Theoretical foundations and history
What is the History of Educational Therapy?
In its earliest form, educational therapy emerged from individual practitioners who questioned the psychoanalytic models underlying therapeutic education practices in the late 1800s and early 1900s. However, initially, these individuals lacked a uniform definition or standard practice for educational therapy. Over the course of the 20th century, through the work of many individual contributors and organizations, this definition began to emerge. Below are some key moments in the history of the development of the field of educational therapy.
1951 – Marianne Frostig establishes the Marianne Frostig Center in Los Angeles to train educational therapists with a focus on helping students with developmental lags across academic, social, and emotional domains. She also draws attention to factors such as student organization, attention, and difficulties with sequencing.
1968 – Ruth Mallison writes “Education as Therapy," distinguishing educational therapy from therapeutic education and arguing for a highly individualized approach in which therapists use specialized skills to work with students with disabilities
1977 – Katrina de Hirsch writes a seminal article defining educational therapy and the qualifications and traits necessary for the profession. She also introduces the concept of the treatment alliance between therapists and clients.
1978 – Irene Capari establishes the first training program in educational therapy in the UK
1979 – The Association for Educational Therapists (AET) is formed with the goal of defining educational therapy, training educational therapists, and setting standards for the field. Dorothy Ungerleider, the founding president, argues for the importance of educational therapists being generalists who can serve as evaluators, remediators, case managers, and bridges of communication between the family and others involved with the child (school, allied professionals, etc.)
1990s – AET expands and builds relationships with other allied organizations across fields focused on topics such as school psychology, speech and language therapy, psychology and psychiatry.
2000s – AET is accepted as a contributing member of the National Joint Committee on Learning Disabilities; Research finds high perceived efficacy rates among families who engage in educational therapy
(Werbach, Kornblau, and Slucki, 2018)
The theoretical foundations of educational therapy are rooted in a client-centered and sociocultural approach. At the heart of this philosophy is the belief that the individual client’s needs and experiences should drive the therapeutic process. This perspective emphasizes examining all aspects of the child’s life, starting from the immediate environment—such as family, interpersonal relationships, and school—and extending to broader cultural and community contexts, as well as the unique events that shape the client’s lived experience.
Central to this approach is Kaganoff & Ficksman’s Multidimensional Model (2009), which highlights the depth and breadth of educational therapy. In this model, the treatment alliance—comprised of the educational therapist, the client, the client’s family, and other allied professionals—forms the core of effective intervention. By prioritizing this alliance, the model emphasizes the importance of collaboration and responsiveness, ensuring that therapeutic goals and strategies are consistently aligned with the client's evolving needs. Kaganoff & Ficksman also note the importance of developing deep learning and autonomy, while keeping a keen eye on what the client communicates through behavior and how the client is developing across various domains (language, executive functioning, emotional development, memory, and perception) within their sociocultural context.
(Ficksman & Adelizzi, 2018)
What are the Theoretical Underpinnings?
