Professional Development Search

In this webinar, we’ll answer the questions how do we get youth engaged and what are the best practices for youth leadership in out-of-school time? You’ll walk away with the tools needed to implement successful youth leadership strategies in your program.

In this final webinar in KIT’s Youth Leadership series, we will explore both the theory and practice of empowering youth leaders. Ensuring youth leaders feel and are empowered is a key element of implementing successful youth leadership strategies. Youth who are empowered in their role as leaders can fully benefit from participation in your program.

Keeping youth engaged in out-of-school time programs can be a challenge! Research shows that youth leadership can be a key component in engagement and retention. But what is youth leadership? What does it look like and what are the benefits to your program and your participants? Join us for the first webinar in KIT’s Youth Leadership series to answer these questions and get started planning for youth leadership opportunities in your program.

In 2019, the top trend KIT staff identified in youth programs is social-emotional support. This isn't surprising knowing that 12.5% of teens experience a major depressive episode in one year. This webinar will explore this trend and offer strategies to support the social-emotional needs of the youth in your program.

Fifteen percent of children experience hearing loss and up to 50% of children experience vision loss that can impact learning. Join us for an introduction to visual and auditory disabilities, and learn strategies to support children and youth who experience these disabilities.

Out of school time programs can help youth successfully navigate their adolescent years and develop the skills they will need to become our future leaders. In order to design and create successful youth programs, staff need to enhance their knowledge of adolescent development and intentionally create opportunities and supports for all participants to develop the skills necessary to transition into adulthood.

This webinar will introduce participants to a different perspective regarding autism. We will explore the connections between motor challenges and social-emotional development. Additionally, we will review emerging views that consider the symptoms of sensory and movement differences and how support for children and youth with autism may shift with this view.

As tweens and teens go through dramatic growth transformations, it’s typical for them to change from being happy to sad or from feeling smart to feeling stupid. The tweens and teens stage of life is filled with worry about personal traits that others hardly notice and seem overly dramatic. Our first step is to identify and define the difference between a tween and a teen. The webinar will provide identified social-emotional barriers that staff may face when working with tweens and teens.

This webinar will help providers/caregivers recognize and be able to support those hard to understand children many of whom have immature sensory processing. Specific activities and strategies will be shared that can be used effectively with ALL children while specifically meeting the needs of children with sensory processing challenges.

Engaging school age youth in program activities can be challenging. If a child has a disability, providers must be sure the child has the skills and tools to meaningfully participate in the activity. This eLearning course will walk you through the steps of planning successful activities and how to make accommodations to meet the needs of all children.

We all want to create welcoming environments where disabilities are viewed as a natural part of life. When your program says that it is “for all,” what does that mean and what does it look like? To create welcoming programs, we first need to assess what respect for disabilities looks like. We can then explore ways that we can teach children and youth in our programs to respect disability as a form of diversity.

Do youth seem disconnected, disinterested, or discouraged? Are you searching for meaningful and engaging ways to support them? This webinar explains how to use the pyramid model to develop realistic and individualized supports for youth in school-age programs.

Does the thought of developing a support plan feel intimidating? This webinar will empower you to take the reins to create and implement SMART support plans to meet children’s individual needs in your school-age program.

IEP, what is that and how can it help you support children in your program? This webinar will explain how an Individualized Education Plan provides important information you can use to help children thrive in your school age program.

Redirection can be an effective strategy for preventing challenging behavior, but it must be used at the right time. Learning a child’s signs and signals is key to stopping a challenging behavior before it begins. Join us to learn how to recognize those signs and signals, as well as the different types of redirection that can be used in your program.

It’s not easy being three. While “terrible twos,” is a familiar term, many parents have a more difficult time with their children at three than at two. In fact, most children people call KIT for help with are three-year-olds. You may be feeling the same way, especially those of you in a mixed-age preschool class. In this webinar, we’ll discuss why it’s hard to be three years old and how you can support three-year-olds' unique developmental needs.

Does it ever seem like parents just don’t get it? How can you better understand where they are coming from? How can you help families understand what you see in the program? This webinar will help providers understand varied family perspectives and responses and offer strategies to collaborate with families to build upon each other’s experiences, expertise, and resources to agree on how to include the child meaningfully.

Naptime can be one of the most challenging times of day in a Preschool classroom. Providers are juggling multiple responsibilities, covering breaks, and supervising the group, all the while meeting the individual needs of children. Multi-tasking, scheduling, and a consistent routine are essential for successful naptime transitions. Join us on a webinar that will outline strategies for multi-tasking, setting a routine, and meeting the individual needs of children; especially the ones that don’t nap!

