She’s only playing! How Play
and Play Therapy can
Transform Us
Dr Maggie Robson
Senior Lecturer
Keele University
UK
Overview
• explore the transformative effects of
play on our development and mental
health
• Look at children playing
• consider observations of the play of a
group of Kenyan children who took part
in a research study
• explore how play therapy can help both
children and adults therapeutically.
• invitation to engage in play
Importance of Play
’children’s …play has been hypothesised to
contribute to the cognitive, motor and social
development of children, including the development
of perception, attention, memory, problem-solving
skill, language, communication, creativity, logic
operations, emotion regulation, self regulation, social
skills, gender roles, social relationships, conflict
resolution, coping with stress and so on.’
(Power, 2000)
Children Playing
Watch short clip of children playing in
Nairobi, Kenya
What functions do you think it is
fulfilling?
Why is it important to
study play?
Source:
http://kabiza.com/images/aochildren2.jpg
Accessed 19th March 2009
1. Play is a fundamental right of
all children and recognised as
such in Article 31 of the
United Nations Convention on
the Rights of the Child
(Office of the United Nations
High Commissioner for Human
Rights, 1989).
2.Play is important in child
development
3. It is the theoretical base of
play therapy & the theory
of play rests on
observations of European
children
Transformative Effects of Play
The “natural language” of children is play. Play is more than recreation. It is
an activity whereby children can process experience and assimilate that
experience and make some sense of it. Children have little choice; they are
compelled to play
“In the process we change ourselves and our view of the world. We dare to
change because our autonomy is not challenged or threatened. On the
contrary, the process of playing gives the glorious sensation of increased
autonomy. Play can be deeply satisfying. As it is with adults so it is with
children. Yet children’s needs to play are greater since their autonomy less”
(McMahon, 1992, p.1.)
“Play under the control of the player gives the child his first and the most
crucial opportunity to have the courage to think, to talk and perhaps even to
be himself” (Bruner 1983)
“Play is a unique experience in our lives that has a reality of its own, an
activity in which human beings explore their worlds and their identity in
relation to other worlds and identities. Play is the place where children first
recognise the separateness of the self from others and begin to develop a
relationship with the world beyond the self” (Cattanach, 1995)
Nuffield Research Foundation
Funded Research Project
Small grant to:
1.Collect rich descriptions of
children’s play
2.Pilot an observation
schedule
It is hoped to use the data
gathered here to conduct
comparative studies in
Europe, the US and other
parts of Africa
Child (Aliases) Age
Mary
8 years
Location
Jed
Joseph
Dotty
Shiro
Mike
8 years
9 years
10 years
8 years
9 years
Kibera slums
Eunice
George
10 years
8 years
Vihiga District
Outskirts of Nairobi –
between Kibera slums &
modern Olympic Houses
Lavington District
Buru-Buru Estate
Nahashon
Nyanza Province, Bondo
District
South Nyanza Province
Observations
Each child was observed by a pair of
observers 4 times for approximately
45 minutes each time:
2 different times in school
2 different times at home
There were 4 urban children and 4
rural children – 16 observations in total
Kenyan Children & Piaget
All the children were
between the ages of
8 & 10 so we would
expect them to be
playing make believe,
symbolic play &
games with rules.
They did!
• Jed -They are playing a game
called Kati. Two girls hold play.
The have a ball and they try
aiming and hitting the girls in
the middle if you are hit by the
ball then you are out of play
and have to be rescued
• Dotty - Some children who
have been brought to the line
are saying we are the policemen
and some are saying we are the
robbers. Dotty’s turn reaches
and she is brought to the line
and she says, ‘am a robber.’
When everybody is on the line,
they count, one, two,
three…..ten. Then they all run
scattering in different
directions. The police are
chasing the robbers. Dotty is a
robber. She has been caught by
a police but she breaks loose.
