Guiding Children's Behaviour in general, or with a specific focus on topics such as:
• ADHD
• children with additional needs (disability or giftedness)
• chronic aggression or other social skills difficulties
Take a look at a sample abstract - Guiding Children's Behaviour or Fine Tuning a Guidance Approach
Social & Emotional Needs of children in general, or specifically on topics such as:
• self-esteem
• the impact of giftedness on children’s social and emotional development
• child abuse and protection
• grief in children
• bullying
• stress
• social skills
Take a look at a sample abstract - Meeting Children’s Emotional and Social Needs
Developmental Needs of children, in general or:
• identifying and responding to giftedness
• recognising disabilities
• programming for children with additional needs
Take a look at a sample abstract -
Young Children with Additional Needs or Gifted Children or Guiding Children with ADHD
Collaborating with Parents in general, or:
• with parents of children with disabilities
• with parents of gifted children
Take a look at a sample abstract - Collaborating with Parents
Developing Policy on issues such as:
• guiding children’s behaviour
• catering for gifted children
• catering for children with disabilities
Guiding Children’s Behaviour
In this seminar, Louise suggests how adults can prevent most behavioural disruptions and can respond to them in ways that do not provoke further outbursts. This will involve avoiding the use of rewards and punishments, as these tend to excite resistance and rebellion in children.
The recommendations given have been included in the books, Children are people too and Young children’s behaviour. The main rationale for the suggestions comes from Louise’s doctoral research into behaviour management with young children, which found that many of children’s disruptions arose in reaction to how previous difficulties had been responded to. Children who had experienced being told off or who had been sent, for example, to time out, would subsequently try to escape or would lash out angrily when adults attempted to correct disruptive behaviour. This reaction, clearly, was unsafe – and made the problem much harder to handle than the original disruption had been.
Therefore, the seminar will offer alternatives that teach children how to act thoughtfully, rather than manipulate them through rewards and punishments to do as they are told.
The half-day seminar typically comprises two sections: principles of a guidance approach, followed by practical alternatives to rewards and punishments. The full-day version includes these two sections then follows with strategies for solving chronic behavioural difficulties.
Fine-tuning a Guidance Approach
This seminar is intended for participants who have previously attended a presentation by Louise Porter on Guiding young children’s behaviour, or who have read either of Children are people too or Young children’s behaviour.
Participants raise issues that they have encountered in the implementation of a guidance approach in their service. The aim is to resolve these and empower workers to continue to tailor the approach to their particular context and needs. The content of the session is thus largely driven by the questions and other feedback initiated by participants.
Meeting Children’s Emotional and Social Needs
This seminar introduces a hierarchical model which categorises children’s needs in four levels:
• Level I: survival;
• Level II: security and wellbeing;
• Level III: self-esteem, belonging, and autonomy;
• Level IV: self-fulfilment and fun.
Professionals have most influence over the second and third levels; if earlier needs are satisfied, the highest-level needs will flourish naturally. The session examines how parents or professionals can enhance children’s self-esteem, facilitate social engagement and friendships with peers, and provide opportunities for children to exercise autonomy.
Some agencies have asked that this session be linked to behavioural issues, when its title is The implications of children’s social and emotional needs for behaviour management. In that case, these emotional needs form the rationale for a guidance approach to discipline, as described in the separate seminar described above.
Young Children with Additional Needs
This seminar aims to assist professionals to identify when children’s development departs significantly from the norm. Timely awareness of learning difficulties or giftedness in children can allow educators to intervene before entrenched patterns (of movement or behaviour, for example) increase the complexity of intervention.
Having looked at signs of atypical development across various domains, this session outlines how to individualise programs to cater for young children’s additional needs. Sometimes, referral to specialists will also be necessary so that they can guide educators on suitable programming adjustments, so the session examines which specialists are most relevant to a range of learning difficulties.
Working with young children also involves joint planning with their parents, particularly when the children’s needs are atypical. Some ways to engage collaboratively with parents are raised.
Gifted Children
In the understandable emphasis on the needs of children with developmental difficulties, the needs of gifted children can unintentionally be overlooked. Yet the early childhood years are a time of particular challenge for these children as they have less access than their older counterparts to intellectual peers. Without peers, the children can appear to lack social skills, they can experience extreme loneliness and perhaps learn to think of themselves as isolates or as unpopular.
At the same time, their parents are learning – perhaps for the first time – about the needs of a child with advanced development, and are searching for guidance. Some realise that they themselves are gifted and anticipate with some sadness the same problems for their child that they themselves experienced. With awareness from parents and the education system, these difficulties need not be repeated in the next generation.
Depending on participants’ needs, this session can examine what is meant by the term gifted, how it is recognised, what it implies for children’s educational, emotional and social needs, and how to support parents. It can focus on the early childhood years, or across the age range.
Guiding Children with ADHD
Depending on the professional development that participants have already received on this topic, this seminar can define both types of attention deficit (ADD and ADHD), known causes, progression through the schooling years, and adult outcomes. Various treatments are discussed in light of the controversies surrounding these conditions. Research on dietary management, the use of medication, educational interventions and the latest behaviour management techniques are outlined, and their implications for practice are described.
Collaborating with Parents
Parents employ professionals to supplement the care and education that they already offer their children. Parents are the ones with intimate knowledge of their child and who best know their aspirations for their son or daughter. Therefore, they are the ones who must direct the services that their child receives.
At the same time, professionals have expertise that can complement the skills of parents. By collaborating in the interests of the child, then, both professionals and families will be empowered to meet children’s needs. This seminar discusses the key services that parents might require from professionals, and will examine how both parties can communicate effectively and solve problems jointly.
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