농촌 다문화가정 아동의 모래놀이치료 사례연구

A Case Study on the Sand Play therapy for Children of Multi-cultural Families in Rural Area

The purpose of this study is to verify the effectiveness of sand play therapy for children from multicultural families living in rural South Korea. Eight students were randomly assigned to an experimental group and the untreated control group consisted of 16 elementary school students from rural Jeolla Province whose mothers were of foreign descent and nationality. The therapy program was conducted for a total of 24 sessions, 50 minutes each week. Sand play had elements of emotional expression and therapeutic healing. Validation of the sand treatment effects was done through pre- and post-experimental audits of the children’s stress and happiness levels. The main results of this study are as follows. First, variables of individual stress, home stress and school stress, measured after sand play treatment, were found to be lower in the experimental group than in the control group. Second, following sand play treatment, the experimental group showed significant increases in self-character, ability, and interpersonal relationships in the area of happiness. In contrast, the control group did not show any significant changes in terms of happiness as a whole or in its subcomponents.