Differences in Play: Rural
& Urban
Qualitative data does not aim to generalise
but there did seem to be commonalties in
some of the observations:
When playing at home, rural children and
children from the poorer urban homes tend
to play more made up games and the urban
children who came from more comfortably
off homes seemed to have more technology
based e.g. playing while watching TV
Differences in Play: Rural
& Urban
Rural Home & Poorer Urban Home
• Shiro has a few friends around her
at home, three boys. She has taken
a stick and has a tin. She hits the
tin and a boy comes, picks it up, and
runs away with it. She is hitting the
tin after the toys; however, it is
holding the stick in the mouth. A
fourth boy has come to join.
• Eunice gets in to skip and this time
they sing along a song called Jimmy
do You Love Eunice? She skips and
skips and skips as the brother
swings the rope (This game entails
questioning and where the rope
stops as you skip is what becomes
the answer to the question. Some
of the choices available were,
Nyumba ya nyasi, mabati, simitiUtafanyia wapi harusi? Where will
you wed? Church, toilet, bafu,
Utakuwa na watoto wangapi-10, 30,
40, 50,60etc)
Urban Comfortably off Home
• . Joseph has put it (the car)
upside down indicating that
the car has rolled and
awaiting help, looking at it, he
has stopped driving to watch
Television, a cartoon program
about spider man is running.
He momentarily recovers the
overturned car back on the
road (table)
•
Mary keeps looking at the
Television and mouthing the
remote control then she plays
with it. She talks to her
sister, telling her she has
many things.
Taking on adult roles in RuralAreas
Eunice (10) has taken her lunch and
also made sure she has given food to
younger brother and sister. Her
parents left in the morning.
Eunice is called by the grandmother
to attend on house chores. She is
cleaning some basins. She carries the
basin to go and wash. Carries the
cloth for washing. She finally finishes
washing
George (8) comes out with a bucket
of water. He then brings out a sack
and pours its contents on the ground.
They are sweet potatoes. All this is
happening outside his uncles house.
He picks a potato at a time and
washes. He scrubs the potatoes very
thoroughly and puts the clean one on
a separate piece of rug….. He
continues to wash the sweet
potatoes. They are talking about the
war between the Luos and the
Maasai. They talked about how the
attacks were scary. (George’s home is
at the border of Maasai and Luos)
Mike (9) tells us that at this time they don’t play
coz they have roles to play. They carry Jeri cans
to go fetch the water. He goes for the first trip
comes back and empties into the big drum in the
next room. His bro joins him and the go the next
trip together. They come back and empty again
into the drum in the house again. Go for another
trip together again and do the same routine.
When they come back, he doesn’t go the next
round but his brother goes to fetch the water.
He sets his waters outside but his brother
empties into the big drum in the house. He starts
removing the utensils one after another. He
places them where he had put the water. He
moves from room to room looking for the dirty
utensils. He locks the door and goes to the shop.
He tells us he is going to the shop to buy soap to
come and wash utensil. He says that they usually
take turns in washing the utensils. He tells us his
brother will cook food. Their mum has gone to
the market to sell food stuffs for money. He has
a very serious face at this time. He comes back
and washes the dishes one after the other until
they are all over then he takes them to the
house.
Onto Play Therapy
Cattanach (2003) argues that:
‘When children play imaginatively, in
whatever context, they create a
fictional world, which can be a way of
making sense of their real world’
Paul’s Story
•
Paul was 6 years old and was referred for play therapybecause his long
term foster placement had broken down and he seemed to be experiencing
behaviour problems due to loss triggered by this experience.
• Paul was placed under a care order when he was a young baby. His mother
physically neglected him and he and his elder brother were placed in care.
His father was a drug addict and disappeared shortly after Paul's birth.
• Paul was placed in long term foster care but this placement broke down,
allegedly because of Paul's unmanageable behaviour at home, shortly
before Christmas 1997 and he was placed in another long term foster
home. His brother remained in the original foster home and at the
beginning of therapy, Paul visited him and his previous foster parents on a
regular basis.
• Paul also has regular contact and visits with his birth mother but has not
had any contact with his father since he was born. His father died in a
drug related incident just before commencement of the therapy.
• Because of his contact with his birth mother, Paul knew his foster mother
was not his real mother but the Social Worker thought he believed that his
foster father was his real father.
