practioner's feedback

Here is a selection of feedback and comments from practitioners who have taken or are taking the Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy Courses:

"By the use of mosaics and sand (a 16 year old girl with moderate learning difficulties) was able to demonstrate to me in one session that she had been abused, something that would have taken many sessions, even had she been able to articulate." (H.M., Community Psychiatric Nurse, CAMHS)

"This is an inspiring course.....The techniques of the 'mosaic test' and the 'world technique' along with other play therapy activities, provide the family therapist with an amazing set of 'tools' that are profoundly child-centred and which connect with the language of the child - which is that of play and therefore non-verbal." (M.K., Family Therapist, NHS Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry)

"Whilst most playrooms have sandtrays, knowing about Lowenfeld's theories has deepened my understanding of children's thought processes and how sandplay maybe used by them as a symbolic activity." (D.H., Head Occupational Therapist and Play Therapist, CAMHS)

"The content of the course encourages rigorous and detailed thinking and teaches techniques designed to discover the child's individual way of expressing their internal interpretation of their life experience." (V.G., School Counsellor and former Head Teacher)

"(The Lowenfeld World Technique, which) I have enjoyed using for the past five years, .. .. enables the child to explore his world view and to communicate it through the use of a sand tray and World figures. It is a child friendly medium - non-threatening, versatile, multidimensional and effective in allowing access to the child's 'way of seeing'." (J.C., Primary Mental Health Worker, NHS Primary Care Trust)

"I find Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy invaluable for the child with language difficulties. It is a method which allows their familiar, pre-verbal and non-verbal personal thought processes to function by providing appropriate materials with which a child may think and attempt to communicate using their own personal 'language'." (C.K., Specialist Speech and Language Therapist, School for Children with Speech, Language and Communication Difficulties)

To see full texts, click on profession:

Occupational Therapist
Play Therapist
Primary Mental Health Worker
Counsellor, School
Counsellor, Adults
Speech and Language Therapist
Family Therapist
Community Psychiatric Nurse
Social Worker
 
Full Texts and Feedback from:

P.B.
Senior Occupational Therapist
Child & Adolescent Mental Health Service

"I have found Lowenfeld techniques particularly helpful with the children and adolescents whom I see for therapy sessions who do not wish to talk about their concerns or have very low self confidence. Creative activities may be too demanding for them to use at first. Instead, using a Lowenfeld Sandworld or mosaic, where the child knows that there is no right or wrong way of playing with the objects and which does not require direct explanation from the child about what they are doing, allows communication to take place on a different level.

OTs use a variety of therapeutic approaches derived from different theoretical frameworks, using meaningful activities as a treatment medium. I have found that using Lowenfeld Projective play techniques can extend and improve the classic OT role and becomes another tool in the 'OT skills box'."

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D.H.
Head Occupational Therapist and Play Therapist
NHS Child and Adolescent Mental Health Service

"In my practice as a non-directive play therapist I have observed children choosing to use the sandtray for different purposes at different times in their therapy. I have found sandplay appeals to children of all ages on both a sensorial as well as a cognitive level and as such the sandtray continues to be an essential tool in my 'kit bag' of play equipment.

Whilst most play rooms have sandtrays, knowing about Lowenfeld's theories has deepened my understanding of children's thought processes and how sandplay may be used by them as a symbolic play activity. Lowenfeld's ideas about the sandtray being symbolically representative of a child's world and the process of its construction being an illustration of the child's approach to life, have helped inform my observation and analysis of each child's play process, each child's emotional needs, their thoughts and feelings.

Equally, Lowenfeld's Mosaics, used less often by young children perhaps because they are a less familiar play activity and require greater fine motor skills, offer children another means of expressing their thoughts and feelings in a way that does not rely totally on verbal skills. Both Lowenfeld techniques therefore offer children and adolescents an alternative means of expressing themselves and provide practitioners with a client centred tool to apply in a variety of child therapy settings."

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J.C.
Senior Nurse, Primary Mental Health Worker
NHS Primary Care Trust

"Children demonstrate that they are upset, behaving in ways that parents don't like. Often, they are not good at communicating why they are upset. Their behaviour can be distressing and disturbing, and those who love them can feel helpless, frustrated and sometimes angry, because they can't reach the child and the child can't reach them.

