There has been a growing amount of research on play therapy skills
training both with parents and teachers. These studies revealed promising results
on the effectiveness of play therapy skills training; however, a majority of the
studies were quantitative in nature. The current study implemented a qualitative
approach to exploring teachers’ beliefs about children’s play and play therapy by
investigating the perceptions and experiences of a group of teacher participants
who received play therapy skills training. Individual interviews were conducted
and data analysis generated category themes to answer research questions.
Findings suggested that the play therapy skills training had an impact on
teachers, the child of focus, and the teacher-child relationships. The training led
to changes in teacher participants’ perceptions of play, play therapy, and
children, and a pattern seemed to emerge in the influence the training had on
teachers. Teachers perceived changes in themselves in terms of awareness,
attitudes, skills, and emotions. Teachers’ views of play appeared to be changed
and shaped to be more consistent with the ideas of play therapy. Two of the four
teachers reported observing positive changes in behaviors of the child of focus. Three of the teacher participants indicated changes in teacher-child relationships
with the child of focus. Teachers seemed to generalize play therapy skills from
the playroom to the classroom. Teachers perceived that using play therapy skills
helped them build better relationships with children, interact with children more
positively, manage the class more effectively, and ultimately reduce their stress
and frustration. Overall, the play therapy skills training suggested positive results
with teacher participants, the child of focus, and teacher-child relationships.
However, there were also challenges, disadvantages, and constraints observed
and perceived by the teachers. Challenging issues in applying play therapy skills
in the classroom included the perceived difficulty of being both a teacher and a
therapeutic agent to the child of focus, and finding an appropriate classroom
balance between permissiveness and structure. Three of the four teacher
participants expressed their desire and excitement to continue applying play
therapy skills with other students in a new school year. Implications and
limitations of the study, and recommendations for further research are discussed. / text
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UTEXAS/oai:repositories.lib.utexas.edu:2152/6898 |
| Date | 05 February 2010 |
| Creators | Hsu-Smith, Tsui-chin |
| Source Sets | University of Texas |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Format | electronic |
| Rights | Copyright is held by the author. Presentation of this material on the Libraries' web site by University Libraries, The University of Texas at Austin was made possible under a limited license grant from the author who has retained all copyrights in the works. |
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