Join Eliza for a day of gearing up and gearing down to differentiate for your mathematical learners. In any given classroom, on any given day there are objectives that need to be met by learning with different needs and skills. Learn a “mindset” while doing activities and playing games to meet a variety of learners’ needs by using the grade level’s standards and your students’ skills to adjust, adapt, and support achievement.

Outcomes:

Participants will:

·      Work on building gearing up and gearing down steps to meet mathematical standards

·      Play games and adjust them to meet the content and needs of their learners.

·      Reflect on structures, strategies, and activities so they are implementable in their education setting.

This interactive workshop explores the importance of writing instruction and the research-based practices that support the development of students as writers across grade levels. Participants will deepen their understanding of The Writing Rope, a comprehensive framework for the essential components of effective writing instruction. Through engaging activities and collaborative learning, educators will examine best practices including teaching the writing process through a model-practice-reflect cycle, using mentor texts to highlight strong writing, and explicitly teaching sentence-level syntax. By the end of the session, participants will synthesize their learning and create a practical plan to integrate these strategies into their own instruction.

Topics include –

Understanding Big, Baffling Behaviors - Dori Phillips

Audience: Appropriate for Pre-K through High School staff (all teachers, paraprofessionals, specialists and administrators)

If you work in education, you have seen big, baffling behaviors in students. Are you feeling lost and frustrated when you work with these students? Based on work from Robyn Gobbel, Dr. Bruce Perry, Dr. Dan Siegel, and many more, we will discuss how trauma impacts students’ brains, how this changes the development of their brains, and how this can result in big, baffling behaviors. All behavior makes sense when we learn to look at it through a new lens; a lens that believes regulated, connected kids who feel safe, behave well.

We all need connection; relationships are vital to our growth and safety. But what happens when students do not have strong connections? Maybe some big, baffling behaviors! These behaviors are a result of brains switching into protection mode. We will learn how to tell which mode our students are in and what to do to help them.

Often we have parents who want help with their child. They try hard, they communicate with the school well, and they want to play an important role in helping change these behaviors. Join us as we learn some new techniques to try and how we can use this information to support our families at home!

Building Number and Fraction Sense – Dori Philips

A hands-on workshop creating manipulatives and playing games that will be classroom ready the next day. There will be a focus on Number Sense, the basic skills that children need to learn to work fluently with numbers. When students have good number sense they are more fluent with basic math facts and better problem-solvers! 

Children need to learn to work fluently with fractions. Learn the progression of fractions skills and playing games that will increase students’ “fraction sense”.

Making the Most of Math – Dori Phillips

Do you like hands-on workshops? Then this one's for you!! This course will include activities and games that support fact fluency in the Montana Math Content Standards (K-5). Time will be spent learning about warm ups for ongoing cumulative review, instructional tools, and ideas of how to extend learning for students who finish early.

Fundamentals of Differentiating Instruction – Brynn Cadigan

“Differentiation” has been a buzz word in education for decades and current research supports the notion that contemporary students truly benefit from this approach to learning. In this workshop participants will learn the fundamental principles behind differentiated instruction and tips and tricks to manageably implement them within their classrooms. Participants will leave with a differentiated lesson for use in their personal classroom.  

Accommodations and Modifications for All – Brynn Cadigan

More often students are coming to school with a variety of different academic, behavioral and emotional challenges. Many have IEPs and 504s to address these issues, but several do not and struggle in the general education classroom. With teachers’ busy schedules optimal collaboration is not always possible to know how to best accommodate the disparate needs of all learners. Join one former English teacher and special educator as she covers several easy high leverage practices that will help you modify learning across myriad contexts. Specific takeaways include accommodations and modifications to direct instruction, grading, content, process and product, etc. 

Better Stress Management – Joe Moriarty

In the spirit of Kaizen, better stress management means happier, more effective educators. In this session we will explore the practical definition of stress, emotions, states and how we influence those states in others and ourselves. You will learn 5 healthy stress responses and Joe’s (a former middle school math teacher) favorite stress management equation. We will also explore some of the top happiness habits that effective “stress” managers employ in their happiness and self-care practice. Come join us for a relatively stress – free, fun, and engaging workshop.