Parents and some therapists use words to try to reach the child. 'Why''. 'Tell me!' 'Is it because'' But what if the child doesn't have the words' The thought of telling may be too frightening, the disturbing experience behind the behaviour may be beyond words. What if the child is responding to an experience using a frame of reference, beyond the reach of the observer' A frame of reference that, if it was accessible to the adult logical mind, would appear an irrational cluster of stimuli, but to the child, makes sense and constitutes what could be called his world view'

This is some of the thinking behind the Lowenfeld World Technique. It has led to a form of therapy which I have enjoyed using for the past 5 years. It enables the child to explore his world view and to communicate it through the use of a sand tray and world figures. It is a child friendly medium - non-threatening, versatile, multidimensional and effective in allowing access to the child's 'way of seeing'.

With a thorough knowledge of the child's history, a sensitive therapist can help him make links, first within the world portrayed in the sand, and gradually to the real world of family, school and everyday living. Making these links the child can adjust his world view, make new sense of what is happening to him and hopefully adjust more successfully to his environment.

Children enjoy the freedom and appropriateness of sandplay. It allows for free expression and flights of imagination that open up the child's world view in a safe and therapeutic way. Being allowed to 'play' rather than being expected to talk wins the child's confidence and makes for an easier transition to a productive therapeutic environment.

It is hard work for the therapist, holding the history as a backdrop to what is being produced in the tray, and it is an art being faithful to the child's 'account' of his world view but the results in changed lives and happier children are well worth it."

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V.G.
School Counsellor and former Primary Head Teacher

"During my years in primary education both as a class teacher and head teacher I became increasingly aware of the emotional needs of the children and how for many individual children early life experiences which remain unresolved could militate against successful learning and a child's simple joy in living. I became determined to discover a vehicle whereby those children could begin to express and make sense of their earliest sensory and non verbal memories, so that they could move on in their lives. The Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy course provided me with just such a vehicle using the symbolism of play to explore and understand the child's view of the world.

The course is based on the work of Doctor Margaret Lowenfeld, her insights into the impact on children of emotional trauma and the techniques of sand world and mosaics which she developed to enable the child to communicate and understand their past experiences. The content of the course encourages rigorous and detailed thinking and teaches therapeutic techniques designed to discover the child's individual way of expressing their internal interpretation of their life experience.

My principle training in counselling was enhanced by the Lowenfeld course and I would recommend it, either to extend and enhance other training or to enrich the existing skills of any professional person wishing to work therapeutically with children."

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B.H.
Counsellor, Psychotherapist and Counselling Supervisor in independent practice with adults

"My main work is with individual adults, for whom play is no longer a familiar means of communication and expression. I mention Lowenfeld's sand play in my publicity material but will wait to introduce it to a client until after they have 'had their say' because adults generally expect to communicate in words at first. I find Lowenfeld methods useful when working with professionals whose theoretical knowledge might inhibit their personal therapy. I do not use Lowenfeld techniques indiscriminately.

I display a few objects on a shelf in my counselling room, leaving the rest of the collection in labelled boxes. When I notice a client's curious glances, or perhaps their direct comment about an object which has attracted their attention and 'speaks' to them at some level, I use that opportunity to offer Lowenfeld's sand play.

It has also proved to be a useful method when words don't come readily, perhaps because the pre-verbal stage of life experiences needs to be explored, or when a client feels 'stuck'. Clients may find, on stepping back to review their completed world, that many layers of meaning, past present and future are represented in their choice and arrangements of sand and objects. As one client said on looking at her world: 'My whole life is there'. For an adult to create a world in the sand can be a relaxing yet wholly absorbing experience. The visual image and whole sensory experience can be retained and developed inwardly between sessions. There is also the optional benefit of sketch and photographic records of the process following through a series of sand plays."

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C. K.
Specialist Speech and Language Therapist at a day/residential school for children with speech, language and communication difficulties.

"A child who has what we know as a 'speech and language impairment' does not easily or swiftly make use of verbal language: it is not their first or chosen form of expression. However, all of us, including this child, may articulate what we know of our own personal and social experience without needing words or speech. This is through personal expression in play.

