Nana's Children Practicum Placement Program

Nana’s has been partnering with local and out of state Universities in placing graduate level students working to receive a Masters and/or Doctors in the mental health field. Since 2001, Nana’s has delivered over 7,000 play therapy sessions to more than 1,000 children and has graduated 48 practicum students.

Training


Each year, all practicum students are required to attend a one week training in August, covering areas on homelessness issues and laws, Neuroscience and trauma, history, techniques, and ethics in play therapy, crisis intervention, and Nana’s policies and procedures.

Services

  1. Services are provided September through May for 35 weeks, five days per week. Students are required to work at the site/s for a minimum of two days per week to ensure receiving all indirect and direct hours.
  2. Clients are referred by parents, teachers, school administrators, CPS, local shelters, foster care organizations, and other local mental health organizations. Once a Nana’s consent form has been signed, clients are entered into the program.
  3. Sessions are provided through individual and group play therapy.
    1. Individual sessions: Each client receives a 30 minutes session each week or alternate weeks, depending upon attendance at school. There is no set limit on the number of sessions a child receives while in school.
    2. Group sand tray sessions: Groups are organized by grade level and are run by two practicum students for eight weeks following a standard procedure.
    3. Play therapy is a well thought out, evidence based, research supported approach, helping “students at risk” achieve academic success. The play therapy room provides a supportive and nurturing environment where children safely express their emotions (under the guidance of a trained therapist), learns to make choices, and accepts responsibilities for their actions. These skills translate outside the therapeutic setting onto the classroom and real life situations.
  4. During school crisis situations, Nana’s provides support and grief counseling to the students and support to all teachers and school personnel.
  5. Nana’s also participates in IEP’s (individual education plans) helping place, when necessary, children into Special Education programs.
Record Keeping
  1. Clinical records, treatment plans, and testing are entered and stored in the Therascribe database and reviewed by the site Supervisor.
  2. Each site is has its own computer system and is backed up nightly with a no access remote server.
Supervision
  1. Individual and group Supervision is provided by Dr. William Jenkins, PhD,
RPT-S each week
  1. Forms utilized for tracking in supervision are the Nana’s Core Competencies Outline and the Clinical Supervision Form.
  2. In the model play room, an observation window and video taping is utilized during supervision.
Research/Testing/Evaluation Process
  1. A longitudinal study of two years evaluated reduction of anxiety and depression on children who were homeless, receiving treatment through play therapy. The findings were that for this population, more than ten sessions were needed to statistically significantly reduce symptoms and improve academic achievement.
  2. A current study utilizes “themes” on feelings described by children during sessions, which are tracked in clinical notes and downloaded into an SPSS program.
    1.  During supervision, the Nana’s Pilot Study Worksheet is used to help track and label this information. This research is not only important to aid the children’s emotionality, but also improve the level of understanding by the therapist in training.
    2. We anticipate the outcome of the study to show that children receiving more than ten sessions of play therapy not only significantly reduce levels of anxiety and depression as measured by The Boxall Profile and RCMAS, but also increase academic scores, which help and/or aid in a better school environment.
Policy and Procedure
  • Each practicum student must read the Nana’s Policy and Procedure Manual and sign a verification sheet that he/she will adhere by this.
  • A copy of Nana’s Policy and Procedure will be given to each student and one to the University if requested.