Date/Time
Date(s) - May 12
9:00 am - 3:00 pm
Categories
Child Development and Infant Mental Health:
Two Worlds or One?
Friday, May 12th
9:00AM – 3:00PM
at
UJA-Federation of New York
130 East 59th Street
New York, NY 10022
Healthy social-emotional development for a young child encompasses the capacities to experience, manage, and express a full range of positive and negative emotions; develop close and satisfying relationships with others; and actively explore environments and learn. This is synonymous with what we call ‘infant mental health.’ This conference will explore social-emotional development as part and whole, first examining it as one component of child development (the part). Then it will examine the whole — how all aspects of development are affected by the child’s social-emotional development as an interdependent and integrative force and the reciprocal relationship between the child’s developmental capacities and the caregiving environment.
Out of this conceptual framework, the conference plenary and breakout session presenters will describe and illustrate hands-on applications for work with children and their parents to promote remedial and optimal pathways of development. We will discuss strategies and diverse situations that families may face due to their immigration and/or cultural experiences, and their encounters with various programs.
Dr. Wieder is the Clinical Director and a founding member of the Profectum Foundation, dedicated to advancing development and infant mental health through training and educational programs. She is a Board Member of Zero to Three, on the Advisory Board of NYZTT, and provides consultation and training to numerous international and national programs, including DIR-Israel.As a clinical psychologist, Dr. Wieder pioneered approaches to diagnosing and treating infants and toddlers with infant mental health and developmental disorders, starting with her work with Stanley Greenspan on a six year NIMH study reported in Multi-Risk Families. This led to chairing the Task Force on the first edition of DC 0-3 and the DIR Model. They later published The Child With Special Needs, Engaging Autism and Infant and Early Childhood Mental Healh. Dr. Wieder also developed approaches to integrate visual-spatial knowledge to advance emotional and cognitive development published in Visual Spatial Portals to Thinking, Feeling, and Movement with Harry Wachs, O.D.. Her current research interests concern fidelity in DIR intervention and follow up studies and is writing a book on symbolic development. At this time Dr. Wieder also practices on the Upper West Side in NYC.
Tal Baz, MS, OTR/L is a registered and licensed Occupational Therapist who has practiced as a DIR/Floortime therapist, supervisor and consultant for more than fifteen years and works both nationally and internationally with families, clinicians, and various school systems. She has a clinical practice in Somerville MA, and is teaching DIR/Floortime courses through the Profectum Foundation. Her special interests revolve around sensory-affective regulation, as it develops within the parent-child relational field. Tal has served on the DIR Faculty since 2001.
And Featuring Breakout Sessions Led By: