The Human Brain:  Setting the Stage, with Eva Dwight, M.Ed, and Dr. Michael Gurian. Body, mind, and soul are not three isolated systems.  Intricately woven together, they give us the human experience.  In our culture now, our children’s bodies, minds, and souls are experiencing significant stress.  This opening session of the conference will link our weekend of training to the deep issues of our time in schools and neighborhoods, and provide a primer on the amazing human brain–both its natural resilience and its potential fragility.

Boys and Girls Learn Differently – Two-Part Strategies Session, with Eva Dwight, M.Ed., Gurian Institute Program Director.  This two-part session will give participants a tool box full of practical strategies that can be adapted for use in any classroom to increase teacher effectiveness and make sure the needs of both boys and girls are being met. The workshops will model the strategies for both online and in-person classroom delivery.  This two-part session is a requirement for applicants for Gurian Institute Trainer Certification and includes specific innovations for coeducational classrooms and for single sex classrooms and academies.

Self-Care for Teachers and Parents During Crisis and Trauma, including Strategies to Use with Children, with Eva Dwight, M.Ed.  Brain science can give us profound and practical insight into how to help ourselves as adults with self-care, which is absolutely essential during times of crisis and  trauma.  The same science holds powerful clues and provides best practices for setting kids up for success in both learning and social-emotional development during times of crisis.  In this workshop, Gurian Master Trainer and Program Director Eva Dwight brings more than three decades of school- and parent-coaching experience to a solution-oriented hour of best practices.

The Digital Girl:  What Teachers and Parents Need to Know about Tech Use in Girls’ Development, with Eva Dwight, M.Ed. This workshop will focus on how to help schools, teachers, tweens, and teen girls use tech most effectively and safely.  Overuse of social media and tech is a national problem, yet, tech is here to stay, especially in the Covid era.  Limiting screen time–which is necessary and important–is not the whole story.  Especially with the stress our girls are under constantly today, this workshop focuses on tech use as a positive and negative stressor.  Eva Dwight provides tools, strategies, and real-time conversations to have with girls as parents and teachers help them navigate their digital world.

Engaging, Motivating, and Managing Boys and Girls in the Standards-Driven Classroom, Dr. Lakeva S. Barnes, Gurian Master Trainer and Gifted Differentiation Coach at Sycamore Elementary School in Collierville, TN. With the multitude of demands placed on teachers to manage large class sizes, plan standard-aligned instruction, and improve student growth-measures, many teachers are burning out–they are just finding it too difficult to balance their work load. This session will address best practices for how to engage, motivate, and manage boys and girls through novelty, a token economy, and August to May routines.  These practices and this session help teachers reduce inappropriate classroom behaviors and maximize instructional time while improving student achievement.  Dr. Barnes will share her real-world situations and solutions that have impacted students’ motivation and the teacher’s, including her own, ability to manage some of the worst student behaviors.

Communicating with Parents of Boys about their Behavior, Discipline, & Achievement, Dr. Lakeva S. Barnes.  Communicating with parents about boys’ behavior, discipline, and achievement can be difficult for educators and parents. Parents can get defensive when called to meet with school officials because many times it is not their first experience with hearing about issues their child(ren) may be having in school. Sometimes educators are anxious about the thought of communicating their concerns about male students because of past experiences with challenging parents. This session will provide educators with tools for conducting positive and effective parent-teacher conferences and meetings regarding the behavior, discipline, and achievement of male students. Dr. Barnes will share real experiences and methods used to conduct positive and effective meetings with difficult parents.

Why Did You Do That? I…Uh…Don’t Know! with Joseph Moody, M.A., Assistant Head of Middle School for Student Life at the Lovett School, Atlanta, GA.  Students must deal with discipline, student communities, peer groups, and personal relationships with teachers, while simultaneously coping with the physical and emotional changes they experience during puberty and adolescence.  Their lives are in turmoil, and they need our help understanding who they are and what they are doing.  In this workshop, Joseph will outline evidence-based strategies that improve the student-teacher-administrative relationship from a brain-based perspective.  He will further explore factors that impact behavior, and ways to both set measurable goals for students and help them become leaders in school culture, even through distress.  Joseph will also provide strategies you can use to increase your visibility in the twin roles of advocate and disciplinarian.

Best Practices for Working with Learning-Different Students, with Josh Nordean, M.S., Clinical Director, and Shirleen Lombard, Educational Director, The Forge School for Boys, and Gurian Certified Trainers.   The Forge School for Boys is a therapeutic boarding school and Gurian Institute Model School that specializes in working with learning different boys and boys who present with behavioral issues.  The Forge School works with boys on the ASD spectrum, boys with ADD/ADHD, boys with sensory integration difficulties, boys with developmental trauma, and boys diagnosed as behavioral challenges in mainstream schools.  Josh, Shirleen, and the Forge school utilize a holistic model that they will share in this workshop, one that is brain-based and uses boy-focused strategies.  Be prepared to explore exciting ways to get challenging and “difficult” boys in sync with the mission and values of your classroom and community.