1. Culturally Competent Play Therapy with the Mexican Child and Family
Roberto Robles, LCSW

2. Learning Objectives
How to engage the Spanish speaking Mexican child and the family
Identify ways to treat the Mexican child and family by using culturally appropriate games
Understand the different ways to use the traditional games and Historia de la Loteria/Lotto Story in a therapeutic manner

3. Cultural Inventory
What messages are you conveying when the family enters your
Waiting room?
Office?
Fills out your forms?
Return a phone call?

4. Common Practice Usually there is sensitivity to the
Language needs
Leaflets
Brochures
Videos
Forms in Spanish
What about once they enter the office?

5. Assessment Issues What kinds of questions do you ask? Immigration
Religion
Treatment approaches
Discipline

6. Some Games Used in therapy
Candyland
Therapeutic games
The Talking, Feeling and Doing Game
Available in Spanish
Doesn’t take into account culture
Only two bilingual therapeutic games that can be used by Spanish-speaking or bilingual children and their parents.

7. Games to Use with Mexican Children
La Loteria
Juego de la Oca (Game of the Goose)
Sierpientes y Escaleras (Snakes and Ladders)
Historia de la Loteria/Lotto Story

8. Narrative Therapy developed by Michael White and David Epston
Implies listening to the child and family’s story about their problems
Told once or more than once
Language can shape events into narratives of hope

9. Narrative Therapy
Problems arise when a person is stuck in a story that makes him or her unhappy
Narrative therapy is a search for events which disprove some erroneous beliefs
A new story can liberate the person from the shackles of the problem

10. Narrative Ideas People are the experts
Views problems as separate from people
Emphasis on the story
Allows for the telling and retelling of stories

11. Narrative Therapy
Children and some adults naturally externalize problems
Doing this separates the child from their problems
It directs the focus away from the child as a problem and onto the child-problem relationship

12. Narrative Therapy
“The problem in the problem, the person is not the problem”

13. La Loteria in Mexico Colonial Spanish card game
Arrived in Mexico during the last half of 18th century
First played in a parlor by social elite
Still widely played

14. How it can be played Up to six people and one caller
Caller pulls individual cards from a bag or hand
Each player selects at least one game card
Three or four in a row wins

15. Another traditional way to play
Players place bets on the picture on their game card which they feel the caller will next pull from the bag
This version is played at carnivals in Mexico
Caller has a bowl of oversized dice that have the pictures on each side instead of dots or numbers

16. In Oaxaca Poetic verses are shouted out
I’m the ___and I’ve arrived although you can’t see me; I haven’t come to borrow, not even to eat.

17. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
El sombrero de los reyes
The hat of kings
Para el sol y para el agua
For the sun and water

18. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
El que por la boca muere
One that dies by the mouth
El que con la cola pica
The one that picks with its behind

19. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
La guía de los marineros
The sailors guide
El farol de enamorados
The lantern of lovers

20. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
Al que todos van a ver cuando tienen que comer
Where all go when they have hunger
El que le cantó a San Pedro no le volverá a cantar
He that sang to St. Peter will not return to sing again

21. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
Pórtate bien cuatito si no te lleva el coloradito
Behave yourself so that the little red one doesn’t carry you off
Al pasar por el panteón, me encontré
While passing the graveyard, I found

22. Riddles and Rhymes Acertos y Rimas
La herramienta del borracho.
The tool of the drunk.
¿Por qué le corres cobarde trayendo tan buen puñal?
Why are you running like a coward when you are carrying such a good dagger?

23. Riddles and Rhymes Arcetos y Rimas
La cobija de los pobres
The blanket of the poor
Tanto va al agua
Where the water goes

24. La Loteria--in clinical setting
Winner tells a story about himself/herself or a family member or just a story using each of the cards--four in a row
Winner identifies the feelings that they have when they see or think about the image
Excellent alternative to the Thematic Apperception Test (TAT)

25. La Loteria--in clinical setting 1 on 1
Display all cards on floor or table
Have child select five cards--develop a story
Turn them upside down and have them select five--have them do the same--develop a story
Place all face up--have child place emotion peg on top
Go fish game with two decks--if there is a match tell the story

26. Let’s play--hay que jugar

27. Tell a Story

28. Historia de la Lotería/Lotto Story
Bilingual bicultural game
Came about after a search was made for culturally appropriate therapy games
Influenced by La Lotería, the Mexico City Metro

30. Emotional Pegs/Fichas Emocionales

32. Four years of treatment
Card numbers 14, 11, 40, 19, 1, 10, 44
A little girl it was her birthday and she was sick and her parents brought her candy and ice cream. They went to the store only to find out they were out of money. She could not pay for the little girl’s party and the little girl thought every one in the world hated her so she did not get anything [for her party]

33. Juego de la Oca (game of the Goose)
Some say it dates back to 1471 in Germany, others say in 1587 in Italy, a copy was sent to King Philip II of Spain, very popular in 1700’s in France
When it arrived in Mexico some of the images were changed to reflect the culture
El Charro
La China poblana
La Pirámide

34. Sierpientes y Escaleras
Originated in India, game is Hindu
It was used to teach children about the religion where good squares allow a player to ascend higher in the league of life whereas, evil will reduce a player back through reincarnation to the lower tiers of life
Rewards good deeds-up ladder
Consequences for misdeeds-down the snake

35. Individual images

36. Why is this important?

37. State’s Latino Births
Beginning in July of 2001, more than half of all California babies were Latino
According to a UCLA study of birth records
Tyche Hendricks, Chronicle Thursday, February 6, 2003

38. Cultural Competence It is a life long process
Refers to the process by which individuals and systems respond respectfully and effectively to people of all cultures, languages, classes, races, ethnic backgrounds, religions, and other diversity factors in a manner that recognizes, affirms, and values the worth of individuals, families, and communities and protects and preserves the dignity of each
NASW Standards for Cultural Competence in Social Work Practice 2001

39. More on cultural competence
Is the integration and transformation of knowledge about individuals and groups of people into specific standards, policies, practices, and attitudes used in appropriate cultural settings to increase the quality of services, thereby producing better outcomes (Davis & Donald, 1997)
NASW Standards for Cultural Competence in Social Work Practice 2001

40. It conveys the Attitude
That one is respecting a person’s
Immigration status
migration status
colonization
acculturation experiences
diverse heritages
U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, SAMHSA, CMHS

41. La cultura cura no locura

42. Thanks-Gracias
Howard (91) in Culture tales… (American Psychologist 46(3)
Life-- Stories we live by
Psychopathology-- stories gone mad
Psychotherapy-- Exercises in story repair