Training pros to use play to heal vulnerable kids

Professionals who work with abused, anxious or troubled children can learn how to use art and toys to help children open up about their anxieties.

Play therapy training will be conducted later this month by Dr Hannie Schoeman, who runs the Centre for Play Therapy and Training in Gansbaai in the Western Cape and is on a training roadshow around South Africa.

Stocked with a carload of art supplies and puppets, she is travelling to Rustenburg, Secunda, Jeffrey’s Bay and Durban to show professionals like psychologists, occupational therapists, social workers and teachers how to use them to help young clients.

Schoeman, 71, who has a PhD in social work, uses the Gestalt approach to play therapy, which maintains that family, parents, friends, culture and religion make up who you are.

She said that because children have not developed sufficient vocabulary to vocalise what is worrying them and because being asked direct will come out in what she creates. In other words the monster comes out.”

And, while play therapists steer clear of asking direct questions, children reveal what is on their minds when participating in non-pressurised, safe interactions once they have established a relationship of trust.

“One boy I worked with insisted he wanted to build a shower to play with and so I helped him make one with sticks and blocks. He then put two figurines in it and said they were him and his daddy,” said Schoeman.

“He showed us that his father was sodomising him in the shower. I reported the man and he was found guilty of rape.”

Schoeman said she had seen a rise in children being afraid of crime.

“Children are very insecure about their safety because of what they see on the news and because of the way their parents talk about crime.

“Parents need to warn them, but they also need to feel protected. Some children are so scared they don’t want to go out anymore and some even refuse to go to school or the shops.”

Play therapy was an effective method to divulge these anxieties and work through them.

● Play therapy sessions will be held at the Dutch Reformed Church in Arcadia between July 17 and 25.

Level One training will take four days and cost R2 100, while Level 2 takes three days and costs R1 950. Call (028) 3880348 to make a booking.

With a child who has been sexually abused the therapist uses what we call the monster technique