Joy in the Workplace – Joe Moriarty

What is your JQ? That is a two-part question. The answer to the first part of the question is JQ stands for joy quotient. The second part of the question is answered by you. What is your JQ set point? In this session, you will be inspired to bring an even greater JQ to work each day. We will review the habits of joy-filled happy people and how to deflect and prune the biggest robbers of joy. We will also joyfully reconsider our approach to the Big S. In our time together we will define the aforementioned happiness / joy set point and how that can be adjusted, cover your inner home for joy and happiness, survey another batch of “The Three R’s,” and synergistically interact with one another as joy-filled champion educators

University of Montana Western 1-2 semester credits or

18 OPI Renewal Units will be available 

June 10, 2025

Dr. Keith Radley III

ABC’s of Behavior – Know where to start  

The day will cover a review of the essentials for conceptualizing behavior and developing interventions to modify behavior within educational settings. Basics of behavior functions will be introduced, as well as the three-term contingency (i.e., Antecedent-Behavior-Consequence). 

Dr. Eliza Sorte Thomas

Intentional use of Montana Early Learning Standards to Support Our Youngest Learners

We’ll be able to use the domains (should know what’s overall staying and going by June in the big scheme and should have more info. About Lit and Num). We can really work on the four domains (those should stay the same).

Join Eliza to dig into creating intentional learning experiences for our youngest learners. Use the four domains (Physical, Cognitive, Communication, and Social Emotional) to help strategize high yield invitations for learning for children. Consider ways to focus on one domain or extend to encompass others. 

Stephanie Lester 

Teaching Cognitive Engagement in Math: It’s More Than Just Keeping Them Awake! 

“Don’t miss this opportunity to transform your math instruction and ignite student thinking! Join us for a full day of practical strategies, interactive learning, and empowering tools that will help every student do the heavy lifting in math—thinking, reasoning, and truly understanding

Heidi Gibson

IEP Bootcamp

Tackle the Individualized Education Program (IEP) process from start to finish? Join us for an immersive workshop hosted by the Montana Empowerment Center team, where we’ll guide you through each critical stage of the IEP journey—from early childhood to adulthood!

FYI; June 10th only - Half Day 3 OPI Renewal Credit sessions - When you register for Rob Watson, Sara Cole's session will be provided for your selection 

9:00 - 12:00 PM

Dr. Rob Watson

Facilitated Consensus for School Problem Solving                                                                                                                   

Empowering School Teams to Tackle Real Issues Through Collaborative Dialogue. This interactive workshop introduces participants to a structured, hands-on approach for tackling such issues using a facilitated consensus process. Session Description in Full

1:00 - 4:00 PM

Sara Cole

Personalized, Competency Based Education (PCBE): What Is It & Why Are People Talking About It?

This professional learning session will explore the core principles of Personalized Competency-Based Education (PCBE). Through engaging activities, reflective discussions, and collaborative planning, attendees will leave with clear insights into the shifts from traditional systems to PCBE. 

June 11, 2025

Dr. Keith Radley III

Behavioral Interventions – Class wide to Student and Tech to Support Implementation 

Presentation will describe interventions that may be applied within smaller groups, including classrooms or groups of students within classrooms. Of primary focus will be the application of group contingencies as a means of supporting student success.

Dr. Tessie Rose Bailey

Essential Elements that Increase Opportunities for Success in Sp Ed & Gen Ed classes for Students with Disabilities & Struggling  Learners.

How do we promote progress for students with disabilities across educational settings, including resource classes, general education environments, non-academic environments? 

Dr. Eliza Sorte Thomas

Developing an Early Childhood Professional Identity and Using Montana’s Early Childhood Knowledge Base to Develop Reflective Practices

Whether you’re a director, classroom teacher, or a support to educators this session will help you take a look at your education characteristics and how they impact your relationships with children and your colleagues. The Montana Early Childhood Knowledge Base will be used as the foundational document to do this work 

Stephanie Lester

Making It All Add Up!  

Making It All Add Up!" is a two-part session focused on building and reinforcing foundational math skills using developmentally appropriate, engaging, and inclusive strategies.

Part 1: Developing Children’s Number Sense

Part 2: Math EVERY Day for EVERY Child!

“Rocket Rob” Reynolds

Google Data Tools and Management

Exploring Google tools for collecting, analyzing and sharing data results with teams and key players. This will be a morning session for seeing examples of data collection methods, followed by an afternoon guided workshop to begin building your own set of Data Tools for your specific needs. You will need a laptop - class is limited to 20!

