WEBINARS FROM FAMILY PSYCHOLOGICAL SERVICES
Current Webinars Offered
FAQ
1) Yes – We offer Continuing Education Credits for the professional associations of APT and NBCC.
2) Yes – If you cannot attend a live session, you will be able to view the webinar recording afterward at a more convenient time.
3) Yes – You can register for one or two sessions, for a whole series, or for both of the Saturday series. There is special pricing when you register for a whole series, or for both Saturday series at once.
4) Yes – There is an Early Registration discount on individual sessions.
Reaching Children Through Play Therapy
The webinar presenter is Byron Norton, Ed.D., LP, RPT-S, CPT-P
This is an excellent opportunity to learn more about Experiential Play Therapy from the couple who first developed the influential concept and literally wrote the book. This comprehensive overview is not available as individual sessions.
Course Topics
- Philosophy and Assumptions of Experiential Play Therapy
- The Beginning Processes of Experiential Play Therapy
Session 2
- Toys: The Tools of the Play Therapist
- Client Disorder Appropriate for Experiential Play Therapy
Session 3
- How Children Personalize Expression with Toys
- The Dependency Stage in Play Therapy
- The Process of Play Therapy with Traumatized Children
Session 4
- Metaphorical Expressions of Traumatized Children
- Characteristics of the Play of Sexually Abused Children
Session 5
- Dynamics of Play Therapy for Children who have endured Domestic Violence
- Somatic Expression of Trauma in Experiential Play Therapy
- Therapeutic Growth Stage of Experiential Play Therapy
- Termination Issues in Play Therapy
** Please Note: The book “Reaching Children Through Play Therapy” is currently unavailable. It is not necessary to have a copy to attend the webinar.
Series of 10 Experiential Play Therapy (EPT) Webinars
Participants can select to attend any number of webinars in the series, or attend all 10 sessions at a specially discounted price.
These are pre-recorded sessions and continuing education is non-contact hours.
Series of Ten EPT Webinar Series: Session descriptions and objectives – including registration for individual sessions.
Course Fees
Registration is $95.00 per session when attending individual sessions (using PayPal).
There is a special price for attending all 10 sessions, only $650.00 (using RegOnline).
Course Topics
Drs Byron and Carol Norton are excited to offer webinar training, allowing participants to take an in-depth look at various elements of the Experiential Play Therapy model. Participants can select to attend any number of webinars in the series, or attend all 10 sessions at a specially discounted price.
This webinar series covers key aspects of EPT in great detail. Each session includes a lecture by Dr. Byron Norton, followed by Dr. Norton’s commentary of video tape of children in actual play sessions. An online quiz follows each session for Continuing Education credits by the major associations (non-contact hours). Participants entirely new to Experiential Play Therapy may want to watch “Reaching Children Through Play Therapy” first, to get a comprehensive introduction to EPT. These are pre-recorded sessions.
Session 1:
Tracking Trauma Expressions in EPT Webinar Description: Children express the dynamics of their trauma experiences through their play process. The child also expresses several other levels of how the trauma experience has affected their functioning. These different levels of functioning will be discussed and demonstrated as part of the play process. How play therapists can respond to move the child client through the healing process will be presented.
Objectives:
To identify and assess when a child is moving into trauma experience and how play becomes the medium of the trauma expressions.
To understand the trauma sequence of play that children utilize to discharge trauma memory.
To gain an understanding of the subtleties involved in tracking the trauma sequence of children’s play.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 2:
Metaphorical Expressions of Children in EPT Webinar Description: Children express their internal emotional world through metaphor. This form of communication allows children to express meanings beyond their developmental capacity to express language. Once the therapist understands the meanings being expressed, the therapist encounters a deeper relationship with the child. Accepting this level of expression enhances the therapeutic process for the child client.
Objectives:
To understand how children can communicate through the use of metaphor.
To demonstrate how children use child-created metaphors as self-expression in play therapy.
