UM-Dearborn SOE and Oakwood prepping for inclusion conference

The conference, “Making Inclusion Work: Transdisciplinary Teaming to Support Children with Changing Behaviors,” will emphasize a team approach of working with professionals from a variety of professions to best serve children. Sessions will focus on addressing challenging behaviors of children and adolescents.

The conference is hosted by UM-Dearborn’s School of Education (SOE) Early Childhood Program and Oakwood Healthcare’s Center for Exceptional Families (CEF).

“The annual transdisciplinary conference is one of many efforts to disseminate our collaboration to the community. This year’s conference is carefully designed to meet the needs of both educators and healthcare professionals by having a keynote speaker from each discipline,” said Seong Hong, director of UM-Dearborn’s Early Childhood Education Center (ECEC).

“Through this conference both groups have an opportunity to gain an understanding and exchange knowledge about each other’s perspectives and learn strategies to enhance each other’s skill.”

The event will include sessions from practitioners and educators, as well as a tour of Oakwood’s Center for Exceptional Families and UM-Dearborn’s Early Childhood Education Center.

Keynote speakers are:

• Mary Louise Hemmeter, associate professor of special education at Vanderbilt University and principal investigator at the Center on the Social & Emotional Foundations of Early Learning. Hemmeter’s talk is titled “We Are All in This Together: Preventing and Addressing Challenging Behavior.”

• Pamela McCaskill, clinical psychologist at McCaskill Family Services. McCaskill will speak on “Unraveling the Truth about Oppositional, Defiant and Angry Children.”

The event marks the fourth annual inclusion conference. It’s part of a growing collaboration between CEF and the SOE’s Early Childhood Education Center (ECEC), which began in 2006 in an effort to create a learning center that houses clinical and educational programs for kids, families and future teachers. The collaboration now includes a research partnership dedicated to advancing knowledge about inclusive childhood education and research.

The conference will take place May 2-3 in the Social Science Building (SSB) on the main campus of UM-Dearborn. To learn more, or to register for the event, visit the Inclusion Conference webpage.