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Co-sponsored by Greater Phoenix Urban League, Head Start of Phoenix, and Booker T. Washington Schools.

 

To register, scroll down to the button.
To register groups of five or more, email gail@gurianinstitute.com.

Thank you for joining our Summer Training Institute 2022! All Presenters focused on the healthy social-emotional growth of our students and children in a “post-Covid ” world, in which we continue to deal with emotional, academic, digital, behavioral, and mental health issues from the pandemic.

KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

Michael's new headshot

We are living already in our future–one of intense digital and tech use among our children, especially necessitated by pandemic response but ongoing as we come out of the pandemic.  Our future definitions of sex and gender are also being negotiated now, in social media, academe, and our schools.  The future has found us.

In this dynamic keynote presentation, Dr. Gurian will explore how the minds of boys and girls learn and grow, including brain differences that impact K – 12 education, early childhood, and social emotional development throughout the lifespan.  He will provide insight into best teaching, parenting, counseling, and mentoring practices for both girls and boys and reveal safe, effective electronics and technology standards for various stages of child development in a “heightened digital use” Post-Covid world.  

Michael’s presentation will include PET, SPECT, and MRI scans that display sexual dimorphism (male/female brain differences) as he focuses on educating, raising, and counseling boys, and educating, raising, and counseling girls, as well as all children throughout the sex and gender spectrum.  The sciences of sex and gender are race and gender inclusive already, if we know how to look at them and utilize them.

Michael will lead two working lunch discussions, as well.  The books that underlie these discussions are Saving Our Sons and The Stone Boys for Saturday and The Minds of Girls for Sunday.  We hope you will read these books ahead of time.  In these working lunches, we will study and strategize regarding violence/suicide prevention, and mental and emotional health in our schools, families, and communities.

Dr. Gurian’s Second keynote focuses on children’s resilience-building in school, at home, and in our communities.  Michael will help us look at our role in resilience-building and provide strategies for developing trauma-informed, poverty-sensitive classrooms and environments.   Participants will learn how to build strong relationships and attachments with traumatized boys and girls, as well as those raised in poverty, and how to provide resilience-building for all children.

Michael will also tell a bit of his own story, both of trauma and resilience-development.  A product of early childhood trauma, he scores a 7 out of 10 on the Adverse Childhood Experiences, ACE survey.  The publication of his newest book, The Stone Boys, made public some of his own childhood trauma.  We hope you will read The Stone Boys ahead of time for a deep dive into boys’ potential trauma-responses in particular.  Resilience-building is a crucial part of child success and this keynote explores it with brain science as a focus.

With sponsorship from the Greater Phoenix Urban League, we are proud to once again provide an Early Childhood Track this year that runs concurrent with our K – 12 track.  All our keynotes will cover children from birth – college age, then the two separate tracks will focus on their distinct age groups.

We have group registration discounts available for 5 or more or 20 or more.   For more information on the group options or with any questions, please email us at info@gurianinstitute.com.

 

A former coach and youth mentor, Marion Hill is Program Director for Head Start and a Gurian Certified Trainer with the Greater Phoenix Urban League.  Dynamic, visionary, and deeply committed to social change, Marion founded M.A.N.C.A.V.E. (Men All Need to be Caring Actively-Engaged, and Encouraged), a fatherhood program designed to encourage fathers/male role models to be actively engaged in their child’s growth and development.

In his morning keynote, Marion Hill will present some of his own powerful, developmental story as an African-American boy growing up in a military family around the world.  He will also use anecdotes from his two decades of work in child development and father-engagement to bolster audience understanding of the crucial role fathers play in children’s lives.

As he tells his own powerful story, Marion will bring to life evidence-based success strategies M.A.N.C.A.V.E. is using as it works to help children and schools in under-resourced neighborhoods and classrooms.  Because of his work in Hispanic/Latino communities in Arizona, Marion will also provide culture-specific success strategies for engaging Black and Hispanic/Latino fathers and male role models in their children’s education and social-emotional development.

To learn more about Marion, please visit Marion’s Gurian Institute Trainer page.

Dr Glynetta Fletcher

For two decades, Dr. Fletcher (“Fletch”) has been teaching in Los Angeles urban schools where she is now a Director for Racial Equity Programs.  In her keynote, she will focus on the learning and life-needs of children of color especially, providing frameworks by which communities and schools can build culturally and racially sensitive classrooms and environments.

