Building Bridges: Biblical Counseling Activities for Children and Teens

Knowing how to approach children and teens in counselling can be a challenge. Learning to enter into their world and draw them out can sometimes feel impossible. But with Julie Lowe's Building Bridges—a practical workbook of expressive activities to do with kids and teens in counselling—you will find the biblical tools you're looking for.

Anyone who has ever heard a child say, "I don't know" in answer to a question about what they are thinking and feeling or about why they acted a certain way, will be thankful for these thoughtful, biblically wise, and creative ways to engage young people. Julie Lowe, drawing on decades of experience in counselling children has compiled helpful, practical ways to speak the gospel into children and teenager's lives. By building bridges with young people, we can build bridges with them to the Lord.

With over fifteen years of counselling experience and by working as a registered play therapist supervisor, Julie Lowe understands there is a need to speak truth and hope into the lives of children and teens in a hands-on, meaningful way. That's why the activities and reproducible worksheets in Building Bridges can be used over and over in multiple contexts.

As part of CCEF's Helping the Helper series, this workbook walks counsellors, teachers, parents, and caregivers through the rationale for expressive activities, provides examples, and then shows counsellors how to do it themselves. Upon the purchase of this product, customers will be given access to downloadable, colorized versions of each of the interactive charts and graphics, with the option of creating printable posters for their ministry. By pointing to the Lord through expressive mediums, counsellors and youth workers will be able to reach kids and teens in a unique, biblical way.

"It is impossible with a few words to capture the love, wisdom, and practical helpfulness that splashes across every page of Building Bridges. If you are a parent and you want to know how to love and be God's tool of change in the lives of your children, you should read this book. If you are a teacher, children's counsellor, or in children's or youth ministry, this book is absolutely essential for you. As a father of adult children, I read Building Bridges with gratitude for the many that it will help, but also with sadness that I didn't have it when our children were young. We cannot lose another generation of vulnerable children, made in the image of God, to the evils of life in this broken, groaning world, and for this reason, I enthusiastically commend Building Bridges to you."
—Paul David Tripp, Pastor; author; conference speaker

"'Tell me about your problems,' rarely gives us access to children because words can elude them when emotions are complicated. Julie has given us creative and engaging means of drawing out a child's heart."
—Edward T. Welch, Faculty and counsellor, Christian Counseling and Educational Foundation (CCEF); author

Format: Paperback