Program planning is an important piece of a successful Head Start or Early Head Start program.  A current & comprehensive Community Assessment is one of the key documents to have for effective program planning. A comprehensive Community Assessment is also needed to write your Refunding Application, your Recompetition Grant Application and to maintain programmatic compliance. Your Community Assessment is a key document that drives decision-making in your program.

We create comprehensive & custom designed Community Assessments for Head Start programs, Early Head Start programs and agencies (including Community Action Agencies).  Our Community Assessments will meet the requirements of the Head Start Program Performance Standards (and of your CAP or other program regulations). Since all of our services are custom designed to meet the specific needs of your program or agency, we will include any additional data that you request.

Our Community Assessments include:

• Aggregating and analyzing a multitude of data sources;
• Comparing current data with past years’ data;
• Colorful graphs and charts illustrating the data;
• Key findings for each piece of data;
• Highlights & considerations for each major section;
• Survey results of your Parents, Staff, Board of Directors and Community Partners.

Our user-friendly Community Assessments include an Analysis of the data, Methodology, an Executive Summary & much more. Call or email us for a free sample!

Are you looking for a Community Assessment for your program or agency? Give us a call today at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.

Head Start classrooms today contain more & more children with extreme behavior issues as well as children with diagnosed and undiagnosed special needs. Teachers often report that despite trying many different things to manage children’s challenging behaviors, nothing has been effective. We have found that the origin of many children’s challenging behaviors is rooted in developmental trauma.

Many of our children come from hard places and have experienced trauma. Early experiences adversely impacts brain development. Developmental trauma impacts children’s attachment system and their ability to self-regulate. This often results in children acting out through a multitude of challenging behaviors. Becoming trauma informed (learning strategies and language that increases safety while promoting optimal brain development) is a key piece of successfully addressing children’s challenging behaviors.

Behaviorally challenging children are also relationship-resistant children. Instead of spending precious time trying to get challenging children under control, we can instead create a compassionate school culture. This strategy employs the natural power of connection between all members as a means of co-regulating behavior and teaching children to self-regulate.

We believe that successful behavior management training is based on shifting teachers’ daily practice from reward and punishment — to teaching, modeling and nurturing relationships within a positive school climate. This highly interactive training includes:

• Understanding how developmental trauma impacts children’s attachment and their ability to self-regulate;
• Defining teaching behaviors & interventions that improve children’s ability to pay attention and impulse control;
• Learning to “meet children where they are” including specific strategies to reach challenging children in a way that builds trust and connection;
• Exploring how these connections directly increase the ability to problem-solve, engaging students in interactions that facilitate effective learning;
• Discovering how to connect with relationship-resistant children, reduce oppositional defiant behavior and increase cooperation and compliance.

Are you looking for highly interactive & practice-based Training on “Successfully Managing Children’s Challenging Behaviors: Becoming Trauma Informed”? Give us a call at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.

Your Community Assessment is one of the foundational elements of your program. It is used to make important decisions in your program regarding program design and service delivery. It is a critical document when writing your Refunding application, when writing a Recompetition grant application and when making programmatic decisions about selection criteria, enrollment slots, and types of services needed by children and families. It’s an essential document used for data-driven decision making and must include all needed data.

We create comprehensive Community Assessments for Head Start & Early Head Start programs as well as Community Action Agencies. They include all of the required items in the new Head Start Program Performance Standards (and, for Community Action Agencies, the regulations of your CAP programs). As all of our services are custom designed, we will include any additional data that you request.

Our Community Assessments include:

• Aggregating and analyzing a multitude of data sources;
• Comparing current data with past years’ data;
• Colorful graphs and charts illustrating the data;
• Key findings for each piece of data;
• Surveys of your Staff, Policy Council, Board and Community Partners.

The Community Assessment will include an analysis of the data as well as an Executive Summary & much more – in a user-friendly format. Call or email us for a free sample!

Are you looking for a Full Community Assessment that will provide you with all of the data that you need to make critical programmatic decisions? We can take this off your to-do list and create it for you. Give us a call today at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.

Effective learning is achieved when children are fully engaged. This occurs when children are actively involved and energized by what is being presented. The classroom environment should be one that captures children’s inquiry, promotes creativity and encourages problem-solving skills. Equally important is the intention on the part of the teacher.

Intentional teaching is always thinking about what you are doing and how it will foster children’s development.  In everything that teachers plan and implement in the Head Start classroom, it’s essential that they are highly intentional. That is, they need to work with children’s outcomes in mind and seek out every opportunity to help children progress on their road to school readiness. This is accomplished through the learning experiences that teachers plan, the ways they interact with children and how teachers individualize for all children.

We believe that children need playful learning and meaningful play. It’s important that teachers intentionally integrate learning opportunities throughout the daily schedule. Intentional planning is the cornerstone to engaging interactions.

This highly interactive training will address how to teach with intentionality, including strategies to:

• Be highly responsive to children and intentionally build relationships;
• Integrate instructional interactions throughout the classroom centers and routines;
• Match content with students’ developmental levels and emerging abilities;
• Organize the classroom environment and closely monitor children’s experiences;
• Maximize learning time through carefully planned transitions and routines; and
• Use effective teaching strategies throughout the school day.

Are you looking for highly interactive & practice-based training on Teaching with Intentionality? Give us a call at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.