Emboldened by her work with GI in the Greater Phoenix Urban League’s Head Start Pilots in Phoenix, Arizona, Fletch will integrate early childhood strategies with K – 12 strategies.  Overall in her professional work, Fletch is masterful at supporting students with building resiliency.  A testimony to the power of relationships, neuroplasticity and resiliency, Fletch will share part of her own personal story in her inspiring and powerful keynote.  

To learn more about Dr. Fletcher, please visit Dr. Fletcher’s Gurian Institute Trainer page.

Daryl Howard
Bonus Keynote
Many of our boys, especially those of color, are falling behind academically and socially.  With training and commitment, dedicated educators can make a difference by utilizing instructional strategies and methods that fit the developmental and learning needs of these youngsters.  Come prepared to learn strategies and discuss how to best meet this challenge in your classroom and your school.  Because Dr. Howard has worked with a widely diverse group of boys from all races and socio-economic origins, he has both culturally sensitive and universally applicable wisdom on masculine and male development.  This workshop will include anecdotes, stories, and action plans you can use right away, including results from the BOND program Dr. Howard co-founded, which helps bring more teachers of color, especially men of color, into schools.  Dr. Howard will also share both the genesis of Maryland’s Excellence and Equity for Black Boys Initiative and successes the Pilot schools are having after one year of focusing on this work.  The Gurian Institute is honored to have trained cadres and trainers in the Pilot Schools.

What Participants Have Said About Summer Training Institutes

“Every year I come back. This is the best conference anywhere for understanding the brains of males and females, and how that understanding can positively change classrooms and communities.”
``Michael's section on the science was huge in my effort to make sure as principal that our school is an inclusive community for LGBTQ+ students without leaving girls, boys, and their parents out of the positive school experience.``
“This is some of the most practical training I can find anywhere. To me it operates at three levels--the science itself, including the brain scans; the practical strategies for pre-k through 12 schools; and very important to me, the resonance with common sense.”
``The applications of this work in early childhood are stunning. I was especially moved by what is happening with our boys in preschool. No one is at fault, but we must face a systemic issue.``
``The Gurian approach to STEM is unique in that it does not apologize for being brain-based. As a math teacher, it was just what I needed--the practical strategies grow from understanding the human brain.``
``This training is for everyone--administrators, teachers, leaders, parents, and our kids themselves. Every keynote and workshop is filled with practical strategies we can use tomorrow.``
``The hybrid/virtual option was essential for our districts. Via the virtual option, we were able to send between 5 and 10 staff from each of our 12 Pilot schools to the GI Training and we certified 18 GI trainers in our districts to continue the work back where we are.``
“I came as a parent first and mental health counselor second, but I ended up learning a lot in both categories. Gurian theory and strategies can change our counseling systems for the better.``
“This is some of the best professional development I've ever experienced, and I am one of those 'cynics' who has 'seen it all' in more than 30 years of teaching. All credit to Gurian and the GI team. They are at the leading edge in education.”

THE GURIAN SUMMER TRAINING INSTITUTE
VIRTUAL AND ONLINE

Ensuring Academic and Social-Emotional Success for All Children

To register, scroll down to the button.
To register groups of five or more, email gail@gurianinstitute.com.

Featured Speakers and Workshops

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 Master Trainer 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 as if in a classroom setting.  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.

The Digital Child:  Strategies for Protecting and Empowering Boys and Girls in the Digital World, with Eva Dwight, M.Ed. This workshop will focus on how to help schools, teachers, tweens, and teen girls and boys 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 post-Covid era.  Limiting screen time–which is necessary and important–is not the whole story.  Especially with the stress our children 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 boys and girls as parents and teachers help them navigate their digital world.

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Rites of Passage into Manhood:  Blending Science and Spirit to Build Good Men, with Tim Wright.  Fifteen years ago, Pastor Tim emailed Michael Gurian to help set up Rites of Passage programs for both boys and girls in his church, Community of Grace, in Peoria, AZ.  The two men built H.E.R.O.I.C. programs as ROP programs for secular communities as well. Tim is also host, with Michael, of the Wonder of Parenting podcast (www.wonderofparenting.com), which has more than one million downloads.  In his workshop, Tim will bring his blend of science and the sacred to explore masculinity and manhood with a special emphasis on what works for boys in rites of passage programs.  This workshop will include strategies, anecdotes, stories, and ideas you can use right away.

