Course Description
3 hour live, online course
In this workshop, we explore the surprising and profound ways that play and art can facilitate new and helpful insights, understandings and behaviours for clients of all ages. We focus on the work of internationally recognised therapist and author, Dr.Violet Oaklander, an early pioneer of the therapeutic approach now recognised as Gestalt play therapy.
Dr Oaklander's seminal 1978 text Windows to our Children: A Gestalt Therapy Approach to Children and Adolescents presented a model of working with children and adolescents in the therapeutic setting using expressive and playful approaches that has since influenced practitioners worldwide.
Presently, this text is published in seventeen languages editions, including Spanish, Portuguese, Italian, Croatian, Russian, Chinese, Herbrew, Korean, German and Bulgarian.
Participants in this workshop will gain refreshing perspectives and approaches that will enliven their therapeutic encounters no matter the age group with whom they work.
Learning Outcomes
By the end of this course you will have an opportunity to:
- Gain an introductory understanding of the theory supporting a Gestalt-based play therapy approach for all ages
- Gaining an understanding of the cross-cultural and cross-generational effectiveness of this approach
- Gaining a repertoire of methods to meaningfully engage clients of all ages through playful means utilising multiple media
- Determining which media provides the best fit for you as a practitioner and the populations with whom you work
- Gaining an understanding of how a Gestalt-based play therapy approach is both similar and different from other models
Training Methods
The Facilitator will utilise a combination of didactic and experiential approaches, offerings hands-on opportunities to put into practice approaches that can immediately by applied to one's professional setting.
Workshop Facilitator - Peter Mortola, Ph.D. Professor in Counseling, Therapy and School Psychology
| 
| | Peter Mortola, Ph.D. is a Professor in the Counseling, Therapy and School Psychology Department at Lewis and Clark College's Graduate School of Education and Counseling, Portland, Oregan, USA. He is the author of Windowframes: Learning the art of Gestalt play therapy the Oaklander way (Routledge/Gestaltpress, 2006), the culmination of 10 years of inquiry and research on Violet Oaklander’s methods of both child therapy and adult training. Windowframes has been translated into German, Spanish, Romanian, Italian and Korean. He is also the co-author of BAM! Boys Advocacy and Mentoring: A leader’s guide to facilitating strength-based groups for boys (Routledge, 2008), and The Bear Inside (19th Avenue Press, with Illustrator Mark Molchan), a children's book about regulating strong emotions. The Bear Inside has been translated into Spanish, Bulgarian, Russian, and Sinhala language versions. For 15 years, he has also facilitated a partnership between Lewis & Clark College and David Douglas School District in which graduate students have served over 1500 sixth-grade students in the small group counseling setting. The culmination of that project is the recently published book Strengthening Social Connections and Individual Resilience in Adolescence The Belong and Be You Curriculm (Mortola & Gans, Routledge, 2023). |
Who Should Attend?
This workshop will be suitable for therapists and counsellors working with any age group.
Please note, this is a LIVE and INTERACTIVE training event. We don't record this.
Date and Time
Live only online course will be run on:
7th August 2025, 9am - 12pm AEST
(6th August 2025, 4pm - 7pm PDT)
&
28th October 2025, 9am - 12pm AEDT
(27th October 2025, 3pm - 6pm PDT)
Attending from interstate or internationally?
You can use this time converter to check the exact day and time of this training for your location.
Training Details
Included in the training price:
- 3 hours live, online training
- Access to slides and link to create Certificate of Attendance will be emailed to you upon completion of course evaluation
- GST
Training Cost
SPECIAL Price $200
Work Paying?
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Send us an email requesting an invoice via the contact page with your name, the dates and name of course/courses you'd like to do and the name of your organisation who you want us to invoice and we will send you an organisational invoice and a registration form.
