Play Therapist - Specialist Intervention Service (Full Time)

This is a unique position, opportunity and moment for you to bring yourself as a Play Therapist to a place where in the work, miracles happen, and seeds of hope come to life. This post is part of the development of a play therapy team, where we are working with children known to children’s social care, to help them make sense of their lived experiences and narratives. This is a place where our work actually brings about deep change in both the children’s lives and that of their families, often preventing disruptions in children’s living arrangements and starting new patterns of being able to be together.

This role also offers the play therapist and the adolescent ways of explaining and thinking about complexity through sensory media, so it no longer feels like play but really makes sense of, and highlights, their feelings and experiences. As Play Therapists, we get to be situated right at the point of most need, which means we have the privilege of seeing great change and impact.

Special requirements for this post: This post is exempt from the Rehabilitation of Offenders Act 1974 and a comprehensive screening process will be undertaken on successful applicants including a Disclosure & Barring Service (DBS) check at enhanced level for both children’s and adults.

About you: As a play/adolescent therapist, you will be exploring issues around trauma and identity, through the use of all the play therapist toolkit. You will need to be able to apply theories in order to offer analytical understanding of your sessional material. However, clinical supervision comes as an integral part of this work. This position will suit a therapist who works with children and holds relevant play therapy qualifications. Whilst the post will focus on working with children and teenagers, it will also offer the opportunity to work collaboratively with family members to build bonds and attachments and develop therapeutic life story work. We have also developed exciting group work methods with children, which will offer you as the therapist the ability to work with and understand siblings like never before. Once again, training and supervision will be offered to this post.

The applicant must be able to assist any child by displaying a working knowledge of play therapy methods and theories, whilst being able to work between the play therapy quadrants using various modalities and all media as is necessary.

Critical criteria:

• Personal: Energy, passion, perseverance, and an eagerness to creatively engage with child/young person and their connected people and professionals. An insightful team player.
• Professional: Relevant professional therapy qualifications and accreditations with therapy bodies. We offer creative clinical supervision and work as a small coherent therapeutic team with clear management and peer interaction. It is essential that the incoming team member understands working within corporate care processes in order to work in a close multidisciplinary way. Analytical report writing is critical to this position.

About us: This is an exciting time to join the London Borough of Barking & Dagenham. We have been on a journey over the last few years, that has seen us transform the council and the way we deliver our services. At the heart of this transformation is our community. We need committed individuals to support us in the delivery of these aims and to become part of our team to make a difference to our children and families. In return we offer a competitive pay package, generous pension, annual leave up to 30 days, investment in your learning and development as well as a commitment to your wellbeing. We work in a dispersed way, offering flexible working arrangements.