June 12, 2025

 Dr. Eliza Sorte Thomas

Develop Children’s Creativity Through Purposeful Planning

Come get curious and creative in this session through creative exercises you can modify and extend to offer children more creative thinking opportunities to develop their confidence, problem-solving skills, and perseverance

Dr. Keith Radley III

Practical Functional Assessment and Skill-Based Treatment:  An effective approach for addressing the more challenging behaviors

This training will provide an in-depth, hands-on introduction to Practical Functional Assessment (PFA) and Skill-Based Treatment (SBT), an empirically validated approach for understanding and treating challenging behavior in educational settings. 

Dr. Tessie Rose Bailey

Six Key Instructional Practices for Accelerating Learning and Promoting Progress for Students with Disabilities & Struggling Learners.

How can educators accelerate learning and promote progress for students with disabilities? This session will highlight and model six high-leverage, evidence-based practices shown to support implementation of high-quality instruction for students with and at risk for disabilities regardless of their identified disability category or grade span. 

Stephanie Lester                                                                                                                                       

Empowering Educators: Targeted Math Intervention Strategies for Grades 3–6   

Ready to close math gaps and boost student success? 

Join us for a powerful day of learning where you'll walk away with practical strategies, ready-to-use resources, and the confidence to deliver targeted math interventions that make a real difference! Let’s make math meaningful—and achievable—for every learner in your classroom!”

Carrie Cole

Laser Focused Literacy Instruction: Prioritizing What Matters Most in the Classroom

Teaching can feel overwhelming—especially when trying to meet the diverse needs of all learners, including those with disabilities. While this session won’t solve every challenge, it will help reduce that overwhelm by getting laser-focused on what truly matters most in teaching reading.  research-based strategies that make a lasting difference—for every student, in every setting. Join us!

Students in our classrooms often come to us lacking skills like: organizing and planning, starting a task and finishing it, regulating emotions, paying attention, and self-monitoring their own behavior. These skills are known as Executive Functioning Skills. Executive Functioning skills are needed throughout our lives. When students lack these skills, they struggle socially and academically. Join me to learn more about EF skills and how to support students who need help improving their skills.

Learning goals:

1. What is Executive Functioning?

2. How do I know if my students have EF weaknesses?

3. Strategies, activities and games to improve EF skills.

Have you ever heard a parent say something like this: "I can understand why everyone is so frustrated with Freddie because I’m frustrated with him too! He can’t get ANYTHING done on time. Whether it’s homework, putting on his shoes, finding his coat…he CAN’T get it done! He gets so excited about writing a story but when it comes time to DO it, he just sits there staring at the pencil, taking forever to write things down or look things up. If I didn’t know Freddie so well, I would think he just didn’t care, but I know he does. One teacher thinks he’s lazy, the next says he just doesn’t care, and all of us are spending too much time yelling at him to get things done. How did this happen and what can we do?"

Do you have students like this? Let me share some new research and terms that might shed some light on what is happening in this child’s brain. We can then apply this new knowledge to education and the impact educators have on children like Freddie. 

Have you ever experienced a student who you felt chose to be “bad”? If there was a rule, this student would try to break it. Let’s look at this student through a new lens: the lens of childhood trauma. Trauma is everywhere in education. We will learn more about trauma: how it affects our students, signs that students are living with trauma, resiliency and how you can help them. We will also cover how trauma impacts YOU. Your past trauma(s) will dictate how you interact with students now. You cannot regulate students if you are not regulated first. You will gain important teaching strategies along the way to start using to help ALL students, not just those who are impacted by trauma. This is for Elementary teachers, Middle and High School teachers, Counselors, Administrators, and everyone in between!!

Learning Outcomes:

• Understand what trauma is and how it affects your students’ behaviors and learning [msubillings.us5.list-manage.com]

• Identify behaviors that signal possible trauma exposure

• Identify possible triggers to your students and to your own self

Learn strategies that create a safe environment for ALL students 

In this workshop, teachers will learn practical steps to introduce original thinking and creative problem solving to their students in any discipline. Specific activities that participants will experience include: Visual Journaling, Mental Mapping, and Collaborative Project Building .

