Sandtray Play and Storymaking

Book excerpt: Introducing sandtray play and storying into mainstream and special education classrooms can have an extremely enriching impact on the learning experience. When used effectively, it can create the climate for social, emotional and behavioural growth and incite bursts of creativity in students. Build a world in your sandtray; tell its story; record it; listen to your partner's story – these are the invitations to students in a sandtray play/narrative workshop. The benefits of such an approach are endless, from the positive, therapeutic effects of physically displaying emotions through sand worlds to the development of essential speaking, listening and writing skills when telling and recording sand world stories. This accessible and classroom-friendly book explains the thinking behind this unique approach and answers all the nuts-and-bolts questions of sandtray/narrative workshop setup. It offers a wealth of practical methods that can be applied to a wide spectrum of the student population and details real-life anecdotes and student work. This book is an invaluable handbook for teachers and school counselors looking to use play and storying as a way to develop core competencies in children with special educational needs and in the mainstream, and will also be of interest to play therapists, speech and language therapists and educational psychologists.