Marianne Lescher
Our Special Kids:  Best Practices for Working with Learning-Different and Anxious Students, with Marianne Lucas Lescher, Ph.D. Gurian Certified Trainer.   Marianne is principal of the innovative Kyrene Traditional Academy in Phoenix, AZ.  During and after Covid, the school has found itself, like most of our schools, a de facto learning and safe space for children who present significant issues including anxiety, depression, ASD, ADD/ADHD, sensory integration difficulties, and behavioral challenges.   Marianne will share insights and strategies from their experience that you can use as you deliver a brain-based approach to these issues in your schools and environments.   You CAN get your challenging, “difficult,” and anxious students in sync with the mission and values of your classroom and community.  

Early Childhood Track.  Bringing Families of Color into the Frame:  Parent, Family, and Community Engagement in Early Childhood Environments, with Phyllis Aro-Trejo, Caseworker Supervisor, and Lauren Paiva, Education Director, of Booker T. Washington Early Childhood Center, Gurian Certified Trainers.  As caseworker supervisor at Booker T. Washington School, Phyllis has worked to bring parents on board with a child’s early education for more than two decades.   Lauren Paiva directs many of these efforts at the school, which is becoming the newest Gurian Institute Model School.  In this workshop, Phyllis and Lauren will share practical strategies and anecdotes from their work in their community  – a how-to of what works and what does not work with busy and distracted parents, including parents whose native language is not English, and parents of color.

Dodie Blomberg

De-escalating Angry Boys:  Strategies for Handling Anger, Frustration, and Escalation, with Dodie Blomberg, ME.d, Gurian Certified Trainer.   Among teachers, parents, and community members, the anger of boys and men is often frightening; when anger escalates, even more so.  For thirty years, educator, Positive Discipline Lead Trainer, and Gurian Institute Trainer Dodie Blomberg has worked with children and adults to de-escalate and manage anger and frustration.  In this workshop she provides a toolkit of strategies and insights to help you manage classrooms, families, and other environments in which, as she puts it, “anger signals deep need in the child but also an issue for the learning community and family system.”

Dr Glynetta Fletcher

Helping Girls of Color Thrive in a Post-Covid World:  Drilling Deeper Down on Equity for Girls, Dr. Glynetta Fletcher, Racial Equity Coordinator, Los Angeles Unified School District and Gurian Master Trainer.  In her work in LA Unified, Dr. Fletcher (“Fletch”) has drilled down into successful ways to help girls of color thrive.  In her work as a GI consultant in the Head Start Pilots in Phoenix, Fletch has provided an essential cultural literacy component to school room and parental education.  This workshop is a powerful follow-up session to her keynote, in which Fletch will give participants a toolbox  of practical strategies that help ensure girls’ success in pre-K through 12 environments.

Ariana Lopez

Early Childhood Track Teaching a Love of Words:  Best Practices for Literacy Learning in Preschool Classrooms with Dr. Ariana Lopez, Gurian Certified Trainer.  As Education Director at the Greater Phoenix Urban League, Ariana leads educational innovations in early childhood literacy learning.  She has worked with diverse populations, including ESL learners, for more than two decades.  In the Greater Phoenix Urban League – Gurian Institute Pilots in Phoenix, Arizona, Ariana has made sure that literacy is a major classroom focus.  In this workshop, Ariana will share and model programs and strategies that have worked to augment and improve early literacy at the Cartwright Child Care Center, a Gurian Model School.  She will also discuss the differences in how boys and girls come to literacy and share strategies from coed and single gender classes.

Early Childhood Track.   Essential Early Childhood:  Boys and Girls Learn Differently Strategies for Our Youngest Children, with Dr. Ariana Lopez and Cynthia Reynolds, Gurian Certified Trainers.   This workshop grows from the Gurian Institute Pilot programs in the Head Start and the Greater Phoenix Urban League (GPUL) classrooms in the Cartwright School District, including at Cartwright Child Care Center, a Gurian Model School. Ariana is Education Coordinator and Cynthia is a Mentor Coach with GPUL.  Their session will feature more than a dozen strategies, including single sex groupings, that they have used successfully in early childhood environments for meeting the cognitive, social, and emotional needs of boys and girls.  The chosen strategies successfully integrate into Teaching Strategies Gold, Creative Curriculum for Preschool, and CLASS. 

