Main description:

Therapists who work with children and adolescents are frequently faced with nonresponsive, reticent, or completely nonverbal clients. This volume brings together expert clinicians who explore why 4- to 16-year-olds may have difficulty talking and provide creative ways to facilitate communication. A variety of play, art, movement, and animal-assisted therapies, as well as trauma-focused therapy with adolescents, are illustrated with vivid clinical material. Contributors give particular attention to the neurobiological effects of trauma, how they manifest in the body when children "clam up," and how to help children self-regulate and feel safe. Most chapters conclude with succinct lists of recommended practices for engaging hard-to-reach children that therapists can immediately try out in their own work.

Contents:

I. General Principles to Guide Practice
1. Why Children Clam Up in Therapy, Cathy A. Malchiodi & David A. Crenshaw
2. Resistance in Child Psychotherapy: Playing Hide-and-Seek, David A. Crenshaw
3. A Neurosequential Therapeutics Approach to Guided Play, Play Therapy, and Activities for Children Who Won't Talk, Richard L. Gaskill & Bruce D. Perry
II. Master Clinician Approaches
4. The Sound of Silence in Play Therapy, Anne L. Stewart & Lennis G. Echterling
5. Play Therapy with Children Who Don't Want to Talk: "Sometimes We Talk, and Sometimes We Play,"Nancy Boyd Webb
6. Polyvagal Informed Dance/Movement Therapy with Children Who Shut Down: Restoring Core Rhythmicity, Amber Elizabeth Gray & Stephen Porges
7. Play Therapy through the Lens of Interpersonal Neurobiology: Up and over the
Mountain, Theresa Kestly
8. Treating Adolescent Attachment Trauma: Ten Ways to Co-Regulate and Stay Connected, Martha B. Straus
9. Silencing and the Culture of Sexual Violence: The "Shadow Abuser,"Sarah Caprioli & David A. Crenshaw
10. Art Therapy Approaches to Facilitate Verbal Expression: Getting Past the Impasse, Cathy A. Malchiodi
11. Animal Assisted Play Therapy with Reticent Children: With a Little Help from Friends, Rise VanFleet & Tracie Faa-Thompson
Index