Creative Family Therapy Techniques: Play, Art, and Expressive Activities to Engage Children in Family Sessions

I am a pre-licensed MFT and I have found this book to be helpful when conducting play therapy sessions. This book included a variety of ideas and activities. I appreciate that they explain the activity, cite their sources, and tell about the author of the activity. Overall very satisfied and I would recommend it!

Engaging children in therapy sessions can be challenging, even for seasoned family therapists. This book is an innovative collection of activities that will help make family sessions engaging and effective. I use this book in my clinical practice and it’s required reading for students in my graduate family therapy courses. This is a must-have book for ALL family therapists! I also recommend Liana Lowenstein’s other books, as they have even more creative activities to use with children, teens, and families.

As a child and family counselor, I use the activities in this book on a regular basis. This is an excellent resource that every family counselor needs to add to their bookshelf! It provides creative, easy to understand activities to help engage both children and their parents in the counseling session. The book is divided into three sections: engagment and assessment techniques, treatment techniques, and termination techniques. Each activity includes the following sections: the goals of the activity, the materials needed, advance preparation, description, and discussion. Majority of the activities require inexpensive, everyday materials. The activities address issues such as treatment goals, family strengths, open communication, feelings expression. If you feel stuck in your work with a difficult to engage child or teenager this is the perfect resource to give you fresh, new ideas to incorporate in your counseling sessions!

I think this is a great tool for any therapist. I think the activities are easy to understand and easy to change to fit your client/case. I really enjoy doing play therapy on adults because I have discovered that though they are resistant at first, they usually really enjoy the activity at the end so it is nice to have a book that focuses on families and not just kids.

I have only used one intervention so far, but all my families that have engaged in the activity have reported that they enjoyed it. I look forward to trying more interventions with families.

This book is comprehensive, user-friendly, and a great asset to my work as a graduate school professor for therapists and as a clinician. It includes a clear and detailed introduction to family work, and I used it in a number of different classes. The interventions are thoughtful and effective and work well with families in all stages of work. I love Liana Lowenstein's books and consider them an essential part of my counseling library

Fantastic book with a lot of exercises ready to use or adapt. Time saver and life save for my family therapy sessions allows me time to process with my clients instead of spending so much time looking or creating engaging ways to help clients through family therapy sessions.

Liana's compilation of tried and true therapeutic activities for families is a "must have" for therapists who are faced with the challenge of engaging a wide range of ages and personalities that make up the family system. As a private practitioner, I thoroughly enjoy using this book as a reference when working with families in therapy. The techniques are effective and the materials that are needed to perform the activities are most likely already in the therapist's office. The book will more than pay for itself the first time it is used.Beth M. Hughes, LCSW, PIP Gadsden, Alabama

Such a variety of creative, fun games (yet therapeutic)! A lot of great ideas for a range of needs and families!!Extremely useful. It has also inspired my own creativity, so I am now starting to come up myself with creative ways of interacting.

Loads of ideas to work creatively with families and groups

Contains some really practical and helpful interventions which enable the whole family to engage. It could become my bible!

A good book with useful ecercises, if you plan on working with families.

Informative