To provide the play therapist information on how children utilize their metaphorical process in play dynamics.
Observe how metaphorical expressions allow a child to progress in play therapy.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 3:
Expression of Dissociative Process in EPT Webinar Description: Children express dynamics of dissociative process in play. This is their way of expressing the severity of the trauma they endured. This will be identified on the dissociative continuum. It is important for the play therapist to be attentive to these expressions and their meanings to the distressed child. This workshop will help the play therapist become more sensitive and responsive to the levels of this process as part of the play dynamics.
Objectives:
To illustrate the occurrence of dissociative processes as children confront trauma in play therapy.
To provide the play therapist with a working understanding of how children express dissociative processes in their play dynamics.
To provide the play therapist with direct examples of dissociative processes in play therapy.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 4:
Symbolic Meanings of Toys in EPT Webinar Description: Children use toys as personalized symbols of their internal world. Toys become representative of the meanings that exist in children’s lives. This workshop will review the significance of common toys used by children in their play therapy process. The hidden meaning of toys as part of trauma expression will be explained and demonstrated.
Objectives:
To convey the meanings of toys that children use in non-directive, self-expressive play process.
To show how children personalize their emotional world in the toys they select in play therapy.
Teach how toys are part of trauma expressions for children who have endured trauma situations.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 5:
Symbolic Meanings of Roles, Environments, & Animals in EPT
Webinar Description: Children use a variety of personalized symbols to express their internal worlds. Children use roles in dramatic play to convey relationships that represent people who have influenced them either positively or negatively. This workshop will review the significance of common environments that symbolize predicaments in the child’s play process. Certain animals possess characteristics that children identify with in their play process either as predators or supporters. The meaning of these aspects of children’s play will be discussed as it relates to trauma expressions.
Objectives:
To convey the meanings of roles, environments, and animals that children use in non-directive, self-expressive forms of play therapy.
To show how children personalize their emotional world with metaphorical resources that are associated with events in their lives.
Teach how roles, environments, and animals are part of trauma expressions for children who have endured trauma situations.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 6:
The Testing-for-Protection & Dependency Stage of EPT
Webinar Description: Building a significant therapeutic relationship with a child is a critical process in Experiential Play Therapy. The Testing-for-Protection process establishes that trusting relationship. The therapist must provide the child with a secure relationship as the child enters the dark side of their pain or trauma. This leads to the Dependency stage of EPT, where the child re-enters the experience of their trauma. These two stages are the critical working stages of the EPT model of play therapy.
Objectives:
Discuss and demonstrate the critical process of testing the therapist in order to establish trust by the child client.
Discuss and demonstrate the dynamics that compose the Dependency or “working” stage of EPT.
Discuss and demonstrate the process of “leveling” the power of the fear object or perpetrator in EPT
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 7:
Concepts of Borderline Parenting & the Impact on Children in EPT
Webinar Description: This workshop will focus on the effects of Borderline personality dynamics on the development of the child. Characteristics of this parenting style will be discussed and considerations for the play therapist interacting with these parents will be examined. This style of parenting has intense consequences for young children who have to adjust to distorted variables in relationships that disrupt an appropriate sense of identity.
Objectives:
To understand the dynamics of the Borderline relationship as it affects the child’s world view.
To explain the interactive struggle expressed by a child of a Borderline parent in a search for identity.
Review the professional and interactive dynamics in coordinating with this parent when working with their child in play therapy.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 8:
100 Things to Say to a Bop Bag in EPT. Webinar Description: This workshop will deal with the emotional expressions that children focus toward the (sand bottom) bop bag toy. Most expressions released toward this item are usually aggressive in nature. The art of the therapeutic intervention with this toy is to externalize pent up feelings that are usually expressed inappropriately by children. This toy is one of the most misunderstood toys in play therapy. Knowing how to utilize the benefits of this toy can be an asset to the play therapist.
