Center-Approved PD

Block Play

This course applies to infants, toddlers, and preschoolers. Applicable to all childcare settings, this course will help you recognize the many skills that block play promotes and how to facilitate meaningful block play. This course covers the stages of block play, how block play encourages physical, social, and emotional development, how to set up an effective block play center, and ways to extend block play in meaningful ways.

The ABC’s of Developing a Family Handbook

Having the ability to share a Family Handbook offers prospective families a succinct way to clarify expectations for them, and from your program, and thereby avoid communication problems. It is also a place to document your policies , procedures and philosophy so that everyone is clear. This training will assist in creating a Handbook by offering suggestions regarding policies, forms and contents.

Circle Time with Dolls: Playful Opportunities for Attachment and Attunement

Are you looking for new ways to help your children form attachments and be more attuned in their relationships? AND, help to create a developmentally appropriate circle time that is not full of old school activities like calendar and weather? Then yes, you are in the right place. Participants will learn about the differences between attachment and attunement and how to help these important emotional connections come alive in the classroom by using dolls at circle time with specific engaging activities. Be prepared to play and bring a favorite doll with you!

Providence Talks: Classroom Coaching

Through ten weekly classroom coaching sessions and use of digital language pedometers, practitioners working with infant and toddlers will be provided real data about the language environment in their classrooms and explore strategies to increase overall word count and serve and return interactions necessary to optimize a child’s language development.

Please note: this PD is only open to educators working in family child care or group child care programs in Providence.

Building Bridges to Math and Science through Block Play

This workshop will help teachers explore the 6 stages of block play, while learning to incorporate various components of STEAM.  Teachers will also identify social-emotional strategies (such as problem-solving, negotiation skills, and communicating) to help young children plan and carry out activities that are linked to math and science outcomes.

Behavioral Specialist Training

Resolving Conflicts in the Classroom is a professional training workshop for Behavioral Specialists, Classroom Aides, Teacher Assistants and Classroom Teachers. From Pre-K to grade 12, creating positive learning environments by instilling a safe student classroom culture is a key skill. Positive student behaviors have high correlation to positive learning outcomes.

The Toxic Impact of Stress on a Child’s Brain and Body: What Can We Do in Our Daily Practice?

While stress is a normal (and actually, necessary) part of life, high levels of chronic stress factors can have extremely negative impacts on a child’s brain and body. This workshop will focus on the ways that stress impacts young children and offer strategies about how to combat this impact. Some of these strategies include creating and sustaining supportive relationships, a responsive environment, and mindfulness techniques.

Keep Your Teeth on Your Own Body (Tips for Toddlers and Biting and Beyond)

This training will explore the myriad reasons why a toddler may bite, and offer solutions for how to prevent and/or appropriately respond to biting, as well as offer practical ideas on ways to communicate with parents about biting.

How to Effectively Handle Children with No “Off” Button

Do you have a particularly challenging child in your class this year? One moment he’s playing in the Block Center with his friends, the next moment he is tearing everyone’s structures down. During Circle Time, he might be okay for two minutes, and then he is hitting, kicking, and doing anything else one can think of to annoy his peers. What’s a teacher to do??? Come to this workshop to learn and share some new strategies.

The Impact of Emotions in the Classroom — Emotional Intelligence De-Mystified

This workshop will focus on how a teacher’s emotions can have a significant impact on the overall classroom environment. Participants will gain an understanding of the five skills related to emotional intelligence as well as how they can create and sustain an emotionally safe classroom for their children.

Child Development 101 – What’s “Typical,” What’s Not? Regarding Social-Emotional Development

Social and emotional milestones are often more challenging to understand than stages of physical development. Research shows that social skills and emotional development (reflected in the ability to pay attention, make transitions from one activity to another, and cooperate with others) are a very important part of school readiness.

Building Strong Relationships with Families

Effective family engagement involves intentionally including families in the decisions, plans, and activities that promote their child’s learning. Strong communication skills are essential to this process. In this course, participants will learn communication skills that support the establishment of positive, responsive, and cooperative relationships with families. This course includes strategies for communicating with diverse families, skills for navigating difficult conversations, and practical approaches for managing ethical dilemmas. In addition, this course equips participants with communication tactics to encourage partnerships between school programs, families, and the community.

The Reflective Teacher: Examining Beliefs, Impacting Practice

Rediscover your passion for teaching! Spend some time thinking about your beliefs regarding teaching and learning and about whether you are “walking your talk.” The reflective strategies in this course provide an introduction to reflective practice as well as an opportunity to define one’s own philosophy of teaching. This course provides training suitable for individuals working within a learning environment designed for students from infancy to kindergarten.

Piramide’s Interactive Storytelling

The Piramide Approach is a scientifically-based method that amplifies young children’s learning when applied to any early childhood curriculum. Piramide’s Interactive Storytelling uses Piramide’s Four-Step Distancing Process with children’s literature to intentionally broaden and deepen children’s understanding of story concepts and ideas. Learners will become familiar with the Piramide Approach and will develop strategies for integrating Interactive Storytelling into classroom practice. Piramide’s Interactive Storytelling provides a brief overview of the Piramide Approach to Learning. This course helps teachers intentionally apply the Approach to the use of children’s literature. Interactive Storytelling is a strategy that will broaden and deepen children’s understanding of story concepts and ideas. In this course, participants use children’s literature to create developmentally appropriate strategies and facilitate children’s learning. This course provides training suitable for teachers working within the early childhood education field.

