Speaker
Eliana Gil, Ph.D.Dr. Eliana Gil is director of the Starbright Training Institute for Child and Family Play Therapy, which provides comprehensive clinical training in the treatment of child abuse and neglect, as well as play therapy with children and families. She is also director of the Children's Corner, a program of the Multicultural Clinical Center in Springfield, Virginia. The Children's Corner specializes in the assessment and treatment of young children with a variety of social, behavioral, and emotional difficulties.
Dr. Gil spent the last seven years as founder and coordinator of a treatment program for abused children in northern Virginia. She is a registered play therapy supervisor, registered art therapist, and licensed marriage, family, and child counselor. She received her doctorate in family therapy from the California Graduate School of Family Psychology in San Rafael, California. She has served on the boards of directors of the American Professional Society on the Abuse of Children and the National Resource Center on Child Sexual Abuse. She is also a former president of the Association for Play Therapy. Dr. Gil is an adjunct faculty member at Virginia Tech University, where she teaches courses on family therapy, family play therapy, play therapy, and child maltreatment. She has written numerous materials on child abuse and related topics and has a number of educational videotapes that feature her work. Her most recent book for a professional audience is Helping Abused and Traumatized Children: Integrating Directive and Nondirective Approaches. Other books include Cultural Issues in Play Therapy (with Dr. Athena Drewes); Treating Abused Adolescents; Systemic Treatment of Families Who Abuse; The Healing Power of Play; Play in Family Therapy; and Sexualized Children: Assessment and Treatment of Sexualized Children and Children Who Molest, co-authored with Dr. Toni Cavanagh Johnson. Dr. Gil has also written several popular books for lay audiences including Outgrowing the Pain and Outgrowing the Pain Together. Several of her books are in other languages, including Spanish.
Dr. Gil is a well-known lecturer, author, and clinician and has been a frequent guest on local and national TV and radio shows. Originally from Guayaquil, Ecuador, she is bilingual and bicultural. She has worked in child abuse prevention and treatment for thirty-three years.
Keynote Description
Children who are abused or traumatized utilize a broad range of defenses to protect themselves against their emotional pain, distress, confusion, or anxiety. They are often unable to communicate their pain in ordinary language due to a variety of reasons. However, their communication occurs in behavior, in symptomatology, and in other forms of expressive, symbolic activities. Luckily, children possess an inherent reparative drive and they are often mastery-driven. Conversely, some children may become rigidly dependent on their defensive strategies and thus become unable to negotiate their injuries on their own. This workshop is designed to focus our attention on decoding children's communication through behavior and symbolic work and will emphasize the importance of understanding the child's phenomenological experience.Armed with a more ample understanding, clinicians can then use a variety of integrated approaches to advance therapeutic goals. An integrated approach towards assessment and treatment will be highlighted and special attention will be placed on tailoring the treatment to each child versus fitting children into rigid treatment curricula. Play therapy, other expressive therapies, and cognitive-behavioral therapy strategies will be presented. Clinical examples will illustrate strategies and engage participants in small group work.
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Human Development
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