Objectives:
Understand the value of the bop bag as a tool of expression and tension dissipation in play therapy.
To discuss the most therapeutic ways of using the bop bag to facilitative emotional expression.
To give the play therapist a repertoire of responses that supports the child’s discharge of anger.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 9:
EPT with Children Who Have Endured Domestic Violence. Webinar Description: This workshop will focus on the themes and dynamics of children who have endured domestic violence. Play expressions have several unique characteristics that identify the disturbing emotional impact of this process on young children. It is necessary for the play therapist to be aware of these expressions in order to track and intervene in the child’s best interest.
Objectives:
To discuss and demonstrate the style of expression the young child uses to convey the impact of domestic violence on their perceptions and functioning.
To understand the distorted dynamics and fears domestic violence creates for young children.
To help the child dissipate this trauma experience so that the effects of this process do not continue into the child’s adult life and their ability to parent.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar.
Session 10:
Somatic Expression of Trauma in EPT.
Webinar Description : Children who have experienced traumatic events carry their trauma in somatic ways that effects internal functioning as well as social interactions. This workshop will provide awareness of how children express the internal pain of their trauma. The process of discharging the internal energy that causes intense perceptual conflicts will be discussed and demonstrated. Objectives:
Explain and demonstrate the characteristics of trauma play when children re-enter their trauma experience.
To explain and demonstrate the Norton’s 4S’s of Trauma Expression and Healing that release trauma energy that has been stored in the body.
Assist the play therapist to be more sensitive to the meaning of the trauma experience and discharge.
For continuing education, a quiz and an evaluation will follow each webinar
Here are the topics and objectives for the Series of Five Topics webinars. Participants can select to attend any number of webinars in the series, or attend all 5 sessions at a specially discounted price. These can be grouped with the Case Review for additional discounts. These are pre-recorded sessions and continuing education is non-contact hours.
Course Topics
Participants can select to attend any number of webinars in the series for $105, or attend all 5 sessions at a specially discounted price of $400. Attend all 7 sessions in the EPT Topics and Case Review series for only $490. Sessions are pre-recorded from earlier live presentations, and are ready to watch at your convenience.
Session 1:
High Conflict Divorce and Children in Experiential Play Therapy®
Webinar Description: Children express the dynamics of their adjustment experiences through their play therapy process. The child also expresses several other levels of how the divorce experience affects their functioning and play dynamics. Children are unable to verbalize their inner feelings to their parents since they are caught in the middle of the separation and loss. How play therapists can respond to move the child-client through the healing process in play therapy will be presented. These different levels of functioning will be discussed and demonstrated as part of the play therapy process.
Objectives:
- To identify and assess the issues a child is confronted with as parents move through the divorce process.
- To understand how children express their internal conflicts through play therapy.
- To demonstrate by DVD how the play therapy process can aid the child’s adjustments of this process.
Agenda:
- A short introduction to Experiential Play Therapy.
- Basic developmental concepts regarding divorce adjustment from the EPT perspective.
- DVD demonstrating a child’s expressions of the dynamics of the high conflict divorce of his parents.
- Live question and answer session.
Session 2:
Sexual Abuse Evaluations and Court Testimony in EPT®
Webinar Description: Children express dynamics of their trauma from sexual abuse in their play therapy process. This webinar will identify these dynamics and indicate the clusters of symptoms that signify trauma and the sexualized reactions the children display in play therapy. This will be followed by the court process the play therapist may be required to convey to the court in hearings or testimony. An overview of the role of the mental health therapist in the courtroom will be presented.
Objectives:
- To provide direct assessment of children’s expressions in EPT that indicate trauma.
- To provide direct assessment of children’s expressions in EPT that indicate sexualized behavior and violations.
- To provide the play therapist with an understanding of the court process that involves the play therapist.
- This webinar will give the play therapist a foundation in testifying and what is expected in court.