Piramide: The Power of Play

In this course, we will explore the role of play in child development, the developmental stages of social play, and the different types of play. Then, using the Piramide Approach, we will assess the richness of different types of play. Participants will know the types of play and how they progress from “nearness” (concrete, here and now) to “distance” (abstract and imaginary). They will be able to identify the preconditions that promote play and use a checklist to assess the types and richness of play behaviors in their classrooms. This course provides training suitable for teachers working with students from infancy through kindergarten.

Circle Time: It’s More than Calendar and Weather!

A “good” Circle Time can set the tone for an early learning program’s day, as it can set the stage for learning, offers the children opportunities for sharing and listening, and enables children to experience many content areas within a supportive group environment. When not done well, Circle Time can be an ineffective, inefficient time of the day because a teacher may have unrealistic expectations of the children.

Professionalism and Boundaries for Early Childhood Educators

Reflecting and understanding all that it means to be an early childhood professional is crucial to our work each and every day. This includes understanding how to maintain appropriate boundaries and roles with children, families, and coworkers. This workshop will explore both of these topics through discussion and specific scenarios.

Disciplining Children Positively by Preventing Challenging Behaviors

This training explores the four “P’s” of positive discipline: (1) a positive attitude about children and behaviors, (2) providing supports, (3) being proactive, and (4) preventing concerns before they occur. Participants learn specific strategies they can use to prevent and address challenging behaviors and make improvements in early childhood and school-age programs.

Say What You Mean and Mean What You Say: Intentional Language in the Classroom

It is important to consider what type of language is best suited to work with children in order to be the most effective. We will discuss the differences between assertive vs. passive or aggressive language, and will also learn to help children find their own voices, in appropriate ways.

Mindful Teachers/Mindful Children Part 2: The Art of Teaching Mindfulness to Young Children to Help with Social/Emotional Skills

This is a continuation of the first Mindfulness Workshop, where participants will be given the opportunity to further explore mindfulness for both themelves personally, as well as professionally in the classroom.
Mindfulness reconnects us to our five senses, bringing us into a moment-by-moment awareness of ourselves and our surroundings through breathing exercises, visualization activities, and learning how to focus on learning opportunities, such as Circle Time, Small Group Time/Learning Centers, and Large Group Time. Research shows that mindfulness helps adults and children be more attentive, less anxious, and better able to handle their emotions and self-regulation. As children build and strengthen these skills, they become capable of exhibiting empathy, compassion, patience and acquire better emotional and social skills.

Creating IPDPs with Your Staff: It Can be Fun!

Individualized Professional Development Plans (IPDPs) are written plans that are designed to help individuals develop and continue their professional growth. The process of developing and carrying these out plans can seem like a daunting task, not only for a busy child care center director but for the teachers as well. However, IPDPs are important because they guide professional growth and help teachers reflect on how that growth changes over time in meaningful ways. Attend this workshop and learn about the 4-step process of developing IPDPs that will actually help improve quality for children and make portions of your job easier!

No Bullies Here — Preventing Bullying Behavior in Early Childhood Settings

As early childhood teachers, we have the capability to teach children the appropriate social skills that will prevent bullying from occurring. This training will examine the four characteristics of bullying and will introduce some strategies to prevent bullying behaviors from further developing before they become a problem.

The Assessment Circle

Curriculum is like a road map = it helps you get where you want to go. Assessment is what fuels that journey. Attend this two-part series to learn how curriculum and assessment go hand in hand, how to implement assessment techniques as a process of documenting and evaluating growth and development, and how to effectively communicate with parents regarding assessment.

Teaching with Intention

Learn what it means to teach with intention. Teaching is not only familiarity with content, it is also the way teachers think about and approach the act of teaching itself. This session provides several ways to learn about and experience this thoughtful approach to teaching. This course provides training suitable for individuals working within a learning environment designed for students from infancy to kindergarten.

Understanding Child Abuse and Prevention

In this course, participants will learn how to identify the signs of abuse and neglect, describe how abuse and neglect impacts development, implement strategies to build resilience in children suffering from abuse and neglect, and identify the mandated responsibilities of reporting cases of abuse or neglect. Early childhood teachers have a unique opportunity to affect the life of a child suffering from abuse and neglect. Many children spend as many as 10 hours a day in early childhood programs, and children depend on their teachers to provide a safe, nurturing place to grow and learn. Unfortunately, some of those children come to child care with experiences of abuse and neglect. High-quality child care centers, with professionals who have action-oriented information, can make a difference for children that has long-lasting benefits. The principles discussed and the strategies described will help teachers understand the importance of their role and build resilience in young children suffering from abuse and neglect. This course provides training suitable for anyone related to or involved in the field of early childhood education.