Paul had 11 sessions of play therapy over a four month period.
Themes of the Play
The major themes of Paul’s play have been the
balance between destruction and nurture and being
in and out of control. Much of his play centred
around a wolf who was sometimes defeated by him
and sometimes defeated him. In this play,
sometimes the wolf was imaginary – we would both
‘hear’ him approaching – and sometimes one or other
of us would take on the role of the wolf.
Second Session
The themes in the second session seemed to be centred
around excess and containment. There was a sense of him
grabbing as much of everything that he could, while he could –
biscuits, paints, toys. The wolf appeared again, as did the
'mind your own business' photo game. Again, my role was of
containment and holding the therapeutic space whilst accepting
and reflecting on his play. These themes appeared consistently
throughout our time together.
Watch short excerpt
Process of Therapy
The fourth session seemed to be something
of a turning point. The previous session
had felt quite wild and verging on being out
of control. I had had to speak quite
sharply to Paul when he tried to get out of
a moving car on the way back to school,
and had told him that if he couldn't keep
the rules we would have to discontinue the
therapy.
Process of Therapy
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concerned that I had spoilt our relationship and that he no longer
trusted me.
was concerned that I had introduced an element of conditional
regard into the relationship. However, it was important to keep
Paul physically safe as well as psychologically safe, and he could not
be allowed to endanger himself.
Perhaps because of congruence in explaining my behaviour was the
result of concern for him
Perhaps because he felt safer because the boundary was held,
he returned to the fourth session seemingly having worked
through something.
Process of Therapy
• This session had a much different feel to it. It
was much more contained and protected. He
played with the dolls for the first time and the
themes of nurture and protection emerged again.
He nursed the dolls and put them in the pram to
take for a walk. He then ‘fed’ them from the
bottle and had a tea party with the cups and
plates. He both nurtured and protected me and
the doll as well as being angry with it for crying.
He gave me tea in the toy cups and made sure I
was comfortable.
Process of Therapy
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The theme of nurture persisted throughout all the following sessions and
he became more able to 'control' - his behaviour, the wolf and his
emotional responses.
Session 6: Paul seemed to be moving towards a resolution of his anger with
his ex step father and become more self confident and less of a powerless
victim.
By the seventh session, Paul seemed less insatiable and the predominant
theme was nurture. He seemed able to offer and receive nurture. He
nurtured us both by making tea and looked after and fed the dolls. The
wolf made an appearance but was shot by Paul or I - he could protect and
be protected.
The theme of power persisted over the next session. He seemed very
pleased with his powerfulness and it felt positive rather than dangerous.
He was very active in directing my roles in the play and enjoyed being
‘bossy’. This is something I have noticed with other children I have woked
with which often seems to be a sign that they have achieved a degree of
resolution to their difficulties. They feel powerful and enjoy exercising
this power over an adult in a safe and contained situation. Paul continued
the nurture theme by painting pictures to give to his teacher and foster
mother.
Process of Therapy
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The themes in session 9 were varied. He had just been told that he
would not be seeing his ex foster parents again as they let him
down too often. He was unable to revive himself from the dead
when killed in a game where we were both attacked by powerful
foe and felt I couldn't help him either. The theme here seemed to
be hopelessness, powerlessness and helplessness. He did, however,
manage to nurture us both with drinks from the tea set. The
themes this session seemed to oscillate between almost being out
of control and being pleased with himself and nurturing. Perhaps
this reflects his ambivalent feelings about loosing contact with his
first foster family.
Process of Therapy
•
Session 10 again oscillated between nurture - of himself, me and
the baby doll - and loss - killing the wolf, killing me as the bus
driver and himself being killed. He directed a very complicated
game in which I was a bus driver and he was the passenger and the
bus got faster and faster and the driving more reckless until it
spun out of control and crashed, killing us both. He seemed very
angry with me and at one point took off my watch when trying to
revive me from the crash and flung it against the wall. This was,
perhaps related to the fact that this was our penultimate session.
