Training Opportunities
Teachers and All Educational Staff
Reach me…teach me: Teacher-child relationship enhancement training
Target Group: Teachers and other educational staff
Time: 2 days. Can be customized to your staff development needs.
Class: New and continuing
Learn a “way of being” with the children in your care, which will strengthen the way you communicate and teach. We start with a foundation of the link between social and emotional competence and academic learning. Then we explore and experience specific techniques that are currently used in building emotionally responsive relationships and are applicable to the deepening of the student-teacher relationship within the classroom.
School readiness and children’s play: Oxymoron or compatible options?
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: New and continuing
Based on the work of Sharon Lynn Kagan and Amy E. Lowenstein, we will explore contemporary research findings on the debate which sometimes pits play advocates against play skeptics. We will explore the relationship between school readiness and play, citing research that demonstrates the role of play in achieving various dimensions of school readiness. Rich in discussion and lecture, this workshop will stimulate your thinking.
The possibilities of play
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
Together we will explore the value of play across several domains and through the eyes of different disciplines. We will look at the value of unstructured and structured play, the stages of play, and types of play. We will learn how many early childhood professionals are deeply concerned about the lack of creative play in children’s lives. This workshop will leave participants with a greater appreciation and understanding of the role of play in the healthy development of children.
Flexible yardsticks…Understanding typical child development
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: New or continuing
This workshop covers a broad range of developmental issues of interest to today’s Primary Project teams. Participants will briefly explore the major views of child development theories that have stood the test of time covering multicultural considerations, environment, temperament, and individual make-up of young children. We will cover the physical, social, language, cognitive, gross and fine motor, and social/emotional domains of kindergarten to third grade children. This workshop will remind us of the developmental uniqueness of children and the families we are working with and to reflect on our practices in schools that encourage rather than interfere with growth and learning.
Narrowing in on social and emotional child development
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: New or continuing
This workshop takes a more in-depth exploration of the social and emotional domain of child development, by briefly reviewing major theories and age-specific descriptions of how young school age children develop in this particular domain. We will explore attachment to caregivers, sense of body self, language and communication, which in turn effect emotional regulation, concentration and problem solving, empathy and pro-social behavior. Finally, we will bridge this information into children’s play and imaginations to help us better understand the play we witness in the playroom.
Temperament…it’s in the wiring
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: New or continuing
This workshop takes an in-depth look at the role temperament plays in our work with Primary Project children. By using the well-known work of Doctors Chess and Thomas as our framework, we will add this knowledge to our set of observation skills useful when working and observing the behavior of children. Additionally, we will explore our own selves and ways we interface with our world.
Friendships in children…the social side of life
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: Continuing
Children’s friendships are critical to positive school adjustment. This workshop explores the current findings on the importance of a child’s early friendships and how deficits in this area can cause significant distress, which may impact learning. We will look at how adults can help children to navigate the “social side” of childhood.
Helping children cope with change, loss and grief
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: Continuing
One thing is for certain, change is a fact of life. Children are living in ever-changing and unpredictable times. Family experiences, cultural traditions, individual personality differences and environmental/geographic circumstances all influence the way children perceive the world. When change, loss or grief enters a child’s world they each cope differently. Using information that is simple and practical and drawn from the stories of children who have been on the front lines of grief, we will explore what helps and what does not help.
Intentional language…understanding the power of our words
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
Explore the language of self-efficacy, where our words become powerful influences in building relationships with children, helping them to build a positive view of themselves. In this workshop, participants will learn why encouragement is better than praise and how to invite expression from young children.
Active and effective training
Target Group: Trainers
Time: 3 hours
Class: Continuing
This 3-hour workshop on “Training the Trainer” will explore effective strategies to provide maximum adult learning training environments. Training that is active leads to deeper learning. When training is active, the participants do most of the work! Active training is fast paced, fun, supportive and personally engaging. This workshop explores the skills of effective trainers, pre-planning strategies to ensure the training runs smoothly, as well as ways to actively engage your learning audience in fun and relevant activities that reach a variety of learning styles. Additionally, an eight-step model for training design will be introduced providing a framework for successful trainings from beginning to end.
Primary Project Supervisors and Child Associates
New project training
Target Group: All
Time: 2 days
Class: New teams
New Project training includes an overview of all components of Primary Project and what a site can expect throughout the course of the year. Segments of trainings include:
Primary Project overview, screening and selection of children who are most likely to benefit from Primary Project, barriers to learning, communicating with children through the play-based intervention, staff roles and responsibilities, and an introduction to Supervision.