What do you do when you’ve tried everything to manage children’s challenging behaviors and nothing is effective? Most classrooms today contain children with extreme behavior issues as well as children with diagnosed and undiagnosed special needs.

Early traumatic experiences adversely impact brain development and behavior. Research shows that children who are connected to others in the early years of schooling are much more likely to develop socially, emotionally and academically. Children’s social and emotional functioning in the classroom is a primary indicator of school readiness.

Behaviorally challenging children are also relationship-resistant children. Instead of spending precious time trying to get challenging children under control, we can instead create a compassionate school culture. This strategy employs the natural power of connection between all members as a means of co-regulating behavior and teaching children to self-regulate.

We believe that successful behavior management training is based on shifting teachers’ daily practice from reward and punishment — to teaching, modeling and nurturing relationships within a positive school climate. This training also includes:

• How to connect with relationship-resistant children, reduce oppositional defiant behavior and increase cooperation and compliance;
• Learning to “meet children where they are” including specific strategies to reach challenging children in a way that builds trust and connection;
• Exploring how these connections directly increase the ability to problem-solve, engaging students in interactions that facilitate effective learning.

Are you looking for highly interactive & practice-based Training on “Successfully Managing Children’s Challenging Behaviors”? Give us a call at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.

If you’ve heard it once, you’ve heard it 1,000 times…… data is the driving force of decision-making. Effective Head Start programs develop a culture of data-driven decision making, the process of making choices based on appropriate analysis of programmatic information. As programs consider multiple data sources and analyze their results, they are able to create changes that increase their overall quality and improve child outcomes.

Teachers play a critical role in this process through the use of ongoing assessment data to guide classroom instruction. Observing and gathering assessment information for every child is the starting point for decision-making in the classroom. Teachers must be intentional with every step in the assessment-instructional cycle, increasing their interpretive skills in order to monitor and support student progress.

Here are a few suggestions for strengthening this process:

• Focused Observations: Teachers must target their observations and look closely for specific information. After observing that a child has difficulty with a given task, teachers take a more in-depth look at the areas of development that would support (or hinder) success in that task.

• Interpret Data: Following a focused observation, teachers develop a hypothesis to be tested at the next instructional opportunity. For example, “Could Sara do the task if I provide more visual cues?” or “Could she do this in a different context?”

• Adapt and Modify: Teachers use their data to design intentional groupings of students, increase environmental supports and adjust their instructional interactions to support students’ needs.

• Engage Families: Parents are always an important part of the cycle, including the assessment feedback loop. The process of sharing with families provides teachers more information to improve their classroom practice and target learning goals.

Could your classroom staff strengthen their teaching strategies while using their assessments of children’s play to drive instruction?

Contact us at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com to shedule training for your Teachers to support them with data-driven decision making.

A full Community Assessment will provide you with all of the data that you need to make critical programmatic decisions.  Examples of these programmatic decisions are:

• Determining recruitment areas and selection criteria;
• Selecting program options;
• Determining the type of content area services that are most needed;
• Creating long-range and short-range program goals and objectives;
• Determining available community resources to support family stability.

Consider the following when creating your program’s Community Assessment.

1. Collect a wide variety of data. There is a wealth of data available. Externally, there is the Census Bureau, State and County Departments of Health, American Community Survey, Kids Count Data Center, American FactFinder, State Data Centers, United Way as well as local school districts and early intervention programs, just to name a few.  Internally, there is your PIR, Annual Report, wait list and list of community partners. Surfing the Net, making phone calls and conducting surveys of your parents, staff, Policy Council, Board of Directors and community partners will yield a great deal of valuable data.
2. Look for trends. When you are collecting current data, also gather information from recent years. This will give you an opportunity to compare data. By aggregating and analyzing the information, you will be able to identify key findings and trends. This will provide you with the information that you need to make critical programmatic decisions.
3. Create a user-friendly format. Be sure that your community assessment is a document that is easy to read. It should also be user-friendly so that you can find needed information quickly. Include a combination of graphs and charts as well as text. With each graph, add a “Key Finding” that describes the data. After each major section, include a “Highlights and Considerations” section tht summarizes the key information. This will allow you to reference your Community Assessment frequently throughout the year.

We create Full Community Assessments that include all of the required items in the Head Start Program Performance Standards as well as any additional data that you request. If you need help creating a Community Assessment, give us a call at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com to discuss your needs.

Did you know that your classroom is the third teacher? Your learning environment profoundly impacts skill-building, both socially and academically. Time is our greatest commodity. Therefore, as early childhood educators, we must make the most of our daily schedule (and our space) to increase children’s learning and impulse control.

The essential elements of learning involve intentional interactions that are developed through structure and a nurturing environment. If you want to improve either of these components in the classroom, but you don’t know where to begin, here are some great ways to get started.

• Build on interests – Children’s interests are aroused when new learning is relevant to their lives and integrated across activities and content areas.
• Respond to signals – Children’s feelings and attitudes are responded to throughout the day to build a sense of trust between the children and teacher and to increase connections as a school community.
• Secure the Environment – Children will try new experiences more readily when working in a structured and safe environment where they are allowed to explore freely.
• Support and Challenge – As children become more independent and self-regulating, the teacher changes interactions to scaffold students to a higher level of learning.

To receive training for Teachers on creating a classroom environment that supports effective learning, please give us a call at (704) 451-3255 or email us at kristinecortina@hsessentials.com.