anchored Presence: The calm you bring as a play therapist becomes the memory they carry
Gabrielle Fowler, MEd, PCIT-ED
Anchored Presence invites play therapy practitioners to explore how personal experiences and unresolved stress can influence the therapeutic relationship in play therapy. This session examines the importance of practitioner self-awareness, emotional regulation, and reflective processing to maintain a steady and attuned presence in play therapy sessions. Participants will learn practical strategies to recognize personal triggers, process internal responses, and strengthen therapeutic presence so they can remain emotionally available and effective while conducting play therapy with children and families.
Learning Objective 1: Participants will identify how everyday games can be integrated into play therapy to support emotional regulation and social–emotional development.
Learning Objective 2: Participants will demonstrate play therapy skills, including tracking and therapeutic responding, while facilitating games.
Learning Objective 3: Participants will select and apply games to build confidence in choosing interventions that support therapeutic goals.
Session 7 BREAKOUTS
7A: Gaming in Play Therapy: An Introduction to Video Games, VR and Technology
Tyler Tooley, MS, LPC-S, RPT
This training focuses on understanding the basics of how video and/or computer games, virtual reality, and other technological devices can be used as a therapeutic, facilitative tool within play therapy, and expands on legal and ethical concerns and biopsychosocial impacts.
This training introduces how to implement techniques and strategies within the play therapy setting that involve technology, video games and virtual reality as a means of building trust and developing a therapeutic relationship—for all ages—so that the therapist can address trauma, social and communication skills, and other cognitive or behavioral needs. These techniques and interventions can be used as a directive or non-directive approach to facilitate change and can therefore be implemented using several different theoretical lenses. Children and teens use symbolic language as a way of communicating. Where words are used by adults, toys and games are used by children and teens. Currently, children’s toys, games, and play are dominated by technology. Gaming and technology, therefore, is a way for the therapist to meet the child where they are to facilitate opening the door to difficult conversations. Completion of this training does not certify a person nor provide adequate competence for the introduction of technology or video games in play therapy.
Learning Objective 1: Recognize at least two (2) populations in which utilizing video games, virtual reality and/or technology devices in play therapy is most beneficial and appropriate and provide at least one (1) corresponding evidence-based intervention for each of those populations.
Learning Objective 2: Discuss relevant research and identify how video games, virtual reality and/or technology devices in play therapy can be applied by at least three (3) different theoretical orientations.
Learning Objective 3: Demonstrate an understanding of how to document the use of video games, virtual reality and/or technology devices effectively and adequately in at least one (1) play therapy progress note.
7B: Building Resilience in Families through Family Play Therapy
Alexza Gutierrez, MSW, LCSW, RPT-S
During times of heightened stress and uncertainty, resilience is paramount for families. Resilience, the capacity to adapt in the face of adversity, develops within the context of safe, responsive relationships and is shaped by each family’s cultural, relational, and social context. Family play therapy strengthens attachment bonds, enhances emotional regulation, promotes adaptive coping, and mobilizes existing family strengths—while also acknowledging the broader systemic and sociocultural factors influencing family functioning. This interactive workshop invites participants to explore practical, developmentally responsive strategies to foster resilience within diverse family systems.
Learning Objective 1: Identify the core components of family play therapy and the benefits in supporting resilience within family systems.
Learning Objective 2: Explain how resilience emerges within supportive caregiver–child relationships.
Learning Objective 3: Demonstrate how to implement two (2) family play-based interventions that promote communication, problem-solving, and strengthening of family relationships.
Session 8: Reclaiming Imagination after Trauma: Expanding Play beyond survival in Child Centered Play Therapy
Jennifer Sims, MA, LPCC, RPT, CCPT
Trauma can narrow a child’s imagination into repetitive survival scripts organized around danger, power, and protection. In Child-Centered Play Therapy, symbolic play becomes the pathway through which safety is rebuilt and flexibility restored. This presentation explores how trauma shapes imaginative themes and how consistent relational presence helps expand play beyond defense. Participants will learn to recognize trauma-driven patterns in fantasy play and respond in ways that support integration, mastery, and renewed possibility.
Learning Objective 1: Participants will identify at least three ways trauma can influence imaginative play in play therapy sessions.
Learning Objective 2: Participants will describe how Child-Centered Play Therapy guides therapist responses to trauma-related imaginative play in play therapy.
Learning Objective 3: Participants will differentiate between trauma-related play themes and typical developmental fantasy themes in play therapy.
Learning Objective 4: Participants will apply Child-Centered Play Therapy skills to support integration in trauma-affected imaginative play.