Free Webinars on ASD & Mindfulness from Padmaja Sarathy

Padmaja Sarathy—one of ED311’s long-running collaborators and valued educational consultants—is the creator of many of our most popular and highly regarded resources, including Autism Spectrum Disorders: Seven Steps of Support, Mindfulness-based Practices for Developing Brains, and P.R.E.V.E.N.T. Problem Behaviors: Seven Contemplative Discipline Steps. Padmaja’s approach to student support is wholistic and thoughtful, blending useful strategies with emotional insight and sensitivity in a fresh and unique way.

Padmaja is the founder and president of Parent Engagement for Active Child Enrichment (PEACE). PEACE coaches and guides families, particularly those from marginalized populations, to enable and enrich children toward a productive academic and life trajectory. She is a globally engaged educational consultant and author with expertise in the fields of early childhood and special education.

In addition to authoring practical texts, Padmaja offers free webinars that complement and expound upon the content found in her guides. These webinars are presented by AbleNet University and are available on-demand. They also provide professional credit hours.

Her webinars on Autism Spectrum Disorder comprise a three-part series:

Children w/ ASD: Understanding & responding to the Communication Behavioral & Social Characteristics

Children with autism spectrum disorder tend to process and respond to information in the environment in unique and unusual ways which frequently present challenges to educators and families. This session will illustrate how to better understand the characteristics of children with ASD and the underlying factors that contribute to their problem behaviors in order to provide individualized supports and interventions to maximize their academic, social, and behavioral outcomes. This session is part one of a three-part series.

Setting and Student-specific Personalized Interventions and Supports for Children with ASD

This session, combining the portrayal of several student case examples and setting-specific situations, will present proactive intervention techniques and tools to reduce challenging behaviors of students with ASD. Empowered with best-practice techniques grounded in the positive behavioral interventions and supports (PBIS) approach, you can transform your knowledge into constructive action to achieve desirable long-term outcomes for children with ASD. This session is part two of a three-part series.

Transform Transition Meltdown to Calm-down

Changes in routines, activities, materials, or environments can trigger transition-related tantrums in children with ASD. Experiencing anxiety and stress, they may engage in aggressive or oppositional behaviors. This workshop, drawing from evidence-based best practices, will demonstrate how to pursue child-focused approaches–seven support strategies–to prevent transition-related meltdowns and create smooth transitions. This session is part three of a three-part series.

To accompany the content in these webinars, we suggest Padmaja’s reference guide Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD): Seven Steps of Support as an invaluable resource for those who work with children with ASD. Packed with practical and proven strategies, this guide presents seven steps for maximizing academic, social, and life outcomes for children with ASD, while minimizing the impact of some of their complex behavioral and learning characteristics. It includes examples of interventions and techniques that teachers can put into practice immediately to improve outcomes for students with ASD.

In addition to her work on ASD, Padmaja is an expert in and an advocate for Mindfulness in the classroom. She shares strategies, skills, and activities in the webinar Cultivate Calmness, Concentration and Coping Skills. This webinar is also free and provides professional credit hours. Here participants will learn to spark joy and grow learners’ abilities to develop calmness, concentration, and attentional control to build focus for learning. Participants will learn how to integrate mindfulness-based practices as part of their daily routine while nurturing social-emotional skills. Padmaja’s laminated reference guide Mindfulness-based practices for Developing Brains is an excellent companion text for this training, providing the ‘what, why, and how’ of mindfulness practice: identifying what mindfulness-based training is, why it is beneficial for developing brains, and how to implement it with step-by-step instructions.