Training Schedule


Welcome to our Summer 2022 Summer Training Institute!  All times listed here are Pacific Time.


Saturday, June 25

8:30 – 9:00 Setting the Stage, with Eva Dwight and Michael Gurian then a Brain Break

9:00 – 10:00 First Keynote, Michael Gurian, The Future Has Found Us: Protecting The Academic and Emotional Lives of Boys and Girls in Our Post-Covid World.

Break

10:15 – 11:30 Second Keynote, Michael Gurian, Trauma, Poverty, and Learning: Gender Specific and Trauma-Informed Strategies for Helping Children Learn and Grow.

11:30 – 12:30 “Lunch” – Questions answered by Michael Gurian on his keynotes and subjects related to raising, educating, and counseling boys, girls, and all children in a Post-Covid World.

12:30 – 1:45 First Afternoon Workshop, Concurrent Sessions

Boys and Girls Learn Differently:  Strategies Part I, with Eva Dwight.  For individuals becoming certified trainers, it is a required course.

Single Sex/Single Gender:  Teaching and Empowering Boys and Girls in Single Gender Classrooms and Cultures, with Dr. Ariana Lopez

Rites of Passage into Manhood:  Blending Science and Spirit to Build Good Men, with Tim Wright

Break

2:00 – 3:15 Second Afternoon Workshop, Concurrent Sessions

Our Special Kids:  Best Practices for Working with Learning-Different, Anxious, and Depressed Students, with Dr. Marianne Lucas Lescher.

Bringing Families of Color into the Frame:  Parent, Family, and Community Engagement in Early Childhood Environments, with Phyllis Aro-Trejo and Lauren Paiva

Boys and Girls Learn Differently: Strategies Part II, with Eva Dwight.  For individuals becoming certified trainers, it is a required course.

Break

3:30 – 4:00 Meeting with Michael Gurian, Eva Dwight, and people interested in becoming Gurian Certified Trainers.  Renewing Trainers are also welcome.

 


Sunday, June 26

8:45 – 10:00 Keynote, Marion Hill, The Paternal Nurturance Asset: How to Bring Fathers and Other Essential Men into Our Children’s Education.

Break

10:15 – 11:30 Second Morning Keynote, Glynetta Fletcher, The Equity Solution:  How to Build Culturally Responsive Classrooms and Communities

11:30 – 12:30 “Lunch” – Questions answered by Michael Gurian, Marion Hill, Dr. Fletcher, and Dr. Howard on the morning keynotes and subjects.

12:30 – 1:45 Afternoon Workshops, Concurrent Tracks

Essential Early Childhood:  Boys and Girls Learn Differently Strategies for Our Youngest Children, with Dr. Ariana Lopez and Cynthia Reynolds

The Power of Diversity:  Teaching and Mentoring Latino and Dual Language Learners, with Marlene Ordaz and Shandeen Gomez.

Helping Girls of Color Thrive in a Post-Covid World:  Drilling Deeper Down on Equity for Girls, with Dr. Glynetta Fletcher

Break

2:00 – 3:15 Afternoon Workshops, Concurrent

The Digital Child:  Strategies for Protecting and Empowering Boys and Girls in the Digital World, with Eva Dwight

Teaching a Love of Words:  Best Practices for Literacy Learning in Preschool Classrooms, with Dr. Ariana Lopez

De-escalating Angry Boys:  Strategies for Handling Anger, Frustration, and Escalation with Dodie Blomberg

End of Day 2. 

Logistics for the Recordings

You will be sent an email that includes a password protected website on which recordings of the presentations will be housed.  These recorded sessions and this website are only for use by paid registrants of the SI.

Please make sure we have your best email address (i.e. one that will not go to your spam folder!)

The sessions will be available through July 10, 2022.  Dr. Howard’s and Ms. Kowaliuk’s sessions will be prerecorded and available from June 25 – July 10.

All keynotes and workshops highlight gender-friendly theory and strategies applicable to both coeducational and single sex classrooms, schools, and academies.

