Theater-based social skills for children

I know he enjoys Friends Play Group, because he is always excited to go and he always is happy afterwards.

-FPG Parent

REGISTRATION IS NOW OPEN FOR OUR SPRING 2013 FRIENDS PLAY GROUP.

Click here to learn about our Spring 2013 session.

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Friends Play Group NEWS

New Location for Spring 2013 FPG

This Spring, we will be holding Friends Play Group at the Barrett Community Center, 1835 Belburn Drive, Room D in Belmont.

FPG Wins Grant from Bill Graham Foundation

The San Carlos Children’s Theater (SCCT) is honored to announce it is the recipient of a grant from the Bill Graham Supporting Foundation of the Jewish Community Endowment Fund. The $500 gift will fund SCCT’s Friends Play Group (FPG) a social skills workshop for children ages 6 - 9 years old. Read more by clicking here.

Want to get your kids into college? Let them play

This article appears on the CNN Opinion page. Story highlights include: kids better equipped to learn, interact, if taught using play-based curricula; Play-based learning builds empathy, better self-control, and problem solving skills.

Printed with permission by Gary Raucher, LMFT, RDT, California Institute of Integral Studies.

Playtime in Therapy Nets Serious Results
by Gary Raucher, LMFT, RDT

While adults will generally accept imaginative play as a natural mode of learning and mental-emotional healing for children, they are less likely to appreciate the value of play for themselves. In actuality, entering into a play-state - the experiential and embodied use of imagination - can be extremely beneficial for mental-emotional health in people of all ages.

For example, recent research shows that therapies involving the experiential use of the imagination (for example, role-plays), where emotions are safely contained, are particularly effective in re-patterning the neurological impacts of trauma. Furthermore, a number of developmental studies show that there is a high correlation between a child's capacity to engage in imaginary role-play, and his or her ability to solve real-life relationship problems. For one thing, role-play requires a person to step into another's shoes, an essential step in learning empathy. Additionally, use of the imagination stimulates cognitive development and problem-solving abilities, just as thinking things through makes it easier to complete a contemplated task.

There's also the factor of embodiment: engaging one's body in imaginative play opens more neural pathways to desired emotional or behavioral changes than does talk alone.

Drama therapy, offered at BACF, is one approach that applies all the benefits of imaginative play to the healing and growth of clients of all ages.

(Gary Raucher, MFTI, RDT, is a Registered Drama Therapist who uses elements of play and the expressive arts in his work with children, adults, couples, families, and groups.)