Eileen Kennedy-Moore, PhD
SPEAKING TOPICS
FOR PARENTS
*** Helping Siblings Get Along
Brothers and sisters can be wonderful friends and companions, but they also bicker and argue and tattle and tease. This talk draws from research, clinical knowledge, and the speaker's own experience as a mother of four. With humor and compassion, it describes practical strategies for minimizing sibling squabbles, coping with unavoidable friction, and helping brothers and sisters learn positive people skills.
*** The Social Curriculum: Five People Skills Every Child Needs to Learn
Kids need to learn how to get along with others. Their current and future well-being depends on this. Yet, nearly every child has trouble with social relationships in some way, at some time. This presentation describes five essential people skills that are part of the unspoken social curriculum for school-age children: reaching out, pulling back, blending in, speaking up, and letting go. It offers parents practical ideas for helping children to feel more comfortable and confident in social situations.
*** Emotion Coaching: Helping Your Child Cope With Feelings
We can’t guarantee that our children’s lives will be trouble-free, but we can help them develop the skills they need to cope with their feelings. This presentation offers ways to prevent or minimize children’s emotional “melt-downs.” With clarity and compassion, it focuses on the interplay between children’s and parents’ emotional responses. It describes strategies parents can use to help children cope constructively with negative feelings and cultivate positive feelings.
*** Raising Daughters / Raising Sons (Two-part presentation)
Boys and girls face many of the same issues growing up, but they also face gender-specific challenges. This two-part presentation offers participants opportunities to reflect upon and share their experiences of gender issues, and it describes practical parenting strategies for addressing these. The session on daughters focuses on helping girls to accept their bodies, find their voice, and own their accomplishments. The session on sons focuses on helping boys channel their physicality, communicate their feelings, and build relationships. In both sessions, the emphasis is on ways that parents can be a strong, clear voice, guiding children beyond stereotypes, towards their authentic selves.
*** Beyond Busyness: Finding Balance in Today’s Hectic, Time-Pressured World
Do you feel like there aren't enough hours in a day to do everything you have to do? Is your life so hectic that you rarely have a free moment for yourself? Is your busy lifestyle wearing you down? This presentation explores the epidemic of busyness in our culture. It describes the costs of our nonstop pace of life. It offers practical strategies for coping with fully filled schedules and finding personal fulfillment.
FOR TEACHERS
*** Teaching Children People Skills Through Literature and Activities
People skills are an essential, but often unacknowledged, part of every school curriculum. Whether they’re working with a partner, managing frustration, or even just standing in line, children are learning about getting along. Children’s literature is a wonderful resource for teaching kids about relationships. Through books, children can see the consequences of certain choices without having to live through those consequences themselves. Stories can help children explore feelings and see different people’s viewpoints. This talk presents five people skills that are also common themes in children's literature: Reaching Out, Pulling Back, Blending In, Speaking Up, and Letting Go. Participants will explore books related to each theme and learn classroom activities to help children gain these essential skills.
*** Coaching the Child Who Struggles Socially
Sometimes particular children need extra help in learning to get along with others. This presentation outlines typical social development and describes common social struggles, such as making a new friend, resolving an argument, or dealing with an angry adult. Using a "case study" format, participants will discuss strategies for helping children develop the social skills they'll need through out their lives. (This presentation can be offered in combination with “Teaching Children People Skills…” to provide an all-day workshop.)
*** Helping Children Manage Feelings
Feelings are an important part of who we are and how we relate to others. They color our outlook on the world. Children’s feelings tend to be frequent and intense. This presentation offers an overview of children’s emotional development. It focuses on practical strategies for helping children understand and cope with their feelings, to enhance their sense of mastery and well-being and to enhance their ability to relate appropriately to others.
*** Getting Unstuck:
Breaking Free of Power Struggles and Managing Our Own Emotions While Working With Children
Working with children is delightful, meaningful, inspiring, and fun, but it can also be frustrating, exhausting, discouraging, or exasperating. Over time, these negative feelings can lead to a sense of helplessness and even burn-out. This presentation allows participants to take an honest look at some of the not-so-pretty feelings that can come up when working with children and to learn and share effective coping strategies. It describes ways to avoid stressful power struggles and handle the daily hassles of children’s squabbles and misbehavior. (This presentation can be offered alone, or in combination with “Helping Children Manage Feelings” to provide an all-day workshop.)
FOR LIBRARIANS
*** Are You Being Spread Too Thin?
So many good ideas! Not enough hours in the day! Trying to do more with less! How can you avoid taking on too much, and how can you ensure that your energies go to the priorities that matter most for yourself or for your library? This practical and interactive workshop will help you learn to focus of (re-focus) your energies and resources where you want them to be. It describes strategies for saying "no," for using time effectively, and for managing perfectionism.
