Monday, March 26, 2012

Road Trip for Language Development

The spring conference season has started and it's a fun one! This season WeeHands Instructors have been presenting to Head Start organizations in Atlanta, Georgia and Miramar, Florida. My own road trip plans include:


Road trip #1: travelling to the Massachusetts Association for the Education of Young Children Annual conference held March 16-17, 2012 in Westford, Massachusetts. The theme for this conference is "Our Link to the Future" and I presented on the topics of language development, using sign language with young children and behaviour difficulties. I was also very lucky because Ford Canada lent me this shiny red Focus to take me to Massachusetts! I'd never driven a car that talked to me...it was great company!


The MassAEYC was an incredibly well organized conference and I met so many amazing and inspiring educators as well as area businesses. I don't think I spoke with one person who was unfamiliar with the idea of using sign language with young children!  So many of the staff from different centres shared that they were teaching their children sign language...as well as Spanish and Mandarin! Amazing!


One of the highlights of my trip to Massachusetts had to be actually meeting face to face with one our fantastic WeeHands Instructors, Courtney Koumjian. Courtney has been teaching with WeeHands for over four years and it was wonderful to meet and catch up in person! Courtney and all the other super friendly faces I met...you made my trip!

What's next? This week, I'm on my way to Grand Rapids, Michigan for the the Michigan Association for the Education of Young Children annual conference. I'll also be speaking there about language development as well as on multilingual classrooms.  After this conference, I'll be coming back to Toronto to speak at the Holland Bloorview Children's Centre to speak with their volunteers on Saturday March 31st.

That's it for March and now onto April!


Road trip #3: I'll be travelling on Wednesday April 18th to go to the New York State Association for the Education of Young Children annual conference held in Buffalo, NY.  I'll also be speaking there about language development .


Road trip #4: travelling on Wednesday April 25th to go to the Indiana Early Childhood Conference annual conference held in Indianapolis, Indiana.  I'll also be speaking there about language development.


Lots more pictures and stories to follow!

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