By: Gloria Andrade

Gloria will share her story.
The things she thought about.  
The things she thought a little bit more,  
The things she thought about a lot more. 
First steps. 
Challenges.

By: Susan Baldassi

Mirror neurons, close proximity, signals of safety and soft eyes…what does that look like in a martial arts dojo?  How can we scaffold and support children to build their capacity to regulate while they are learning to kick, punch and block?  Wait, is that a co-regulator who is holding the hand of a 5 year old child who is running through the obstacle course?  What are you noticing about the same child who a few minutes ago was reluctant to join in class and was clinging to their parent?  This Self-Reg talk will provide an inside look at Susan’s karate class (with pics, video, commentary and short clips from parents/kids/co-regulators).  It’s Susan’s hope to inspire others to explore these ways of using Self-Reg in unique settings.  It makes a difference!

By: Casey Burgess and daughter

Casey’s daughter, __________ (just turned 18) has typically been an excellent self-regulator and co-regulator by nature. Lately, __________ has struggled through a pretty rough year, and Casey and her have reflected a lot together throughout these challenges. Together they will share their experience around the impact that Self-Reg has had on them individually and in their relationship together as a mother and teen. 

By: Liela Maria Dos Santos

Leila shares her experience trying to apply Self-Reg into her daily routine at school with her students and how everything changed when she finally understood what limbic resonance was and that she had to take care of herself before trying to calm the students.

By: Aviva Dunsiger

 In her role as a Reading Specialist, Aviva no longer has one class of her own, but instead, supports students and educators from across 11 different classes. This has made building relationships a challenge, but some recent experiences have shown Aviva that even in a drop-in role, there is a need to find ways to connect with kids. In this short video, Aviva will share a couple of different stories about these moments of connection and the impact that these made.

By: Marie Edwards

Over all years Marie has been coming to SRSS, she has been working on her PhD centering  around Self-Reg. This mini-talk summarizes key takeaways from her research investigating how teachers developed self-regulation to support their stress management. Marie will touch on both the research outcomes and personal Self-Reg moments that accompanied the journey.

By: Kristie Ellen Connie Herman

For most of her life, Kristie wore a heavy mask to disguise her divergence. This was a recipe for maladaptive habits, spiraling shame and an utter lack of resiliency. Kristie’s Self-Reg story has become the “how” to transformation and continued growth through her journey of life.

By: Connie Herman

By: Betsy Lamberson

By: Jo Gmyz-Lowndes

Jo will share a story of a family of 4 relocating across the World.  We will find out how they have handled the whole process and coped with multiple stressors on the way – stressors that turned out to have various meanings and magnitudes in different languages and cultures

By: Yu Wen (Lucy) Lin

Self-Reg has both supported Yu-Wen’s parenting in different cultures and the navigation of the education systems in Canada and Taiwan. After living in Canada for 21 years Yu-Wen has returned ‘home’ to slay the dragons. While family and friends may expect a ‘tiger mom’, they don’t expect the Self-Reg mom and educator that she has become. As she states, “Self-Reg saves me.”

By: Kay Matharoo

How do we co-regulate with our adult children when they are looking to launch out into the world?  This talk will explore what co-regulation and strategies look like when your adult children are at the cross roads of big decisions and dealing with the stress of post secondary education. Kay will share with us her experience of how understanding Self-Reg helped navigate the journey.

By: Alexandra Mihai

Alexandra will share how becoming a mom wasn’t an easy transition. Self-Reg taught her self-compassion. Alexandra will share how she learned to give up quick fixes and enjoy being present as with the help of Self-Reg she developed a compassionate mindset as well as finding daily balance.

By: Karen Patton

Self-Reg means different things to different people. We all interpret it based on our own experiences.   For example, we all learned about self regulation but what means for me will be different to what it means for you.  Join Karen to discover her account of how Self-Reg has influenced her life – as an individual, as a mother and as a lecturer/professional.

By: Lisa Pinhorn

The talk will cover how co-regulation is so powerful because of the deep connectedness of humans. When we pause and think about connection, we can ride the wave of emotional dysregulation together. Because at the end of the day, we are all interconnected – we feel each other’s stress and joy. When we tap into the current that flows between people, we can co-regulate to a deeper understanding of each other. We lose all the beautiful by-products of feeling safe and seen within relationships if we feel disconnected. It’s more than just changing lanes to a new place of thinking; understanding our interconnectedness will take us to places we never thought possible within our relationships.  Lisa will share a story about herself and a 16 year old – their tangled domains ,and the interconnectedness to find solutions.

By: Melissa Pinnell

Working with parents and families Melissa has found many times when parents get stuck seeing only labels or diagnosis.  Time and again Melissa  has noticed the power of slowing down, valuing relationships and attachment.  Reducing parents’ stress and helping parents to see their child apart from labels while focusing on their strengths. Based on this, Melissa will share her stories of seeing shifts happening both in the parent child relationship and in the childrens’ academic trajectory. 