Primary Project: General overview
Target Group: Administrators, teachers and mental health professionals
Time: 3 hours
Class: New
This presentation gives participants an overview of Primary Project. While it can be part of the general two-day New Project training, it is better as a stand-alone training and can be used as an introduction for new project sites or potential new sites. When offered at the beginning of a school year, participants will have an understanding of what to expect throughout the course of the year, including screening and selection, the intervention, and roles and responsibilities.
Building your Primary Project team
Target Group: Child associates, supervisors, teachers and administrators
Time: 3 hours
Class: New or continuing
Developing and maintaining a strong team is crucial the success of Primary Project. As we know, the initial implementation and sustainability of Project can be better facilitated by helping individuals to understand their role and the role of others, the core principles, and how each person is vital to enhancing the overall social and emotional growth of children through Primary Project. This workshop is designed to give a brief overview of Project, encourage discussion among team members and increase participants’ understanding of the role that they play in Project. Please remember that, if you select this training, it is important and expected that all individuals involved with Project at your school will attend.
Basics of play in Primary Project
Target Group: All
Time: 3 hours
Class: New
This basic workshop will focus on play: the medium through which the relationship between the child and the Child Associate is formed. Through expressive play, the child explores the world as he/she understands it. This workshop includes discussion about setting up the playroom and opportunities for participants to watch and practice expressive play interactions.
Deepening the play
Target Group: All
Time: 3 hours
Class: Continuing
This experiential workshop starts with a review of the important elements in expressive play. Then to deepen the participant’s understanding of “the power of play” in a non-judgmental atmosphere with clear limits, we will explore the basic helping skills and conditions. We will look at pacing, common missed opportunities, limit setting, and response reflections that help the child feel listened to and understood.
Talk the talk…writing expressive play goals in a standards-based environment
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: New and continuing
Schools are goal directed and very standards based. While Primary Project is a relationship based intervention, there are goals to move towards. This workshop will explore goal writing in an expressive play environment, concentrating on the important responses that child associates can engage in during the play sessions to promote growth.
Data and outcomes…making sense of it…making it count
Target Group: Team
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: Continuing
So what is the purpose of all this data we collect? What can we make of it and how can we use it to improve our programs? This workshop walks through the data report from the previous year and includes time to plan with your team areas to focus improvement on and how to share your success with others.
It’s all fun and games until…the art of setting limits in the playroom
Target Group: All
Time: 3 hours
Class: Continuing
Setting firm, clear and consistent limits is a key helping skill in the Primary Project intervention of play. This workshop is devoted to the art of setting limits with children. Learn why to set limits, when to set limits and how to set limits effectively. This workshop will encourage discussion about why limit setting can be challenging and what can be done to overcome these challenges.
Child associate talk story
Target Group: Child associates
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: New and continuing
This workshop allows sharing between Child Associates to gain increased understanding of the unique work we do with children. Ideas, best practices, struggles, tools we have discovered along the way, will be discussed and facilitated by the trainer. Come prepared to share, laugh and learn.
Communication in Primary Project
Target Group: Team
Time: 3 hours
Class: New and continuing
Communication in Primary Project isn’t just between the child and the Child Associate!
This workshop looks at the multi-level communication issues of implementation and maintenance of a successful program. We will look at our own styles of communication, how we communicate to teachers, parents, administrators, school boards and funding sources. Emphasis will be placed on preventing communication glitches by actively preparing and predicting barriers, with an ongoing focus on the importance of relationships, and public relations.
Saying goodbye to “our time together”
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: New or continuing
We work so hard to build a relationship with the children in Primary Project, that ending the special playtime can be difficult. This workshop will explore the importance of healthy goodbyes in short-term prevention programs, and share ways to smooth transitions/endings for both the child and the child associate.
The shy/quiet child
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
The shy/quiet child presents a special challenge for most Child Associates. Participants in this workshop will discover the need for patience to truly practice a “child-led” play approach when little or no verbal communication is exchanged. Particular attention to pacing, silence, and non-verbal communication will be addressed. We will discuss strategies for building upon our own patience, and dialogue about when and why we should or should not hurry the process along.