FOR CHILDREN
*** Speaking Up: Assertiveness for Kids (grades 2-5)
Assertiveness means being true to ourselves while also respecting others. Being too mean (aggressive) or too nice (passive) causes problems. Through discussion and role-play, children learn assertive ways of coping with everyday situations.
*** Building Teamwork Skills (grades 3-5)
What makes a team? What actions help build or break up teams? In this highly interactive workshop, children are introduced to amusing characters who act as “team busters.” They describe the social impact of the characters’ behavior and deduce the teamwork skills that the characters need to learn. Children then practice using these skills in fun, cooperative activities. After each activity, the group discusses two questions: 1) Did we achieve our goal? and 2) Did we work as a team? Most groups show a dramatic increase in teamwork over the course of this workshop.
*** It Takes Three (or More) to Bully (grades 3-5)
Research tells us that the key to stopping bullying is to rally observers to speak up. In this lively workshop, children perform and discuss a short play that highlights the importance of observer responses to bullying.
*** Is It Bullying or Just a Disagreement? (grades 1-3)
Using a game-show format, teams of children decide whether scenarios constitute bullying or just a disagreement. For disagreements, they suggest possible solutions.
*** The Power of No: Resisting Everyday Peer Pressure (grades 3-5)
Peer pressure isn’t just about drugs and alcohol, it’s also about the temptation to do things that are irresponsible or unkind. In this workshop, children learn a variety of ways to say no, and practice using them through role-play. Children will also discuss times that they have or haven’t managed to resist negative peer pressure.
*** The Benefit of the Doubt (grades 3-5)
Our legal system is based on the premise that people are innocent until proven guilty. This is also a good policy for personal relationships. Children (and adults) who are prone to anger tend to assume that others’ actions stem from deliberate meanness. In this values-oriented workshop, children discuss the importance of giving others the benefit of the doubt. Through role-play, they practice “arguing for the defense” when faced with common “kid crimes,” such as “He took my pencil!”
*** Writing Lively Nonfiction (grades 3-5)
Interesting nonfiction starts with curiosity. Whereas a fiction writer begins by thinking, “What if…?”, a nonfiction writer begins with “I wonder why or how or what…?” Lively nonfiction excites the feelings and imagination of readers. This workshop describes different types of nonfiction and shows specific techniques for turning dull text into lively prose. It emphasizes the importance of revision. Nonfiction can help people by sharing information, solving problems, or teaching a skill. In the hands of a master, like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., lively nonfiction can even change the world.
*** Make Attention Getting Hats (preK-grade 1)
Craft activity linked to “What About Me? 12 Ways to Get Your Parents Attention Without Hitting Your Sister.”
FOR WRITERS
*** Preventing and Overcoming Writer’s Block: Practical Strategies for Getting Unstuck
Writer’s block is a painful feeling of being “stuck”—unable to move forward with writing—that stems from anxiety. Like any creative undertaking, writing is inherently anxiety-provoking because it involves moving into unknown territory. Writer’s block occurs when anxiety escalates. Fears such as “I’m not good enough” or “My work is terrible” lead to avoidance, which leads to feelings of guilt, shame, and frustration, which further compound anxiety. Anxiety can interfere with starting, continuing, and/or finishing writing. To be productive, writers need ways to move past fear. This presentation describes practical strategies writers can use to find inspiration, build momentum, and cope with uncertainty in order to unleash their creativity.
*** Writing Self-Help Books for Children
Self-help books are a mainstay of adult publishing and a growing category of children’s book. In this workshop, Dr. Eileen Kennedy-Moore, psychologist and author of the award-winning picture book, “What About Me? Twelve Ways to Get Your Parents’ Attention Without Hitting Your Sister,” shares tips for planning, writing, and pitching an effective self-help book for kids. This presentation:
1) describes types and topics of self-help books for children
2) suggests strategies for getting your message across to children in a meaningful way
3) highlights the key publishers working in this genre
4) offers ideas for effectively submitting your manuscript.
*** So You’d Like to Write a Book on Psychology…
Are you passionate about a certain topic in psychology? Do you have some special expertise that you'd like to share? Have you had an experience as a therapist or in your personal life that inspires you and could help others? Do you just love to write?
If you've ever dreamed of writing a book, this practical and candid presentation can show you how to turn that dream into reality. Whether you have a specific book topic in mind, or you're just wondering about the publishing process, come meet with an experienced author to learn about the journey from idea to published book.
To discuss your organization’s needs or to schedule an event,
please contact Dr. Kennedy-Moore at eileenkm{at}att.net