When the Sand Stays Silent: Working with Nonverbal Stories in Sand Play

Ever wondered how the sand whispers its stories without a word? Join us for a unique journey into the world of nonverbal storytelling!

When the Sand Stays Silent: Working with Nonverbal Stories in Sand Play is a trauma-informed training focused on understanding and responding to moments in sand tray and expressive work when clients are quiet, still, or unable to put experiences into words. This training explores how silence, minimal movement, and symbolic absence can reflect dissociation, protective withdrawal, developmental factors, or emerging meaning. Participants learn how to attune to nonverbal communication, pace interventions, and use presence, containment, and subtle expressive strategies to support safety, regulation, and integration across children, adolescents, and adults.

This training is ideal for social workers, play therapists, mental health counselors, and psychotherapist. Join us in person or virtually for this training.

Learning Objectives:

1. Identify clinical meanings of silence and nonverbal expression in sand tray and play therapy.
2. Demonstrate at least three play or sand tray interventions that support nonverbal processing and regulation.
3. Apply developmentally appropriate responses to silence in children and adolescents using trauma-informed play therapy principles.
4. Analyze symbolic absence, stillness, or repetition in sand tray scenes to inform treatment planning.
5. Explain how nonverbal expression and silence function as adaptive trauma responses

My Crossing Paths Training Center has been approved by NBCC as an Approved Continuing Education Provider, ACEP No. 7253. Programs that do not qualify for NBCC credit are clearly identified. My Crossing Paths Counseling Center is solely responsible for all aspects of the programs.
My Crossing Paths Training Center is approved by the Florida Board of Clinical Social Work, Marriage and Family Therapy, and Mental Health Counseling. Provider # 50-37274.

My Crossing Paths Training Center has been approved by the Association for Play therapy, APT No. 23-705. Programs that do not qualify for APT credit are clearly identified.

My Crossing Paths Training Center provider number 1877, is approved to offer social work continuing education by the Association of Social Work Boards (ASWB) Approved Continuing Education (ACE) program. Regulatory boards are the final authority on courses accepted for continuing education credit. ACE provider approval period: 4/16/2025-4/16/2026. Social workers completing this course receive 4 general continuing education credits and psychotherapy, and clinical intervention continuing education credits.