You have noticed something. Perhaps it is worry that will not let go, tears that come more easily than they used to, or behaviour that is not like your child at all. Whatever brought you to this page, our Burlington child therapists are here to help. We provide caring, professional child therapy for children ages three to twelve, using play-based and creative approaches that fit how children actually grow and heal — with no waitlist, and with both daytime and evening appointments available.
Watch a child at play and you are watching a child process. Long before children can explain what is troubling them, they rehearse it, replay it, and work at it through play — a doll gets scolded, a tower gets knocked down and rebuilt, a drawing fills with storm clouds. Play is not a break from a child’s inner life; it is the clearest window into it.
This is why asking a struggling child “what is wrong?” so often goes nowhere. It is not that nothing is wrong — it is that the question is asked in an adult’s language. Child therapy asks it in the child’s language instead. In the playroom, with a therapist trained to understand what play is expressing, children can finally say what they have been trying to say all along. That is the heart of play therapy: it helps children feel heard and understood, and it helps them understand themselves and process what life brings.
Parents often reach out to us about child therapy in Burlington when their child is showing signs such as:
No checklist replaces a parent’s intuition. If you have a sense that your child could use some support, we would be glad to talk it through with you — the introductory call is free and carries no obligation.
Child-centred play therapy is the foundation of everything we do with children at our Burlington office, and every one of our child therapists is trained in it. Around that foundation, our approach looks like this:
Creative approaches are at the heart of how we work with children. Our Burlington office is centred on child-centred play therapy: a well-researched approach in which the toys, figures, and art materials of the playroom become the vocabulary through which a child expresses, explores, and resolves what they are carrying. To a visitor it looks like play. To a trained therapist, it is a child doing serious and often courageous work.
Creating is part of that vocabulary. Drawing, painting, and making things are woven into play therapy itself, so creating is as natural a part of a session at our Burlington office as the toys and figures themselves.
For families interested in the formal specializations of art therapy or music therapy, these are available within GreenValley at our nearby offices — art therapy with our trained art therapist at the Brantford and Kitchener offices, and music therapy at our Cambridge office. Your Burlington therapist can help you decide whether one of these would be a good fit for your child.
Some children are also helped by elements of Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT), which teaches that thoughts, feelings, and actions are connected — and that changing one can change the others. In the hands of a child therapist, CBT becomes tangible: a worry might be given a silly name and a small size, a brave step might be practised through a game. Our Burlington therapists fold these tools into play-based sessions when they suit the child in front of them, rather than delivering CBT as a standard package. The approach serves the child, never the other way around.
From first contact to ongoing sessions, here is the path at our Burlington office:
Your first call is with one of our client care coordinators, Kim or Aleeyah, who will listen to what is going on and suggest a couple of Burlington therapists well suited to your child’s needs. You choose who feels right, and most families simply book a first appointment from there — and if you would like to be more certain of the fit first, a free introductory call with the therapist is always available.
And a reassurance worth hearing before you begin: getting children to attend therapy is rarely the battle parents brace for. Most of our young clients are happy to come back — the playroom does not feel like a doctor’s office, and an hour that belongs entirely to them is something children rarely turn down.
The ways a child learns to handle hard feelings become the ways an adult handles them. That is precisely why childhood support is so powerful: you are not only easing today’s struggle, you are shaping the equipment your child will carry for decades. Emotional regulation, self-worth, the confidence that problems can be faced — these are built early, and they are built more easily than they are rebuilt.
Reaching out is not a verdict on your child or your parenting. Families come to us at all points — some at the first sign of trouble, some after months of hoping it would pass. Wherever you are starting from, starting is what matters, and it is far easier for a child to do this work now, while the patterns are still soft, than to do it years later when they have set.
Child therapy at our Burlington office is for children ages three to twelve, applied with flexibility — a young six and a mature eleven need different things, and we follow the child’s developmental stage rather than the calendar. When your child is older, the support continues: we also offer therapy for teens in Burlington, so adolescents can keep working with a practice they already know.
Lin & Bratton (2015), Journal of Counseling & Development
If you are wondering whether child therapy in Burlington could help your child, the easiest way to find out is a conversation. We offer a free introductory call so you can ask questions and see whether we are the right fit — no pressure and no obligation. We can usually arrange an appointment quite quickly.
Call: 289-337-0765
Toll Free Call: 888.699.7817