Winter 2024 Semester Schedule

All classes are held on Zoom, and might offer a hybrid in-person option for local students. Please contact your instructor to explore in person options.

Core Classes:

Abnormal Psychology (3 units)

Zoom, Individual Study, and Film
Cost: $899
Zoom Times: January 20, January 27 , February 3, February 24

Time 10:30am to 4:00pm (PST)
Individual Study (10 hours TBA ) Film Viewing and Lab (13, TBA)
Facilitator: Pam Dunne, Ph.D, RDT, BCT, NT

*Required Core Psychology Class for AT students

Through creative, hands-on learning, involving role play and other creative methods, students in this course will gain an understanding of how to recognize and understand the wide range of behavioral, emotional, and cognitive patterns from the DSM-5.

Narradrama as a Three Act Play ( 3 units)

Dates: March 16, 23, and 30, April 13, 20, 27 and May 4 plus
TBA (rehearsals)
Time: 10:30 am to 4 pm (PST)
Cost: $899
Facilitator: Pam Dunne, Ph.D, RDT/BCT, NT

*Required for Narradrama and Advanced Elective RDT Applicants

Participants, as authors of their three act plays, restory parts of their history, imagine new possibilities, experience unexpected outcomes and gain insights about their strengths. Each aspect of the development of their play is explored from a Narradrama perspective, through the lens of the preferred role created by the participant. The journey of the preferred role and participant parallel each other. Participants receive weekly exercises to generate a deeper exploration of the preferred role, themes, encounters and parallels in the play to their own life as well as opportunities to grow personally in understanding themselves and their preferred futures. Reflective, processes through the playing and replaying of scenes and stories as well as other forms of reflection are central to all the participants. The process culminates in short performances honoring all participants.

One to Three Day Classes

New Class! Narradrama with Families (7 hours/CE’s, .5 unit)

Dates: January 14th
Time: 10:30 to 6:00pm ( PST)
Cost: $169
TBA (1 hour)
Facilitator: Pam Paulson MA/LMFT, RDT, NT

*Required for Narradrama Training

Looking at families through a Narradrama lens we see stories and roles in a metaphorical sense. The Narradrama therapist takes on the role of witness and reflector rather than an expert making interpretations. Narradrama Therapy with families involves applying interventions such as witnessing family stories, deconstructing problematic stories, telling and retelling preferred stories, from each family member’s perspective. Participants will learn to engage families in communicating their stories by introducing a format using a witnessing lens versus the evaluative and instructive lens. Narradrama tools will assist in creating space for stories to be understood, deconstructed, and expanded. In this process, people move between positions of telling and witnessing. Family members engage in shared understanding and meaning-making.

Poetry and Expressive Art Multimodal Methods to Cope with Grief and Loss (7 hours/CE’s, .5 unit)

Dates: February 5 and 12
Time: 9:00 am to 12:30 pm (PST)
Cost: $169
TBA (1 hour)
Instructor: Terhi K. Korkiakangas, Ph.D, CL. Hyp

Discover how poetry and expressive art therapeutic methods help to explore grief and loss in a range of contexts, such as the death of a loved one, critical illness, miscarriage or loss of a child, divorce, end of a relationship, and other significant losses. Learn about the five stages of grief (Kubler-Ross, 1970), and the more recent paradigm of continuing bonds (Klass, Silverman, & Nickman, 1996), and how the poetic exploration can facilitate coping in the grieving process. Actively participate in creative, multimodal exercises to experience the therapeutic, strength-based benefits of poetry and arts focused on making meaning out of and transforming grief while adapting to loss.

New Class! Narradrama Creative Techniques: Advanced Applications (14 CE’s/hours- 1 unit)

Date: February 10, 17th , March 1
Time: 10:30 am to 3:30 pm (PST)
1 hour (TBA)
Facilitator: Pam Dunne, Ph.D, RDT-BCT, NT
Cost: $338

*Required for Narradrama Training

Participants will learn and practice specific drama and creative arts interventions. With a foundation of re-authoring and restorying, participants will explore storymaps, preferred role monologues, sensory rich environments, applied metaphors, enchanted tools and objects, soundscapes, advanced externalization techniques and multi- level stories. They discover ways to utilize these techniques with populations in clinical and educational settings. Participants will also explore narrative approaches of the Storied Three Act, and Recursive Frame Analysis utilizing metaphors and fantasy as well as process techniques from Narradrama as a Three Act Play.

New Class! Ethical Considerations in Drama Therapy (14 hours)

Dates: Fridays: March, 1, 8 and 15
Time : 11am to 3:30 pm (PST)
(1.5 hour TBA)
Cost: $338
Facilitator: Renda Dionne Madrigal, Ph.D, RDT, NT; Pam Dunne, Ph.D, RDT, NT

*Completes partial or full requirement for AT Students in Drama Therapy

Participants will explore relevant ethical and legal issues associated with practicing as a drama therapist and review key areas such as laws pertaining to minors and elders, telehealth, dual relationships, etc. The main focus will be to consider issues related specifically to drama therapy, diversity, scope of practice, and privilege and enact hypothetical issues raising ethical and legal concerns for drama therapists. Participants will develop individualized disclosures for drama therapy practice and complete a paper which targets specific ethical and legal areas related to drama therapy.

Using Drama Therapy with People Suffering From Addictions and Their Families (7 hours/CE’s, .5 unit)

Date: February 25
TBA (1 hour)
Time 10:30am to 6:00pm (PST)

Cost: $169
Facilitator: Alexis Maron, MA, RDT-BCT, RADT

Clients dealing with addiction disorders rarely go through their addiction journey truly alone. They often have friends/family members who have been a part of both their active use/behaviors and their recovery, and this may lead to feelings of shame, guilt and regret for everyone involved. This experiential workshop helps therapists understand the use of drama therapy tools with individuals and groups in learning how to address the impact of addiction on clients and their core and chosen families. Using Robert Landy’s drama therapeutic Role Theory, participants will explore how family “roles” can work towards recovery and reparation of relationships, as well as helping to take ownership of their part in the addiction process. Participants will have the opportunity to use projective techniques and embodiment to enhance their clinical skills and will also explore the unique challenges of working in systems with potentially resistant clients and their families. In addition, participants will explore these exercises from both the therapist and the client’s perspectives.

Introduction to Drama Therapy for Educators, Mental Health Facilitators, and Caregivers (7 hours/CE’s, 1 unit)

Date: March 25
Time: 10:30 to 6:00 (PST)
Cost: $169

Facilitator: Alexis Maron, MA, RDT-BCT, RADT

As mental health facilitators, educators and caregivers, the more techniques and tools that we have in our toolbelt, the more we can meet the needs of the people we serve. Using techniques such as role play, improvisation, and kinetic exercises can transform a talk meeting, into one full of meaningful play. In this introduction to drama therapy, participants will learn fundamentals from a role theory perspective. In addition, participants will be introduced to a handful of drama therapy creative activities to work with clients/students, and others. Exercises will be expanded to deepen the experience as well as showing how to develop drama therapy for self-care.