Main description:

Art therapy with infants, toddlers and their families is an exciting and developing area of practice. With contributions from Australia, the United Kingdom and Spain, Art Therapy in the Early Years has an international flavour. The authors describe clinical art psychotherapy practice with children under five and their families in settings that include children in care, mental health clinics, paediatric wards, pre-schools, and early intervention programs.

Divided into three sections, Art Therapy in the Early Years presents different clinical environments in which art psychotherapy with this client group is found:

* individual art therapy;

* group art therapy;

* parent-child dyad and family art therapy.

The book proposes that within these different contexts, the adaptive possibilities inherent in art psychotherapy provide opportunities for therapeutic growth for young children and their families.

Art Therapy in the Early Years will be of interest to art therapists working with children; students and practitioners from creative arts therapies; psychologists and psychotherapists; social workers; pre-school teachers; child psychiatrists, clinical supervisors, and other professionals working in the early years settings.

Contents:

List of illustrations Foreword Acknowledgements Introduction Section 1. Individual art therapy with infants and toddlers 1 An Odd Mirror 2. On mark making and leaving a mark. Processing the experience of art therapy with preschool children. 3 'Cheerful and not Cheerful': Art Psychotherapy on a Paediatric Ward. 4. 'I Do Dots...' Art Therapy with Australian Aboriginal Children Section 2. Family and dyad art therapy with infants, toddlers and their parents 5. Transitions: Moving from Infancy to latency through symbolisation and the acquisition of language 6. The imprint of another life: working with siblings recently placed for adoption 7. Amazing Mess: Mother's get in touch with their infants through the vitality of painting together 8. The crisis of the cream cakes. An infant's food refusal as a representation of intergenerational trauma Section 3. Group art therapy with infants and toddlers 9. Building a fort: art therapy with a group of toddlers going through the adoption process 10. Making waves. An art psychotherapist's retrospective review of counter transference drawings made in a preschool setting 11 Side-by-side: An early years art therapy group with a parental group alongside Conclusion Notes on Contributors Index