Schedule is subject to change.

Monday Morning – June 27 – Certification of Trainers Session, 8:00 a.m. – 12:00 p.m., via Zoom, for those individuals becoming Gurian Certified Trainers with Eva Dwight.  To begin the process of becoming a Gurian Certified Trainer, please visit the Trainer page on www.gurianinstitute.com.

Please send any questions to info@gurianinstitute.com. 

Certificates of Participation

Upon request, participants who complete the two days of training (all sessions over the two weeks) are eligible for a Certificate of Participation for 20 hours via email; participants who also complete the certification training can receive 24 hours.  After you have completed watching the Training Institute please email Gail at gail@gurianinstitute.com to request your certificate.

Learning and Training Objectives

Describe how the field of gender neuroscience is altering what you know about the psychology and education of children in early childhood, K – 12,  and later adolescence.

Discuss specific needs and issues of boys and girls from birth to adulthood, including analysis of the gender spectrum, with focus on both academics and social-emotional development.

Assess how generally institutionalized educational, counseling, and parenting models do or do not fill the specific developmental needs of preschool through high school age girls and boys.

Identify new logic models and strategies for motivation, learning, and behavioral intervention beginning at birth and proceeding into emerging adulthood.

Summarize key stressors and social-emotional factors that differ between girls and boys beginning in early childhood.

Demonstrate new strategies for learning, counseling, and assessment, including strategies for working with highly sensitive girls and boys of all ages.

Implement new strategies and practical tools beyond the training institute, in your own curricular areas and environments.

 

Target Audience:  educators, administrators, counselors, social workers, early childhood specialists, coed and single sex educators, parents, mentors, coaches, government agency professionals, and policy makers working with children and young adults.

 

More Featured Workshops

Ariana Lopez

Single Sex/Single Gender:  Teaching and Empowering Boys and Girls in Single Gender Classrooms and Cultures, with Dr. Ariana Lopez, Education Coordinator at Greater Phoenix Urban League and Gurian Certified Trainer This workshop is designed for teachers, administrators, counselors, and all those interested in developing a deeper understanding of single gender environments.  The workshop features how Gurian’s work and strategies are integrated into single sex classrooms, how to set up the classrooms physically, student mentoring of boys and girls, and strategies for nurturing boys and girls through the sex-specific gender lens.  The Greater Phoenix Urban League has instituted single gender classrooms with success in four schools in the Phoenix area; Dr. Lopez will provide results and action plans from those schools.

Early Childhood Track.  The Power of Diversity:  Teaching and Mentoring Latino and Dual Language Learners, with Marlene Ordaz and Shandeen Gomez, Gurian Certified Trainers.  For over 40 years collectively, Marlene and Shandeen have worked in early childhood populations and built bridges into elementary and secondary education, focusing specifically on learning, literacy, and cultural climate strategies that work with Latino populations and dual language learners.  Marlene is Associate Director of the Greater Phoenix Urban League’s Head Start programs and Shandeen is Director of the Urban Strategies Early Head Start Program.  Their workshop explores barriers of language and culture on both the student and teacher and ways to address the needs of our Latino and dual language populations.  Participants will learn techniques and strategies for  engaging students in a culturally and linguistically diverse learning community.

Bonnie Kowaliuk

Bonus Workshop

The Arts of Mindfulness and Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness, with Educational Consultant and Gurian Institute Trainer, Bonnie Kowaliuk, M.B.A.  Mindfulness and Trauma Sensitive Mindfulness are important practices for brain health in both children and adults.  Bonnie has integrated mindfulness protocols into her coaching and counseling especially in the last year to help with processing of trauma, anxiety, depression, and other mental health challenges emerging or increasing since the pandemic.  In her decade of this work, she has noticed significant differences in preferences between boys and girls, and women and men.  Her workshop will provide her experience and best practices tailored for educators and parents.  She will help you model and integrate formal and informal mindfulness practices into your own lives, and the lives of boys and girls you serve.

To learn more about Bonnie, visit the Trainer page of www.gurianinstitute.com.

Download PDF flyers for easy sharing. One is for the conference in general. The other is specifically for potential Early Childhood Education participants. Thanks for spreading the word!

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GURIAN SUMMER TRAINING INSTITUTE 2022 - GURIAN INSTITUTE