Children with attentional needs
Target Group: All
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
The ability to stay focused and on task is a primary skill for learning. This workshop explores the concept that attention falls along a continuum and that Primary Project children will have attentional needs that fall somewhere on that continuum. We will briefly acquaint ourselves with criteria necessary for “Attention Deficit Disorder” and other childhood disorders that often look like attentional disorders. Participants will also hear about positive interventions and the hopeful role that adults at school can play in helping children with attentional needs.
Attempting to understand the range of children’s aggressive play in the playroom
Target Group: Child associates
Time: 2 hours
Class: New or continuing
Children have always had a fascination with aggressive play. This general workshop will explore why this is so, and investigate factors that contribute to children’s aggressive play. Child associates will have ample opportunities to learn about the general parameters of normal play versus play that signals possible “red flags.” The importance of a team approach and utilizing supervision will also be emphasized.
Play pairs
Target Group: Child associates
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
After a child in Primary Project has received a full cycle of individual time with a child associate and if the team feels group play would be beneficial, then the child-led intervention can be extended into play pair experiences. Learn similarities and differences in individual sessions and pair play.
Expanding parent involvement
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: Continuing
As Primary Project sites mature, the desire to share information and skills with parents often becomes a focus. This workshop starts with revisiting how critically important parents are to a child’s successful school adjustment. From this foundation, we then explore strategies/ideas of other Primary Project sites across the country that have successfully expanded beyond parent permission. Time for individual school teams will be offered, so a customized “next step” action plan can be developed that will be reflective of the unique strengths and barriers of each school community.
Certification: From vision to reality
Target Group: Staff of programs completing second year
Time: 2 hours
Class: Continuing
Participants in this training will have an opportunity to learn both the process for becoming certified and the advantages of being a certified site. Participants will have answers to commonly asked questions such as: Do I need to be certified? How long does the process take? Who is involved? Learn the information for yourself and determine whether your site is ready to join the others who have taken a vision into a reality.
Fidelity in Primary Project
Target Group: All
Time: 1.5 hours
Class: Continuing
As widespread implementation of any effective program becomes reality, careful attention must be given to the degree to which the program is delivered as intended, for true effectiveness to occur. This workshop explores the research regarding implementing programs with “fidelity,” helping participants understand the importance of “staying on track” with Primary Project.
Marketing play in Primary Project
Target Group: All
Time: 3 hours
Class: Continuing
Together we will explore key issues in marketing and educating others about the importance of our work with child-led play. You will leave this fun and interactive workshop with an “elevator” speech to share with others…whether you are going to the third floor only or the top of the Sears Tower in Chicago!
Supervising Primary Project: Fostering our knowledge of paraprofessional development and relevant approaches to supervision
Target Group: Supervisors
Time: 3 hours
Class: New and continuing
A brief overview of Primary Project and supervision will be provided in order to contextualize our supervision activities. Further, we will review historic and current approaches to clinical supervision as they apply to our work with Child Associates. Moreover, participants will engage in role plays and group discussion in order to deepen our understanding of supervision, facilitate the growth of our supervisees and increase our own efficacy in the supervision setting.
Supervision I
Target Group: Supervisors
Time: One day
Class: New and continuing
This workshop is a “sampling” of the skills needed to be an effective supervisor of Child Associates. Through activities, participants will learn “Best Practices” as well as identify potential impediments to providing supervision in a school setting. We will learn to shift our current counseling skills to the necessary skills of providing effective supervision.
Supervision academy
Target Group: Supervisors
Time: 2 days
Class: New and continuing
If you want your supervisors to have more than a “sampling,” then this in-depth workshop incorporates many of the aspects covered in our other supervision workshops. Participants will explore one particular model of supervision, helping to frame the participants’ understanding of role and interventions. We will learn to give “growth producing” feedback to child associates, as well as peer sharing through experiential and creative activities. Common supervision topics in Primary Project will be explored, with ample opportunities to practice our skills throughout the workshop.
Primary Project Preschool Sites
Preschool group play
Target Group: All implementing preschool Primary Project model
Time: 3 hours
Class: New and continuing
This workshop focuses on the small group play phase of the Preschool model. We will compare and contrast group play versus individual sessions. Additionally, skill development in social problem solving and limit setting for this unique age group will be offered by ample opportunities to practice our skills.
For More Information and Costs Contact:
Your state Primary Project consultant or djohnson [at] childrensinstitute [dot] net (Deborah Johnson) at (585) 295-1000, ext. 224.