Goals of this workshop will be:

· Teachers will be able to identify effective creative practice for their teaching (all disciplines).

· Teachers will create a visual journal and creative artifact based on that journaling.

· Teachers will identify at least two practical solutions to how they can apply what they learned in their own teaching practice.

Tentative Schedule:

10:00 – 12:00   Identifying Creative Problem-Solving that Can be Incorporated into the Classroom

                       · Visual Journaling on Campus

1:00 – 4:00

1:00 -- 3:30     - Apply Visual Journal In Your Discipline

3:00 -- 4:00     - Collective Practical Solutions—what can you actually do?

This training was created in collaboration with Sidney High School special education staff, based on key areas where additional support is needed.

Topics will include:

·  Finding and using community partner info and local resources

·  Navigating limited resource availability in rural areas

·  Supporting students with college and scholarship applications, FAFSA, and financial aid

·  Expanding work-based learning and training opportunities

·  Boosting student engagement in transition planning

·  Building strong school-family partnerships to support transition goals

We’ve invited guest presenters from partner agencies to join us and share practical tools and insight. The session will also include a walkthrough of the Region 1 Youth Transition Guide, which offers region-specific tools and timelines to support students, families, and educators.

Bonus: Participants will earn 2 continuing education units (CEUs) for attending.

If you have questions please direct them to Amber Foust afoust@sidneyps.com or

Kari Tarter kari.tarter@mso.umt.edu

Public Education Specialist

Montana Transition Resources

The Rural Institute for Inclusive Communities

University of Montana

406-243-5416 (Voicemail)

Join us for a comprehensive 6-hour training designed specifically for PK-2nd grade teachers, focusing on building and reinforcing foundational math skills in young learners. This two-part session, "Making It All Add Up!," will equip educators with the knowledge, strategies, and hands-on resources needed to ensure every child develops a strong mathematical foundation.

Part 1: Developing Children’s Number Sense
The first part of the training will dive into the developmental progression of number sense in young children. Participants will explore key predictive indicators for school readiness in mathematics and numeracy, such as subitizing, counting, one-to-one correspondence, cardinality, and hierarchical inclusion. This session will provide targeted instructional strategies to help teachers effectively introduce, reinforce, and build these critical concepts, setting the stage for academic success in mathematics.

Part 2: Math EVERY Day for EVERY Child!
The second part of the training will focus on integrating math into everyday classroom activities and routines. Teachers will be introduced to a variety of instructional strategies that give students continuous opportunities to practice and reinforce essential math skills throughout their day.

Participants will learn about inclusionary practices that ensure all students, regardless of their learning needs, have access to meaningful math experiences. The session will also cover developmentally appropriate strategies for knowledge and skill acquisition, making math accessible and engaging for every child.

In addition to classroom strategies, this session will present ideas for strengthening home-to-school connections, offering practical games and activities that can be easily shared with families to reinforce math skills at home. Teachers will also explore intervention strategies to support students who may need extra help mastering key concepts.

As a hands-on component, participants will have the opportunity to create make it/take it math activities. These ready-to-use resources will focus on the foundational skills discussed during the training, providing teachers with practical materials they can implement immediately in their classrooms.

6 OPI Renewal Units are available for this free Region 2 CSPD training.

FREE workbooks will be provided to those who attend!

The goal for the 9 essential skills for the love and Logic classroom is to provide low stress strategies for highly successful educators that make positive and lasting effects in their school and communities.  Through the program, educators will become further equipped with practical techniques that: 

§ are simple and easy to learn

§ teach responsibility and good character

§ change lives and lower stress levels

§  have immediate, positive effects on students and schools

Although there will be an overview of all 9 skills, this one-day workshop will specifically address the first 4 or 5.  There may be a second course offered or a series of online sessions to finish the course (and stay connected) for those that are interested.

The course will be taught in person by the facilitator Joe Moriarty and by video from Doctor Charles Fay (Founder and Owner of the Love and Logic Company).  The nine essential tools include:

§  Neutralizing Arguing

§  Delayed Consequences

§  Sincere Empathy

§  Short-Term Recovery

§  Positive Teacher – Student Relationships

§  Setting Limits and Enforceable Statements

§  Providing Choices within Limits

§  Quick and Easy Preventive Interventions

§  Guiding Students to Solve their problems