Many preschool teachers have noticed a shift in the groups of children in their classrooms. Children with and without disabilities seem to have increasingly complex needs that are difficult to manage in a preschool environment. This webinar will cover how to structure your classroom and adjust your teaching style to address the multiple needs of multiple children in the same room.

Have you ever quietly (or loudly) expressed, “why can’t you sit still?” Or maybe you have been frustrated with children who struggle to attend to tasks, can’t wait for their turn, act before they think… the list goes on! These behaviors are all related to self-regulation. This webinar will help you understand the difference between emotional and behavioral self-regulation and strategies to teach children self-regulatory skills.

An individual’s teaching philosophy often shapes how they view fairness in a preschool classroom. Is fairness about everyone getting the same things, or providing individuals with what they need to succeed? How do we deal with the feelings that may arise when some get the help they need, while others don’t? Join us for a webinar that will explore these questions, differentiate equality and equity, and outline strategies to help educators decide when to encourage sameness, and when to promote opportunities for success.

"Advocacy" might seem like something for lawmakers in Washington, DC, but in fact, you are an advocate for children every day. Join us to find out more about your role as an advocate and to learn additional strategies you can use to support all children in your care.

Our world is filled with sight, sound, smell, taste and touch that our body must take in almost constantly. But what happens when a child or youth's body is unable to effectively read or respond to this information? This webinar will teach you some basics about sensory processing and how challenges with this important area of development impact behavior.

During this session you will learn about the connections between positive child development and nature-based learning. Join the journey as we discover and plan age-appropriate activities, spaces and centers that can be easily incorporated at your program.

The restorative power of nature has been well-documented for both children and adults. When we take learning outdoors, we open up opportunities for children and youth to explore and discover a wide range of skills that enhance everything from emotional well-being to cognition. Join us as we introduce you to the benefits and elements of nature-based learning.

Research shows that nature-based learning environments have positive impacts on children. They are happier, develop critical social skills, are more engaged and eager to learn. Join us as we explore the benefits, discover what to include, and beginning planning your nature-based environment.

Is it impossible to tear teens away from their devices? Have you found yourself no longer planning outdoor activities for your teen participants? Is your amazing garden area a bed of weeds? If you answered yes to any of these questions, join us as we explore innovative and fun ideas to motivate teens to want to be outdoors.

Is it impossible to tear teens away from their devices? Have you found yourself no longer planning outdoor activities for your teen participants? Is your amazing garden area a bed of weeds? If you answered yes to any of these questions, join us as we explore innovative and fun ideas to motivate teens to want to be outdoors.

Join KIT to get your middle school/teen disability inclusion and behavior support questions answered. During the live webinar, you can submit your questions directly to the KIT Trainer and get the answers in real time. You will also learn about our top resources for tween and teen programs.

Social Inclusion for youth with disabilities can be a daily challenge. Navigating the dating world is difficult for anyone who is bold enough to take it on. Combine dating with disabilities and youth can find themselves in a whirlwind of mixed emotions and difficult decisions about relationships. Successful relationships and healthy love lives have been and can be achieved by people with disabilities. Providing education and support can help reduce the challenges for youth navigating the dating world.

Middle schoolers and teens can experience at least 24 mood changes in a day, so it’s no wonder social-emotional learning is a trend in youth centers. In this webinar, you’ll learn ways to support social-emotional learning in your program. You’ll also explore how disability is a dimension of diversity and how to make your program truly inclusive for all.

This webinar will address difficulties staff experience when trying to balance individual and group needs. Strategies for supporting youth who struggle to positively engage in program activities and/or with peers and strategies to help youth manage their emotions in open spaces, such as the gym, will be introduced. Participants will also learn about the importance of implementing a structured plan for helping youth resolve conflict.

Managing a preschool group can be very challenging and rewarding at the same time. Understanding how positive interactions support a preschool group will help support the overall success of the children and staff. This webinar will offer preschool teachers an opportunity to examine their physical, sensory, and social-emotional environments and learn how managing the environment while building in individualized accommodations can enhance the experience of the entire group.

In this 30 minute webinar we will examine our own biases towards parents' perspectives and learn communication techniques that acknowledge the parent experience while objectively stating the concerns in the program.

Having effective communication skills is the key to achieving great teamwork. When you communicate well with your co-workers, it helps eliminate misunderstandings and can encourage a healthy and peaceful work environment. This webinar will focus on the different communication styles that individuals use. It will also provide tips that can be applied in the workplace for effective communication.

It’s just too messy! They’ll just eat the materials! Does that describe your thoughts when you think about art and sensory activities in your infant, pre-toddler or toddler classrooms? This webinar will help you understand how vital sensory exploration is for developing language, social-emotional skills, motor skills and for school readiness. We will offer ideas for tried and true sensory activities that your infants and toddlers will love!

