THE PLAYFUL THERAPIST ( June 10th & 11th 2027)
With Claire Bowers: Integrating Play, Gaming and Creative Methods into TA Psychotherapy
A two-day CPD course for qualified and trainee TA psychotherapists
Course Overview
Play is not a supplementary technique — it is a relational stance, a therapeutic medium, and for many clients, the only route into material that words cannot yet reach. This two-day course offers TA practitioners a theoretically grounded, practically rich and ethically rigorous framework for integrating play, creative methods and gaming into their clinical work.
Rooted in TA theory and drawing on developmental psychology, object relations theory, and intersectional practice, the course moves participants from theoretical understanding into embodied, experiential learning. By the end of Day 2, participants will have created a character, built a shared world, navigated complex ethical terrain through the Labyrinth of Ethics, and practised contracting for creative methods with real clients in mind.
Who Is This Course For?
Qualified TA psychotherapists, psychotherapists in training, counsellors and psychotherapeutic counsellors from within TA and other modalities with an interest in TA and creative practice. No prior experience of gaming or role-play is required — only curiosity.
What Will Be Covered
Building The Foundations - Day 1 Overview:
- The history of play in psychotherapy: Freud, Klein, Vygotsky, Winnicott, Panksepp
- TA and play: from Berne’s Secret Garden through the Ludic Third to contemporary gaming in therapy
- Transitional space (Winnicott, 1953/1971): theoretical development, clinical application, and its relationship to Vygotsky’s Zone of Proximal Development
- Explore script messages within play, using a floor-based experiential mapping
- Co-creating a shared world: an embodied experience of transitional space in a group
- Introduction to video games, role-playing games and online gaming as therapeutic tools
- Character creation and deepening across the day – and using this to explore and reflect on own script
Applying Creative Methods - Day 2 Overview:
- Returning to the shared world: explicit contracting for creative group work
- RPGs as therapeutic tools: the Game Master role and its parallels with the therapist
- Group inventory and symbolic resourcing
- Labyrinth of Ethics with Myriorama cards: navigating ethical complexity through story and image
- ITAA Code of Ethical Practice applied to creative and play-based methods
- Group roles and their script origins
- Skills practice: contracting for play demonstrated live, then practised in pairs
- Tales from the Quest: a narrative close integrating two days of learning
Learning Objectives :
By the end of this course participants will be able to:
- Articulate the theoretical foundations of play in psychotherapy and their relationship to TA
- Understand and apply the concept of transitional space clinically
- Exploring script formation and play through an intersectional lens
- Identify when and how to introduce creative and gaming-based methods with clients
- Contract explicitly and ethically for play-based work
- Navigate ethical complexity arising from the use of creative methods in practice
- Reflect on their own relationship to play and its impact on clinical practice
Theoretical Foundations :
The course draws on Berne (script, group stages, the Secret Garden), Winnicott (transitional space, Playing and Reality), Vygotsky (Zone of Proximal Development), Panksepp (the PLAY system), Steiner (script Matrix 1966), Baskerville (Script and Systemic Matrix, 2026), Cornell (play and intimacy), Temple and King (the Ludic Third), Bowers (play and creativity, 2025/2026), Tuckman (group stages) and Clarkson (group imago). Intersectional and EDI frameworks are woven throughout, drawing on Crenshaw (2019) and the I+U+ philosophical position.
