The Parent Playbook for Child Therapists

CPD

Faculty

Dafna Lender, LCSW Related seminars and products

The Theraplay Institute

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Dafna Lender, LCSW, is an international trainer and supervisor for practitioners who work with children and families. She is a certified trainer and supervisor/consultant in both Theraplay and Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP) and an EMDR therapist. Dafna’s expertise is drawn from 25 years of working with families with attachment in many settings: at-risk after school programs, therapeutic foster care, in-home crisis stabilization, residential care and private practice. Dafna’s style, whether as a therapist or teacher, is combining the light-hearted with the profound by bringing a playful, intense and passionate presence to every encounter. Dafna is the author of Integrative Attachment Family Therapy (2023) and co-author of Theraplay® - The Practitioner’s Guide (2020).

 

Speaker Disclosures:
Financial: Dafna Lender maintains a private practice. She is a published author and receives royalties. She receives a speaking honorarium and recording royalties from Psychotherapy Networker and PESI, Inc. She has no relevant financial relationships with ineligible organizations.
Non-financial: Dafna Lender has no relevant non-financial relationships.

Additional Info

Access never expires for this product.

For a more detailed outline that includes times or durations of time, if needed, please contact cepesi@pesi.com.

Objectives

1. List 3 solutions for obstacles to parent engagement and participation.
2. Identify 2 cultural factors that may be underlying parent defensiveness.
3. List 3 possible reasons that lie beneath a parent’s defensive statement.
4. Examine the three parenting types and the types of supports they need.
5. Determine the significance of parents own attachment style on child rearing attitudes.
6. List 2 techniques for managing a parent’s dysregulation and developing parent self-reflection skills.

Outline

First Contacts Do’s and Don’ts:

The Keys to Making Parents Feel Empowered, Respected and Part of the Process

• How to get parents to meet with you, even if they say they’re busy or frequent “no-shows”
• How to engage the absent/estranged parent who doesn’t answer email
• First meeting with parents: setting the stage for future success
• Research, risks and limitations

Frequency and Content of Parent Contact and Involvement

• How often should you meet with parents and in what format?
• Ethical considerations for sharing child information in parent sessions
• Helping parents with behavior management
• Effective, culturally sensitive, attachment-focused parenting techniques

Stuck Parental Attitudes and How to Respond to Statements Like …

• I’m the adult and she just needs to listen
• I was brought up this way and I turned out just fine
• The real world isn’t going to baby him
• All this play stuff is just a waste of my time and money
• I tried your behavior strategy at home and it didn’t work

Helping Parents Hold Boundaries

• Gently confront parents who want better behavior but can’t consistently hold boundaries
• Addressing parents’ shame and guilt about their own contribution to the problem
• How to confront parents who are inconstant in their messages and behavior

Assess, Prepare for and Conduct Parent-Child Joint Sessions

• Decide when the time is right for conducting child-parent joint sessions
• Timing, subject matter, who to include
• Explain to the parents what to expect in a child-parent session
• Address your own fears as a clinician about conducting family sessions
• Conduct a parent-child session
• Handling chaos, shut-down, arguments and more

Target Audience

• Social Workers
• Marriage & Family Therapists
• Psychologists
• Addiction Counsellors
• Registered Psychotherapists
• School Counsellors
• School Social Workers
• School Psychologists
• Other Mental Health Professionals