This video course is divided into modules.

Module 1:  How Boys and Girls Learn Differently

This one hour module takes the student into the male and female brains over the lifespan and focusing on early childhood and elementary age.  You will delve into learning and play pattern differences between girls and boys by looking at PET, MRI, and SPECT scans that show how differently the male and female brains work.  This information is crucial for people working with young children who have noticed, intuitively, certain male/female differences in their students and even in themselves but were unable to fully activate systemic adjustments in their childcare environments.  As Michael Gurian shows brain scan results even from fetal brains (showing how male/female brain difference happen in utero), the three aspects of child development—nature, nurture, and culture—are revealed as operative on young children with nature finally understood much better.  Now, issues with girls or boys in ECE environments make sense and strategies for handling those issues emerge.

Module 2:  Behavior and Classroom Management Through a Gender Lens 

Combining nature, nurture, and culture in their developmental arc, boys and girls develop social emotional learning differently, including bonding and behaving via somewhat different “norms.”  Early childhood classrooms and environments lose approximately 4 boys for every 1 girl to suspension or expulsion.  This one hour and forty minute module focuses on why that might be, looking carefully at male/female difference from the behavioral and classroom management lens.  You will learn about play, bonding, and developmental patterns that impact daily interactions, and discover ways to turnaround boys’ higher failure rates in ECE.  For example, male physicality is re-framed in this module to be understood, managed, and utilized in positive ways.

Module 3:  Strategies for Teaching Our Youngest Boys and Girls

 This one hour and forty minute module goes even more deeply into practical strategies and environmental tactics that teachers, coaches, case workers, parents, and others can employ to best help girls in STEM and boys in behavioral areas; girls in areas of “drama” and “in-out groups” and boys in literacy and word learning; girls in their learning challenges and boys in theirs.  The strategies will be practical for all children and for the whole child but because they are presented through the sex and gender lens, they will also be acutely practical for working with boys and girls in their environments.

Some subtopics in these three modules include:

What Is Happening in the Brains of Boys and Girls?
Citizen Science as an Early Childhood Tool
Brain Scans of Gender Differences in the Developing Brain
Trauma and the Young Child’s Brain
Spatial and Movement-Based Teaching Strategies for Boys
Graphic and Visual Teaching Strategies for Boys
Male and Female Memory and Rumination
White Matter and Gray Matter Activity
Spatial Intelligence and Competitive Motivation
Aggression Nurturance and Empathy Nurturance
Boys, Self-Regulation, and Impulse-Control
Brains in the Rest State
Bi-Strategic Approaches, Risk, and Competition
Screen Time and the Prefrontal Cortex
Brain Breaks and Neurotoxins
Strategies that Use Movement
Bridge Brains, Trans brains, Gender Dysphoria, and LGBTQ from a Brain-Based Perspective
Movement and Mentoring
How Preschool Can Impact Girls and Women in STEM Fields
Math Strategies for Girls and Boys
Relational Aggression – Boundaries and Resilience
School Issues That Boys Especially Face
Helping Shy and Introverted Kids
Gross Boy Play
Tantrums and Anger
ADD/ADHD
Rumination Loops in Girls
How Women and Men Parent Differently
Strategies for Emotional Problem-Solving
Intervention and Non-Intervention
Teasing vs. Bullying
Strategies for Digital Health
Working with Sensitive Boys and Sensitive Girls
Perfectionism in Girls
Undermotivation in Boys
And Much More…

Module 4:  Post-Test.  We suggest you use this list of topics and/or the post-test as discussion points in your group.

Because this course comprises 6 hours of Professional Development, including discussion and post-test, it is perfect for PD days and/or weekly PD and Professional Learning Community meetings.  If you would like to use the course this way, please email gail@gurianinstitute.com to let us know the number of students.  You will be given a discount based on that number, then you will get access to all the files you need to run the PD.

Whether taken by an individual or by a group, funding for this course may come from any PD source, including school, local, state, or Title and other federal funds.

This Online Course and its Video and Written Content are Copyright © and Trademark® Protected, All Rights Reserved, Michael Gurian 2022, thus can only be used by the purchaser(s) of the course.

We are proud to be able to offer you 4.5 hours of video in 3 Video Modules and a Module 4, a .5 hour post-test on the research-based Gurian philosophy and science-based strategies for educating and parenting our youngest boys and girls most effectively.  Get ready to learn and apply practical applications that have been proven successful in schools, homes, and communities around the world!

If after your group takes the course, you would like Dr. Gurian to connect with you on Zoom, please let us know at info@gurianinstitute.com and we will work with you to facilitate that additional professional development.

If you would like to become a Gurian Certified Trainer, please go to our website, www.gurianinstitute.com/trainers to review the requirements and rewards of that designation.  To apply for certification, you can use that portal or write us at info@gurianinstitute.com.  This online course can be used as the pre-requisite for certification.

Upon completion of the course, including the post-test, GI can provide a 6 hour Certificate of Completion.  To request this Certificate, please write us after the course at info@gurianinstitute.com.

At any time, please reach out to our team at info@gurianinstitute.com.

Target Audience for This Course: early childhood educators, administrators, counselors, social workers, specialists, home visitors, coed and single sex educators, mentors, coaches, government agency professionals, faith leaders, and policy makers working with young children.

For an Online Course targeted to K – 12 educators, please see our The Minds of Boys and Girls – Educator Course on the www.gurianinstitute.com Products page.

For an Online Course targeted to parents, grandparents, and others working in family systems, please see our The Minds of Boys and Girls – An Online Course for Parents on our Products page.

Training Objectives

For Module One

Participants will be able to Describe how the field of gender neuroscience is altering what you know about the psychology and education of children in early childhood.

Participants will be able to 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.

Participants will be able to 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.

For Module Two

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

Participants will be able to Summarize key stressors and social-emotional factors that differ between girls and boys beginning in early childhood.

Participants will be able to Assess from a behavior perspective how institutionalized ECE models do or do not fill the specific developmental needs of preschool through high school age girls and boys.

For Module Three:

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

Participants will be able to Implement new strategies and practical tools beyond the training institute, in the student’s particular curricular areas and environments.

Participants will be able to Assess from a tactical perspective how institutionalized ECE models do or do not fill the specific developmental needs of preschool age girls and boys.

Module 4:  Post-Test.

We suggest using the post-test as discussion points in your group.

For All Modules:  The course expands your personal and collective understanding of the diverse needs of boys, girls, children of color, and children who might be presenting on the gender spectrum.

Pay via credit card to Pay Pal here. Upon payment, you will receive a password that gives you access to the the video coursework in each unit. 

This course and all its units are sold on the understanding that each person taking the course will pay even if you and they share a computer or projector. On this basis, we have kept the price of the course low. If you are sharing a computer/projector with a group of others, please show them how to pay for the course.  

Thank you for taking this course and spreading the word.  We look forward to serving you and your community.

–Michael Gurian and the Gurian Institute Team, www.gurianinstitute.com.

Contact the Gurian Institute at info@gurianinstitute.com for information on how a professional development plan can be designed to meet the needs of your organization and the families you serve.