Infants and toddlers use their whole body to discover and process the world around them, including climbing on chairs, shelves and tables. This webinar will help participants understand how and why infants and toddlers need to move and how to set up the environment to provide safe movement opportunities.

Do crying babies stress you out? Guess what, the babies are stressed too! Helping babies learn to soothe leads to improved pro-social behaviors as they grow. Caregivers can use soothing techniques to help build the foundation for positive social-emotional skills. This webinar will help caregivers understand how experiences and the environment impact infant brain development and how to use “serve and return” to meet infant’s needs for soothing.

These babies can talk! But a lot is happening with communication before they use words, and we can help them through the language learning process. This webinar outlines the underlying skills babies need to develop verbal and non-verbal communication and you will learn six simple strategies to help children develop their words.

Reflective practice in early childhood is a continuous process that helps providers develop an understanding of their own values, beliefs, and practices. Reflection encourages lifelong learning and skill development that helps early childhood providers support positive outcomes for the children in their care. This webinar will help infant-toddler teachers understand the importance of self-reflection to manage on-the-job stress and to improve skills for supporting children.

Recipes are sets of instructions that help people re-create things. Have you ever wondered what the recipe is for teaching babies (infants, pre-toddlers, and toddlers) social-emotional and behavioral skills? This webinar will outline three primary skill categories that dominate a baby’s growth and development through the age of two. You will learn strategies to support behavior and social-emotional development in your classroom!

Movement activities can be a powerful and fun way to enhance inclusive opportunities in your school age program. In this webinar you will learn new games as well as how to intentionally plan these games so children of all abilities can participate and be celebrated.

Families are a valuable resource when it comes to disability inclusion. Families are experts in their child’s strengths, needs, and knowing what does and doesn’t work. Collaborating with families requires youth development professionals to develop positive relationships with families and approach families respectfully when they have questions or concerns.

Out-of-school-time programs provide the ideal opportunity for youth with disabilities to connect with their non-disabled peers and experience a sense of belonging they don’t always get. To make this a successful experience, sometimes youth with disabilities need accommodations. In this section of the course, we will share easy-to-use tips and tools that represent the best practices in disability inclusion.

Responding to concerning behavior can be one of the toughest parts of your job. Responding in the moment is just one piece of the puzzle. Reflecting on your views about behavior helps you to decide if your expectations align with youth development and if you recognize the underlying factors that impact youth behavior. In this section of the course, you will engage in a scenario to better understand your views about behavior and see supportive responses in action.

Imagine walking into your favorite place. Hopefully, that place brings you a sense of comfort and belonging. A critical part of successful disability inclusion is making your program have that same sense of comfort and belonging for all. A supportive environment includes your physical, sensory, and social-emotional environment. In this section of the course, you will watch a video about the impact your environment has on disability inclusion.

There are some basics about disability inclusion that every youth development professional should be familiar with: how the Americans with Disabilities Act, or ADA, applies to you and how to talk respectfully about disability. These videos will give you an overview of the ADA and give you tips about using socially responsible language. Check out the additional resources for more videos and articles.

Children and youth have a lot of demands placed on them in a group setting: follow the routine, respond to social cues, and listen to and communicate with others. Often, children do not have the coping skills they need to handle the stresses they encounter. This webinar will highlight ways to teach children coping skills through modeling and activities for all ages.

This webinar is focused on what it is like for our guest presenter, Stephen Hinkle, to grow up with autism. He'll explain the various academic and social challenges he faced and had to overcome throughout childhood to this day.

Transitions can make or break a routine. Moving a group of children from one activity to another smoothly is an art. Join us for this webinar to learn simple creative ideas for establishing FUN transitions that will make your program feel smoother and you job easier.

Over time, cultural norms and ideas about disability, diversity, and inclusion have changed. As more organizations across sectors focus on “Diversity and Equity”, disability is sometimes left out of the conversation about diversity. KIT’s mission is to meaningfully include children and youth with disabilities, and our webinar focus today is to share current, relevant information regarding the intersectionality of disability and diversity. This webinar will focus on strategies to support tweens and teens in inclusive programs.

Facilitating positive peer interactions can be tricky. It can be difficult to know when to get involved and when to step back and allow natural, spontaneous interactions to happen. Sometimes adults can accidentally stifle peer interactions or “take the fun out of it”. This webinar will provide an overview of different ways to encourage and support social engagements between children and youth through modeling, the environment, scaffolding, and collaborative problem solving.

Youth programs often have challenges sustaining engaging environments throughout the year. In this webinar we will examine factors that influence youth engagement in a program setting. We will also consider ways we can reshape activities, staff interactions, and our program space to cultivate more youth engagement.