Agenda:
- An introductory overview of how the EPT professional does an assessment evaluation for sexual abuse.
- Illustrate the dynamics that present in the play therapy that supports possible sexual abuse.
- Point out the trauma criteria observed in play therapy and the somatic reactions children exhibit in their play.
- Provide an overview of the play therapist’s expectations when testifying on the information and observations of the child’s play process and behavior.
- Provide an overview of the courtroom process and the therapist’s procedures and strategies when asked to testify.
Session 3:
Parent Consultation Regarding Children in EPT®
Webinar Description: Working with parents is a key factor in EPT. Parents can be involved directly in the play process or as the adjunct role of supporting the play therapy process outside the playroom. This webinar will consider all aspects of the parent’s involvement in contributing to change that influences better results from the efforts of the therapist/child relationship and the therapeutic play process.
Objectives:
- To illustrate how the parent is an intricate part of the play therapy process as the primary caregivers.
Provide the participant with procedures on how to present critical information to parents of children’s trauma experiences. - To show how the play therapist supports the child’s perspective and impact from relationships within the family.
- To provide relational interventions that allow parents to support the emotional world of their child as the child works toward a sense of well-being.
Agenda:
- Provide an introduction to the therapist/parent relationship and involvement in completing the EPT process.
- Present to the parent approaches to intervene with their child that gives their child support during the play therapy process and beyond.
- Provide a video demonstration of this process in the playroom and discuss other tactics that help parents become more available to their children.
Session 4:
Children's Expression of Re-birthing Process in EPT®
Webinar Description: When children experience a traumatic birth or live with chronic trauma after their birth, they often find it necessary during the course of their play therapy to relive their birth stress. In the case of traumatic birth, they would like to experience a calmer beginning. In the case of chronic trauma, the desire is to return to the womb and begin life anew within a nurturing environment. Children will direct their own play creation. This webinar will discuss the process that leads children to seek out this play experience. Videos will demonstrate the self-directed rebirthing play of a child. * This style of re-birthing is not related to the rebirthing reputation associated with Evergreen, Colorado.
Objectives:
- Discuss the trauma reactions that children have to stressful birthing experiences.
- Discuss the process that children use to regress to unresolved trauma and its current effect on their behavioral functioning.
- Demonstrate this process through a video of a play therapy session showing the child creating this dynamic.
Agenda:
- Discuss the re-birthing concept and how children naturally move toward unresolved birth trauma.
- Discuss the trauma/regression dynamic underlying the need to resolve the unknown birth issues.
- Demonstrate actual re-birthing play with a child.
Session 5:
Supervision Concepts in EPT®
Webinar Description: Supervising play therapists using Experiential Play Therapy (EPT) necessitates another level of expertise and new skills. This webinar will emphasize basic supervision skills as well as skills specific to play therapy in the EPT model. Different levels of skills expected to be attained by play therapists as they acquire more experience and training will be elucidated. Also, a video of an actual play session will be shown and supervised by Dr. Norton with emphasis placed on understanding and responding to the child in the play.
Objectives:
- To expose the play therapist supervisor to the basic concepts of supervision of Experiential Play Therapy.
- To explain the levels of expertise to be gained by play therapists in the Experiential Play Therapy model.
- To discuss the role of a play therapist supervisor in the supervision process.
- To discuss the feedback process during observations and critiquing of play therapy sessions.
Agenda:
- Basic tenants of Experiential Play Therapy.
- Levels of expertise to be gained by play therapists in the Experiential Play Therapy model.
- The Supervision process.
- Closing and evaluation.
An Interesting Case Review
The Case Review webinar is prerecorded and ready to view. Participants can select to watch part 1, part 2, or both.
Part 2 is a continuation of the previous case. When purchased with the Series of Five Topics the Case Reviews are deeply discounted. These are pre-recorded sessions and continuing education is non-contact hours.
