Professional Development
Professional Development
Trainings and Courses
A New Day and New Vision: Prioritizing Mental Wellness in Early Childhood
This interactive training is designed for all early childhood professionals, including teachers, assistants, support staff, and administrators, who are navigating the emotional demands of working with young children. The session empowers participants to reflect on their current wellness practices, identify everyday stressors, and explore simple yet effective strategies to prevent burnout and promote resilience.
Child Development Associate (CDA)
CDA is a credential that early childhood educators can earn to demonstrate certain competencies and, in turn, can help them advance their careers. This training will provide the foundational processes for ECE. The Child Development Associate credential is carefully administered to ensure that those who earn it know how to apply key ECE understandings in practice. CDAs help prepare workers on how to nurture the emotional, physical, intellectual, and social development of children.
The Community Resiliency Model (CRM)®
CRM is a strengths-based, biologically informed approach that helps people understand how their nervous system responds to stress and how it can return to states of balance and well-being. By learning to recognize and track sensations in the body, individuals gain the capacity to read their own nervous system states and apply simple skills that support stabilization, resilience, and emotional regulation.
Connections Matter
Connections Matter is an evidence-informed training that helps participants understand how adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), trauma, and resilience affect children, families, and communities. The training emphasizes that positive relationships and supportive environments can buffer the effects of adversity and promote healthy development. Participants learn practical strategies to strengthen protective factors, build resilience, foster meaningful connections, and create trauma-informed communities where children and families can thrive.
Creating Safe, Supportive Learning Environments: Understanding Comfort, Risk, and Growth
This training provides early childhood educators with a holistic understanding of trauma, behavioral triggers, and the truth behind challenging behaviors using the Community Resilience Model (CRM). Participants learn how trauma impacts the brain, how to identify classroom triggers, and how to apply CRM regulation tools to support children and themselves.
Culture and Climate in the Workplace
This 1.5-hour DECAL-approved training equips early childhood educators with the essential skills and knowledge to perform practical and effective diapering and handwashing procedures in full compliance with the 2025 standards. Through demonstrations, interactive activities, and compliance checks, participants will learn how to protect children's health, prevent the spread of illness, and maintain safe, hygienic environments.
Diapering and Handwashing Best Practices
This 1.5-hour DECAL-approved training equips early childhood educators with the essential skills and knowledge to perform practical and effective diapering and handwashing procedures in full compliance with the 2025 standards. Through demonstrations, interactive activities, and compliance checks, participants will learn how to protect children's health, prevent the spread of illness, and maintain safe, hygienic environments.
Fostering Resilience: Utilizing Affirmations to Support a Child's Social and Emotional Well-being
Fostering Resilience: Utilizing Affirmations to Support a Child's Social and Emotional Well-being is an empowering workshop designed to equip parents and caregivers with tools to nurture their child's social and emotional well-being through positive affirmations. This interactive session is structured to provide a comprehensive understanding of the principles behind affirmations and how to integrate them into daily routines, fostering a positive and resilient mindset in children.
It's Not About You! Creating an Appropriate Environment for Children During the School Day and After School
The training session "It's Not About You! Creating an Appropriate Environment for Children During the School Day and After School" equips teachers and after-school providers with the knowledge and skills to create an inclusive, supportive, and engaging after-school environment that prioritizes the needs and development of the children in their care.
It’s Storytime! Making Storytime a Funtime
Participants will learn techniques to make story time engaging and fun for little ones.
From Body Fill to Bright Star: Making the Wrong Hire the RIGHT Hire
From Body Fill to Bright Star: Making the Wrong Hire the RIGHT Hire is an engaging 4-hour Professional Learning Community for Georgia Childcare Center Directors focused on transforming struggling employees into successful team members through intentional leadership, coaching, and onboarding strategies.
Physical Activity Learning Session (PALS)
PALS is a series of learning sessions focused on physical activity. PALS sessions examine eight best-practice areas for physical activity and address the challenges that early care and education (ECE) professionals face in supporting active play.
Partnering with Families to Support Literacy at Home
This interactive training equips early childhood educators with practical, research-based strategies to strengthen home–school partnerships around literacy.
Raising Brilliant Black Boys
Discover key strategies for parents and educators to support and elevate the success of Black boys.
Setting Standards for Success: Building a Cohesive and Compliant Classroom Environment during the School Day and After School
This session aims to empower childcare providers with the knowledge and confidence to meet Bright from the Start standards, understand the site visit process, and implement developmentally supportive practices.
So You Want to Write a Book
Master the process from idea to publication with tips on writing, editing, budgeting, and marketing.
Strengthening Families Workshop
The Protective Factors for Caregivers Training of Trainers equips professionals and parent leaders to provide learning experiences that strengthen families and communities across Georgia. Grounded in research and guided by the Strengthening Families™ framework, this training helps caregivers utilize the Five Protective Factors in their everyday lives—building resilience, social connections, and family well-being.
The Building Blocks of Literacy: Phonemic Awareness for Infants
This two-hour interactive workshop introduces infant educators to the critical early steps of phonemic awareness—the sounds and rhythms that become the building blocks of reading. Through a blend of brief research highlights, playful demonstrations, and collaborative brainstorming, participants will see how everyday routines (from diaper changes to snack time) can be transformed into rich "sound labs" where babies learn to listen, mimic, and play with the phonemes of their home language.
"I enjoyed the sessions. Shelia is very intentional about her interventions with you and your family. She has a passion for equipping me to help my family thrive educationally, spiritually, and emotionally.
Janee J.