A child's quest is to make sense of codes for communication in his or her social settings - most are very verbal and society functions in a world of words. The use of words is only one form of the code for communication - a form that, for a child with a severe speech and language difficulty, is difficult to 'break' but one that everybody else uses. There are other clue-giving forms of communication which might be more informative to this child. They include: the intonation (melody and volume) accompanying the words, the facial expression, gestures and movements, as well as the context itself, one's own feelings and personal thought processes. Sometimes, even these clues do not provide swift and effective communication which could help the child process information and make reasonable sense of his or her world.

A child who needs to rely, for understanding and communication, on methods other than words depends upon on these forms daily. They therefore need the opportunity to think in familiar ways in order to begin to carry out the quest. Preverbal and 'non-verbal' functioning skills are a familiar base for them. They can be incorporated in play. With this creative human skill functioning - at whatever level - we can all think, through our own perceptions, to try to make sense of our experiences. In this, the child with speech and language difficulties is not an exception.

Dr Margaret Lowenfeld provided a medium which allows us to define, clarify and organize experience, with all senses firing and no words needed. It is known as the 'World Technique' and allows us to create our 'world'' with materials and toys in sand. It is part of her Projective Play Therapy. We may revisit or re-interpret memories; revise our own theories; express the unmentionable; discover the unfathomable, find and plan the new way forward. These possibilities are available, not only to us, but also to the child whose relationship with verbal language is so different from ours that we cannot truly imagine it.

I find Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy invaluable for the child with language difficulties. It is a method which allows their familiar, pre-verbal and non-verbal personal thought processes to function by providing appropriate materials with which a child may think and attempt to communicate using their own personal 'language'. It also enables me to gently try to discover the meaning the child places upon his or her perceptions of our shared world. In this way I can help them to clarify how people may operate in various social settings.

In Lowenfeld Projective Play sessions the child with severe speech and language difficulties is given an equal opportunity to make sense of their own experiences, to re-discover, express and integrate ideas their own and also those given in their education. They do this through their best and most familiar modes of functioning. They are not expected to use verbal language. The children are purposefully and skillfully engaged in manoeuvring toys in sand: apparently using their personal forms of 'unspoken metaphors' with which to think. Their experience in the session sometimes leads them to express something in spoken words - their own words. This ease of personal expression, which we all take for granted, is a human right. Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy facilitates self-expression and understanding, of the self and of society, entirely without the need for a child to tolerate or produce words. I find it a valuable additional tool to offer to children who have severe speech and language difficulties."

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M.K.
Family Therapist
Department of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, NHS Trust

"This is an inspiring course, which is an invaluable adjunct to those who have training in systemic family therapy. The theoretical ideas informing the practice of Lowenfeld Play Therapy connect brilliantly with family therapy concepts of context, culture, gender, race, ethnicity, age, sexuality and socially constructed experience. The theories also connect well with neuro-psychology and psychiatry by showing the profound connections between experience and the developing brain throughout the first years of life and beyond. It pays attention to the story children tell of their experience and in this way, connects wel1 with family therapy practice of responding to the 'grammar' of the child. It does so by attending to feedback, to process, to patterns within stories both 'lived and told' and reflecting on socially constructed beliefs and early concepts which inform a child's unique and idiosyncratic view of his/her experience. The training provides ideas about assessment and treatment which offers a holistic perspective - the genetic, neurological, biological, environment, cultural and social dimensions into which a child is conceived, born and lives its life. The techniques of the 'mosaic test' and the 'world technique' along with other play therapy activities, provide the family therapist with an amazing set of 'tools' that are profoundly child-centred and which connect with the language of the child - which is that of play and therefore non-verbal. In itself, it is its own language, which these techniques allow the family therapist to 'enter into' and be amazed by its power and its ability to heal and transform the hurts, bewilderment and confusions, which arise within the journey of childhood."

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H.M.
Community Psychiatric Nurse
Child and Adolescent Mental Health Trust

"Within my Trust there is a specific team that works with children who have moderate, severe and profound learning disabilities. I have worked in this team since its inception 9 years ago.

As the Team developed, it became evident that there was a shortage of skills and experience working with this group of children individually, particularly those who were referred for emotional difficulties. I was therefore very enthusiastic when I became aware of the training that was available in Lowenfeld Projective Play Therapy.

As I am in my third year of training now, a procedure for the service that I offer has been developed for referring children to me for sessions using play. At the beginning, after assessment the case would become active to me. But as things have progressed, I find I am also offering assessments only and giving information based on my observation of the child's play. This has proved extremely useful in guiding other clinicians with regard to forming an overall diagnostic assessment of a child and also is of great benefit when formulating behavioural management plans, in that the clinician has a clearer understanding of the child's abilities and difficulties.

