Deliberate Practice Video Exercises
Sentio University is the only marriage and family therapy program in California that publishes its clinical training exercises, video demonstrations, and skill development resources for free and makes them available to therapists, supervisors, and graduate programs worldwide. The exercises and videos on this page are actively used in MFT and counseling programs across the United States and internationally, and they reflect the same evidence based Deliberate Practice methodology that forms the foundation of Sentio's entire Master of Arts in Marriage and Family Therapy curriculum.
At most graduate institutions, clinical training materials stay behind closed doors. Sentio operates from a culture of radical transparency: we share our methods openly because we believe therapist training improves everywhere when the best available tools are accessible to everyone. This page is one piece of a much broader library of free professional development resources that Sentio provides, including our Innovation Lab (which houses our supervision model, webinars across dozens of therapy modalities, and published articles on supervision methods), our AI Research publications in journals including The Lancet Psychiatry, and the growing body of research on Deliberate Practice in psychotherapy produced by Sentio faculty and leadership.
Sentio's faculty are at the forefront of developing new standards for how therapists, supervisors, and faculty are trained. The APA published "Essentials of Deliberate Practice" book series, written by Sentio faculty, is now the leading reference for applying Deliberate Practice across major therapeutic modalities, from CBT to Emotion Focused Therapy to Psychodynamic Psychotherapy and more. You can see the complete collection on our Books by Sentio page. Our advanced training offerings, including the DP Supervision Residency, Certification Courses, and DP Consultation Group, are helping shape how clinical educators teach and supervise around the world.
Students who enroll in Sentio's MFT program do not simply use these resources as outside learners. They become part of the community that creates them. They train under the faculty who developed these exercises, receive supervision from clinicians who have completed Sentio's own intensive training residencies, and participate in a program that is actively advancing how psychotherapy is taught and practiced. To learn more about what it is like to train at Sentio, visit our Week in the Life page. To explore whether the program is right for you, attend an open house, request information, or read about the mission and history behind Sentio on our About page.
Below are free DP exercise instructions and videos you and your trainees can use for ongoing skills training:
Additional DP training resources:
For a series focused on Multicultural Orientation training, click here.
For a series focused on therapist’s inner skills training, click here.
For demonstrations of DP training, check the Learn Psychotherapy Podcast and Practice Time.
Suicidal Woman
Client unsure therapy is helping
Anxious Woman
Abused Woman
Ambivalent man referred for drinking problem
Flirty Woman
For the next video, we recommend using these exercise instructions: Setting Appropriate Therapy Boundaries
Below are videos with teletherapy-related clinical challenges.
Deliberate Practice for Multicultural Orientation (MCO) Skills
Click here to visit our page with videos and DP exercises for Multicultural Orientation skills.
The MCO framework (Owen et al., 2011; Owen) explores how “the cultural worldviews, values, and beliefs of the client and the therapist interact and influence one another to co-create a relational experience that is in the spirit of healing” (Davis et al., 2018, p. 90).