Communicating with Children and Adolescents

Anne Bannister was a social worker, psychodramatist, dramatherapist and play therapist. She worked for the Probation Service and for the NSPCC. She undertook doctoral research on the use of creative therapies with sexually abused children. Annie Huntington is qualified as a social worker, nurse, teacher and psychodramatist. She is currently a lecturer in the Directorate of Social Work and Social Care at the University of Salford. Both editors have published widely in their fields of expertise.

This book provides a comprehensive and wide-ranging resource for those interested in exploring and understanding why action methods are particularly useful when working with young people. Discussion of the application of action methods to work with young people focuses on differing issues and populations.

Part I: The Curtain Rises. 1. Warming up: Introducing action methods and work with young people, Anne Bannister and Annie Huntington. 2. Setting the scene: Child development and the use of action methods, Anne Bannister. 3. Pause for thought: Action or stillness in therapeutic work with young people? Sue Jennings and Andy Hickson. Part II: Action across organisational divides: Health, education and the juvenile justice system. 4. Freeing the self: Psychodrama techniques with children and adolescents who stammer, Gail Smith. 5. Where there is drama there can also be art: Using creative media with children living with life threatening illness, Kate Kirk. 6. Can we do something? Young people using action methods to support each other in school, Nick Luxmoore. 7. Let's make a bridge!: Working in action with autistic children, Sandra Grieve and Ioanna Gagani. 8. Providing dance movement therapy within a mainstream school, Sue Curtis. 9. Psychodrama with 'at risk' youth: A means of active engagement, Erica Hollander. 10. Drago-drama: Archetypal sociodrama with adolescents, Mario Cossa. Part III: Action methods and child maltreatment. 11. The use of action methods in the treatment of the attachment difficulties of long-term fostered and adopted children, Paul Holmes. 12. The Yellow Brick Road: Helping children and adolescents to recover a coherent story following abusive family experiences. Facilitated contact with birth parents using the Therapeutic Spiral Model, Chip Chimera. 13. Touch me - NO! Creative therapies with young sexually abused children, Cristina Citron. Part IV: The Curtain Falls. 14. Resisting change: What stops us acting for young people? Annie Huntington. References. Index.