Course Overview
Parts 1 and 2
While experienced play therapists may recognize familiar patterns in different presenting issues, each child presents with a unique personality and means of expressing themselves. These case reviews look closely at how a child expresses her experiences in play. Participants will observe the child using representational play, symbolic play and metaphorical expressions to convey her experiences. A child’s perceptions of an experience are often unexpected but will be shown in their style of expressing them in play. Topics explored in each case review will be discussed and explored before the video is presented.
The webinar sessions are 3 hours each, and participants may register for one or both sessions. Each Case Review includes an exploration by Dr. Byron Norton and a video tape of the child at play. An online quiz follows each session for Continuing Education credits by the major associations (non-contact). Case Reviews are $105 per sessions (registration links below). These are pre-recorded sessions.
Objectives
- Explain how the information in the intake will relate to how the child will express the issues in the play process.
- Demonstrate how selected information that is missing in the intake will necessarily have to be assessed so that early developmental issues for the child are responded to in play therapy.
- Point out the expressions in the child’s play that have deeper meaning and how the play therapist can respond in the play process.
- Clarify the play expressions so the therapist understands the direction the child is moving the play for personal resolutions.
Agenda
- Introduction of the case with Dr. Byron Norton
- Review of intake information as it applies to the play process
- Short review of academic considerations in the case
- Critique key dynamics that enhance or detract from the child’s play process
- Open question and answer discussion from the participants
Participants can attend either Case Review webinar for $105 each. You may also combine these two Case Reviews with the EPT Topics Series, a total of 7 sessions for only $490.
Session 1 (part 1 of 2):
Description: Our first review will examine the case of a four year old girl exhibiting two levels of trauma. One level is acute, stemming from an incident occurring in her infancy. The other level is developmental (chronic) arising from home and family dynamics. In addition, she experiences separation anxiety. Her behaviors present a complicated array of symptoms confusing to caretakers, day care providers and (currently) the therapist.
This case illustrates the importance of information provided by the parents during the intake and parent consultation times. In this case, some important historical data is missing due to the parents’ unwillingness to disclose. However, her play points to some facts that have not been provided by the parents.
Also involved in this case are some transfer of the mother’s past trauma onto the child. Mother has never disclosed this information, but her comments and reactions to her daughter’s behaviors strongly indicate trauma in her background. History and interactions with the father are missing as he is not an active participant in any of the parent consultation time even though the family is intact.
Session 1 is ready to view any time as a recorded session, $105.
Purchase
Session 2 (part 2 of 2):
Description: This Case Review is a continuation of the work of a four year old girl exhibiting two levels of trauma. One level is acute, stemming from an incident occurring in her infancy. The other level is developmental (chronic) arising from home and family dynamics. In addition, she experiences separation anxiety. Her behaviors present a complicated array of symptoms confusing to caretakers, day care providers and (currently) the therapist.
The case resumes at the end of the session where the child has moved through the trauma expression phases of Sensory, Soma and Serge and is moving into Soothe. This phase indicates the calming experience of the child as she is experiencing resolution play. The play shifts as the therapist introduces the end of the session. The child becomes resistive to ending the session. The therapist requested supervision to help change this process.
Also involved in this case are some transfer of the mother’s past trauma onto the child. Mother has never disclosed this information, but her comments and reactions to her daughter’s behaviors strongly indicate trauma in her background. History and interactions with the father are missing as he is not an active participant in any of the parent consultation time even though the family is intact.
Purchase
Family Psychological Services P.C.
Dr. Byron and Dr. Carol Norton
1750 25th Avenue, Suite 200
Greeley, CO 80634-4945
Phone: (970) 351-6697
Voice Mail: (970) 351-6688
Fax: (970) 351-6687
Attend Our Webinars At Your Convenience
Each webinar is recorded from a live presentation. Recordings include the entire presentation, but the Q & A area is locked - so you can review the written log and see the webcam Q & A, but you can not ask new questions.