It is known that the group of children I work with have great difficulty in communicating on a verbal level. It is also accepted that Lowenfeld techniques facilitate expression, i.e. memories, feelings, etc. but I would like to add my own experiences to this fact by some illustrations.

A child was referred to me with a moderate learning disability who had great difficulty with expressive language, therefore I embarked upon the use of Lowenfeld sand worlds with this particular child, 14 years old and in foster care for the last 4 years.

He consistently demonstrated in the sand his uncertainty with regard to his current position as a foster child. He also demonstrated in the sand his desire to be a part of a family and how inaccessible this felt to him at that particular time. Even at my initial stage of training it did not require a great deal of experience to see in front of me, the things he was expressing very clearly. I was then able to use this information to discuss with his foster mum, his levels of insecurity which were then addressed. These are emotions that this child would never have been able to articulate.
A more profoundly disabled youngster that I worked with, referred for physical presentations that had been explored medically and were considered to be an anxiety-based problem. This young girl had severe epilepsy which was very uncontrolled. Throughout the work that she did with me, she was clearly able to demonstrate in the sand her insecurity and the persistent uncertainty she felt, leaving her lacking in confidence. She used the sand to work through her everyday experiences and the outcome for her was that the original symptoms disappeared.

The use of mosaics has been equally as useful for me working with young people. I particularly remember a 16 year old girl with moderate learning disabilities who was really struggling with her family of origin and was coming close to the point of being ejected from the family. By the use of mosaics and sand, she was able to demonstrate to me in one session that she had been abused, something that would have taken many sessions, even had she been able to articulate it in words.

I have started to do family assessments using sand worlds and I am finding these of equal value as they highlight all sorts of issues particularly in relation to events surrounding learning disabilities. Examples are life cycle issues and the difficulties that parents are faced
with when children reach certain ages and the impact that this
has on the family. I have been amazed at the way in which families can express these emotions in the sand, often so clearly that in fact they have not needed further discussion as they are so evident and are often enough to bring about some change.

Given the space. I could continue to offer countless illustrations of the helpfulness and usefulness of using these methods with children who can not articulate, I hope the examples I have given illustrate my enthusiasm for this particular type of work. It has certainly made me much more able to offer useful individual work with clients with learning disabilities."

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J.R.
Social Worker
Child and Adolescent Mental Health Clinic

"As well as my original training in social work, I have also completed two years training in systemic family therapy. I had about 15 years' experience of working in child mental health prior to starting the course in Lowenfeld projective play therapy.

My reason for applying for this course was that although I had a great deal of experience in working with children and adolescents, there were a number of children who found it difficult or even impossible to access 'talking therapy' for a variety of reasons. These were, however, often the children who seemed most in need of help. I did attempt to use play to engage these children, sometimes successfully. However I felt I did not have an adequate theoretical base for the work I was doing. The Lowenfeld course seemed well tailored to my needs as it is intended for people who are already qualified, and working. I was a bit concerned that Lowenfeld is not well known and wondered whether her ideas would prove to be outdated and not relevant to contemporary practice. However reading some of her writing prior to applying convinced me that she had a unique understanding of children's play and thinking processes. I have now completed the first year of the course, and have found what I have learned has been invaluable in the work I am now doing with children and young people. The non verbal techniques such as the use of mosaics and sand 'worlds' open up a whole new range of opportunities for children to think about and work through their difficulties. I have found adolescents often relate very well to this way of working also, finding it much less threatening and more fun than just talking. As a therapist I feel I now have a sound theoretical base for assessments and treatment. Contrary to my concerns I have found this method very relevant to current practice and research, and it can be used effectively as part of work in a multi-disciplinary team . In fact this method has generated a great deal of interest within the team.

In conclusion I would like to cite an example of a boy of 6 years, referred to us because of a complex bereavement situation. Already angry about his circumstances, he expressed in no uncertain terms his dislike of family meetings and talking, which he said, quite understandably, did not help. He did agree to give play therapy a try. Several months later he is noticeably coping much better both at home and school. His mother told me that he recently tried to persuade his brother to try play therapy, which he said is good because 'they don't ask you lots of questions.' I feel this is a better reference for this course than anything I could say!"

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