This course provides guidance to individuals and organizations on how to improve the security in your workplace. No workplace—be it an office building, construction site, factory floor, or retail store—is immune from security threats.

Employees are often the target of these threats as well as the organization's first line of defense against them. Threats endanger the confidentiality, integrity, and security of your workplace, as well as your virtual workplace and computer systems. This course presents information on how employees can contribute to your organization's security.

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announces the availability of a new Independent Study Course titled: Active Shooter, What You Can Do (IS-907), a no-cost training course developed to provide the public with guidance on how to prepare for and respond to active shooter crisis situations. An active shooter is defined in the course as an individual “engaged in killing or
attempting to kill people in a confined and populated area. In most cases, there is no pattern or method to their selection of victims.

This webinar is focused on what it is like for our guest presenter, Stephen Hinkle, to grow up with autism. He'll explain the various academic and social challenges he faced and had to overcome throughout childhood to this day. Please note that in order to receive a certificate, you will need to watch and view the resources, engage with the materials (click), pass the quiz, and complete the survey.

Transitions can make or break a routine. Moving a group of children from one activity to another smoothly is an art. Join us for this webinar to learn simple creative ideas for establishing FUN transitions that will make your program feel smoother and you job easier. Please note that in order to receive a certificate, you will need to watch and view the resources, engage with the materials (click), pass the quiz, and complete the survey.

Over time, cultural norms and ideas about disability, diversity, and inclusion have changed. As more organizations across sectors focus on “Diversity and Equity”, disability is sometimes left out of the conversation about diversity. KIT’s mission is to meaningfully include children and youth with disabilities, and our webinar focus today is to share current, relevant information regarding the intersectionality of disability and diversity. This webinar will focus on strategies to support tweens and teens in inclusive programs.

Youth programs often have challenges sustaining engaging environments throughout the year. In this webinar we will examine factors that influence youth engagement in a program setting. We will also consider ways we can reshape activities, staff interactions, and our program space to cultivate more youth engagement.

Working to overcome challenging behaviors in your program/classroom can feel like a full-time job all by itself. The difficulty of completing all of the extra paperwork included in a behavior plan can cause anyone to question whether the time it takes to record the observations is well spent. In Part 2 of Documenting & Tracking Behavior participants will review three levels of data collection and discover the advantages and drawbacks of each.

Have you ever wondered what the ABC data you are required to keep is supposed to be for? Would you like to learn how to use the information you have collected to help overcome challenging behaviors? Join us for a webinar focused on making ABC data a bit easier to understand and use.

Attitudes, beliefs, policies and resources influence how inclusion is viewed and put into practice in child and youth programs. This webinar will explore myths of inclusion that sometimes interfere with creating welcoming and inclusive environments for all children.

Sometimes we don't get the opportunity to get outside as much as we would like, while some children may not perform well if they don't "get extra energy out" throughout their day. In this webinar, we will focus on ways we can create opportunities for movement within the confines of our program indoor spaces.

The Tween (9-12) and Teen (13-18) years can be a stressful time in life. It’s the perfect time for parents, teachers, and involved adults to teach tweens and teens problem-solving skills, how to regulate emotions, and positive coping mechanisms. Learning and applying these skills are necessary for teens to become responsible and productive adults in the community.

This eModule is designed for program staff to understand the brain basics behind a child’s challenging or concerning behavior and learn to use the six steps of the connect and redirect strategy in their response. This strategy will help you acknowledge the child, offer support, and redirect their behavior.

Biting is one of the top challenges teachers identify to KIT. In this webinar, participants will learn why they should expect young children to sometimes bite, with some focus on why older children may bite, as well as how to reduce biting and how to respond once a bite has occurred.

At KIT, we are always asked how to support children's behavior. Since every child and situation is different, there isn't one simple answer. Join KIT staff as we discuss the lessons we've learned about how to support behavior. In this session, we'll discuss the importance of exploring personal biases when it comes to behavior support.

At KIT, we are always asked how to support children's behavior. Since every child and situation is different, there isn't one simple answer. Join KIT staff as we discuss the lessons we've learned about how to support behavior. In this session, we'll discuss applying one behavior support strategy to meet many needs.

Please note that in order to receive a certificate, you will need to watch and view the resources, engage with the materials (click), pass the quiz, and complete the survey.

Imagine the day has been interrupted by a shift in the schedule. How would you handle it? And how might a teen with ASD handle it? Unexpected situations can be a trigger for a youth with ASD. This webinar will introduce a concept that will increase the teen’s capacity to handle more thereby improving their ability to be more flexible.

Please note, this webinar will focus on middle and high school youth.