VISTAS Counseling Children and Adolescents

VISTAS Online is an innovative publication produced for ACA by Dr. Garry R. Walz and Dr. Jeanne C. Bleuer of Counseling Outfitters, LLC. Its purpose is to provide a means of capturing the ideas, information and experiences generated by the annual ACA Conference and selected ACA Division Conferences. Papers on a program or practice that has been validated through research or experience may also be submitted. This digital collection of peer-reviewed articles is authored by counselors, for counselors. VISTAS Online contains the full text of over 900 proprietary counseling articles published from 2004 to 2017.



Five Out of the Box Techniques for Encouraging Teenagers to Engage in Counseling

Elisabeth D. Bennett, Kathy Le, Kevin Lindahl, Spencer Wharton, and Tin Weng Mak

2017

Counseling teenagers can be difficult when traditional talk therapy may serve as a barrier in communication. A great deal of resistance may exist when working with teens because of their internal and external developmental transition from child to adult. In order to combat this, counselors must equip themselves with a variety of creative techniques that promote both verbal and nonverbal expression in a way that is therapeutic rather than stigmatizing. This article provides five creative and developmentally appropriate techniques for assisting counselors in increasing engagement while also allowing teenage clients to communicate their thoughts, behaviors, and feelings in a non-traditional way.

Keywords: techniques, adolescent, engagement, encouragement, creativity

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