By: Lorraine Purgret

As Lorraine shares her story, we will explore how our role in the care and education of young children is crucial to how they see themselves, as well as to how others see them. This is the story of Brian, or as he was better known in the school community, Bad Brian. Everyone in the school, teachers, students, bus drivers and families, referred to Brian as Bad Brian. This story highlights that a negative label snowball effect happens very quickly, and the child may never be able to overcome this label. The relationship we have with a child can change a child’s trajectory for life.

By: Anne Showalter

As Anne shares her experience we will learn more about TABS (Temporarily Able Bodied) by exploring how Self-Reg can support those with disability to recognize the unique stressors that can come with exceptionalities.  These are distinguished from the calm energy of abled bodies.  Anne will show us how we can simultaneously help everyone around to imagine a different experience.  

By: Erika Wainwright

This year at Erika’s school she worked with a student who displayed a lot of behaviours that were triggering to the staff who supported him, and it was hard work for the adults to stay calm and co-regulate. This student demonstrated to Erika how powerful reframing is and how hard it can be for the adults supporting, when the behavoiur is triggering and goes against our social norms and rules. The pause allowed them to check their biases at the door, focus on safety and connection, attune to the student needs in that moment and support co-regulation.  Erika will share with us how we are the tool when we are able to reframe and provide a struggling student with an unconditional relationship.

By: Yi Han Wang

Yi Han will share a personal story about a three year old girl in her care who was struggling.  She will share how witnessing and supporting ‘stress behaviour’ lead to a relationship in which a child flourishe

Dr. Stuart Shanker (D.Phil) is a Distinguished Research Professor Emeritus of Philosophy and Psychology, the Founder & Visionary of The MEHRIT Centre, Ltd., and Self-Reg Global Inc. One of his many books, “Calm, Alert and Learning: Classroom Strategies for Self-Regulation (2012)”, is a top-selling educational publication in Canada. Self-Reg: How to Help Your Child (and You) Break the Stress Cycle and Successfully Engage With Life (2016), has garnered enthusiastic reviews and media attention throughout North America and has also been published in the United Kingdom, the United States, Poland, Germany, China, South Korea, Japan, the Netherlands, Georgia and the Czech Republic. His latest books are Self-Reg Schools: A Handbook for Educators (2019) and Reframed: Self-Reg for a Just Society (2020)

Over the past decade, Dr. Shanker has served as an advisor on early child development to government organizations across Canada and the United States, and in countries around the world. During this period, he became increasingly interested in the impact of excessive stress on child development and behaviour.  Dr. Shanker’s five-step Self-Reg model, The Shanker Method®, is a powerful process for understanding and managing stress in children, youth and adults.

In 2012 Dr. Shanker founded The MEHRIT Centre as a Self-Reg learning and information centre. Dr. Shanker commits considerable time to bringing the research and science of Self-Reg to parents, early childhood educators, teachers, educational leaders, health practitioners and communities through presentations, master classes, online courses, webinars, publications, social media and blogs.

Dr. Jean Clinton is a Clinical Professor, Department of Psychiatry and Behavioural Neurosciences at McMaster University, division of Child Psychiatry, Ontario Canada. Dr. Clinton was appointed as an education advisor to the Premier of Ontario and the Minister of Education 2014 – 2018.

Dr. Clinton is a trainer in Dr. Bruce Perry’s Neurosequential Model in Education (NME). She works intensively with Michael Fullan and his New Pedagogies for Deep Learning team. She is also a member on the MindUP Scientific Advisory Board, as well as a MindUp for Families advisor. Dr. Clinton was a Fellow of the Child Trauma Academy, and has been a Zero to Three Academy Fellow since 2013.

She has been a consultant to children and youth mental health programs, child welfare, and primary care for over 35 years. Her special interest lies in brain development, and the crucial role relationships, belonging and connectedness play.

Jean optimistically believes that having a system of compassionate system awareness leadership, competency based, deep learning and relationally focussed education of our children and young people is the road to a better and sustainable world. Good at learning, good at life. 

Dr. Clinton has authored her first book, Love Builds Brains.

Gerard Costa served as the founding director of the Center for Autism and Early Childhood Mental and a Professor in the Department of  Teaching and Learning at Montclair State University.   He is a member of  the faculty of the Infant and Early Childhood Development (IECD) Ph.D. program at Fielding University (formerly the ICDL Graduate School). He serves as a trustee and President of the Interdisciplinary Council on Development and Learning, and has served as a consultant to ZERO TO THREE for the past 20+ years. He received his Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from Temple University and was one of the first 16 recipients of the DIR certificate by Dr. Stanley Greenspan and Dr. Serena Wieder. He is a trained faculty member in the Brazelton Touchpoints Model and holds a “Self-Reg” Certificate from the MEHRIT Center in Canada, led by Dr. Stuart Shanker. He holds an endorsement as an Infant Mental Health Clinical Mentor, through the New Jersey Association for Infant Mental Health and Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.  Gerry has many more qualifications and accomplishments.