I felt the need to come out of role at this point and remind him of
the platy room rules. He seemed to accept this and was, perhaps,
relieved that the boundaries were held. After this, he was , able
to nurture. He feed from the baby's bottle and gave me biscuits
and fed the doll with a bottle.
Process of Therapy
• Our last session and took place after a three
week break while Paul was on holiday. This felt
like a real ending session with no new material
being worked on and the focus on finishing. We
took (real) photos of each other and Paul was very
concerned that we both ended up with an equal
share. He has always seemed to need to leave the
playroom (to go to the toilet, visit the kitchen)
when things get too much for him and he visited it
many times that day. This session was sad but the
sadness was acknowledged and the ending planned
and, as far as possible, in Paul's control.
And so to Play!
Winnicott’s Squiggle Game:
In pairs:
1 person draws a squiggle – a simple
shape e.g. A loop or a curve.
2nd person makes a drawing out of it
Squiggling!
1st person encourages the 2nd to create
a narrative around the drawing e.g.
The person you’ve drawn looks exited,
did you ever fly a balloon....
Swap over and 2nd person draws a
squiggle and 1st person draws
Squiggling!
Discuss in pairs:
• how did you feel when completing
the drawing?
• did it tell you anything about
yourself?
• Anything else that occurred to you?
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Quotes to play by!
G K Chesterton
The true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden;
heaven is a playground.
George Bernard Shaw
We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because
we stop playing.
Mark Twain
Work and play are words used to describe the same thing under
differing conditions.
Plato
You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a
year of conversation.
D. W. Winnicott
It is in playing, and only in playing, that the individual child or adult
is able to be creative and to use the whole personality, and it is
only in being creative that the individual discovers the self.
(retrieved from
http://quotations.about.com/cs/inspirationquotes/a/Play1.htm )
And finally!
• Play is an integral part of our
development so keep playing!
• It can be a place for us to make
sense of our experiences
• It’s powerful and often fun!
Quotes to play by!
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G K Chesterton
The true object of all human life is play. Earth is a task garden; heaven is a
playground.
George Bernard Shaw
We don't stop playing because we grow old; we grow old because we stop
playing.
Mark Twain
Work and play are words used to describe the same thing under differing
conditions.
Plato
You can discover more about a person in an hour of play than in a year of
conversation.
D. W. Winnicott
It is in playing, and only in playing, that the individual child or adult is able
to be creative and to use the whole personality, and it is only in being
creative that the individual discovers the self.
(retrieved from http://quotations.about.com/cs/inspirationquotes/a/Play1.htm )
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Books and Articles that may be of Interest
Axline, V., (1989) Play Therapy London: Churchill Livingstone
Bruner, J. (1983). Child's talk: Learning to use language. New York: Norton
Cattanach, A., (1995), 'Drama and Play Therapy with Young Children' in The Arts in
Psychotherapy, Vol.22, No., 3., pp223-228
Cattanach, A., (1992) Play Therapy with Abused Children London: Jessica Kingsley
Cattanach, A., (1997) Children's Stories in Play Therapy London: Jessica Kingsley
Carroll, J., (1998) Introduction to Play Therapy Oxford: Blackwell Science
Daniels, D. & Jenkins, P. (2000) Therapy with Children, Children’s rights,
confidentiality and the law, London, Sage
Jennings, S., (Ed), (1995) Dramatherapy with Children and Adolescents London:
Routledge
Lane, D. & Miller, A., (1992) Child and Adolescent Therapy: A Handbook Buckingham,
Philadelphia: Open University Press
McMahon, L. (1992) The Handbook of Play Therapy, London: Tavistock and Routledge
Pennels, Sister Margaret, & Smith, S., (1995) The Forgotten Mourners London:
Jessica Kingsley
Power, T. (2000) Play and exploration in children and animals Mahwah, NJ: John Wiley
& Sons
West, J., (1990), 'Play work and play therapy: distinctions and definitions' in Adoption
and Fostering, Vol: 14, No. 4. Pp 30 - 37
West, J., (1992) Child Centred Play Therapy London: Arnold