Embracing Success: Educating Students with Down Syndrome

This one-day conference is designed especially for educators including classroom teachers, resource teachers, education assistants, and other professionals who work in the school setting with an emphasis on providing knowledge and strategies that can be applied in the classroom and school setting to support students with Down syndrome and other developmental disabilities. Learn from the Down Syndrome Resource Foundation’s experienced multi-disciplinary team including teachers, speech and language pathologists, occupational therapists, comprehensive sexual health educators, and behaviour consultants. Join us in person or take part virtually!

8:15-9:00 Registration

9:00-10:15 Learner Profile of a Student with Down Syndrome (Dr. Susan Fawcett, PhD, RSLP)

Participants will learn what we currently know about the overall characteristics, health and medical factors, and learning style of people who have Down syndrome, and how we can effectively apply this knowledge. In addition, they will learn about how to analyze behavioural issues both in terms of contextual factors, and functions, i.e., the reasons why challenging behaviour occurs.

10:15-10:45 Coffee Break

10:45-12:00 Proactive Positive Behaviour Support Strategies (Sara Peralta, M.Ed, BCBA)

Positive Behaviour Support is a values-focused, evidence-based approach to addressing challenging behaviour and increasing adaptive behaviour. The presentation will introduce common proactive / preventative positive behaviour support strategies for students with Down Syndrome who engage in emerging challenging behaviours in school settings.

12:00-12:45 Lunch

12:45-2:00 Teaching and Consequence PBS Strategies (Sara Peralta, M.Ed, BCBA)

In this presentation, participants will learn about teaching adaptive &/or replacement behaviour to students with DS. They will also learn consequences strategies for positive behaviour, minor challenging behaviour and how to approach instances of more severe challenging behaviour.

2:00-2:30 Mental Wellness for Educators (Dr. Susan Fawcett, PhD, RSLP)

Educational assistants, classroom teachers and resource teachers have jobs that may cause them a great deal of stress at times. This session will focus on ways to help professionals build and maintain better mental health for themselves so that they may experience lower levels of stress and higher levels of enjoyment from their work.

2:30-2:45 Break

2:45-4:00 Mental Health in Individuals with Down Syndrome (Dr. Susan Fawcett, PhD, RSLP)

Mental health issues are more common in people with DS than in the neurotypical population. This session will cover the kinds of mental health issues that happen with this population, as well as signs and symptoms to look out for in students with DS. Finally, participants will learn about therapy approaches and coping tools for anxious or low mood states that work best for individuals with DS.

Susan Fawcett, PhD, RSLP
Registered Speech-Language Pathologist; Director of Therapy, Behaviour + Family Support

Susan began her career at DSRF as the head Speech-Language Pathologist from 2003 to 2019, and helped develop the therapy, adult, and summer programs during that time. She has been thrilled to watch the therapy and teaching team and programs grow vastly since she started. Susan has particular interest in the areas of social communication, mental health and problem behaviour in people with Down syndrome, as well as giving families the positive reinforcement they deserve. As part of completing her doctoral degree with Dr. Joe Lucyshyn in the Department of Educational and Counselling Psychology and Special Education in 2020, she completed a dissertation project evaluating a preventative parent training program for families of young children with Down syndrome who exhibit mild-to-moderate problem behaviour. During her schooling, Susan also completed a two-year practicum with a clinical psychologist at the Vancouver CBT Centre, where she learned how to provide cognitive-behaviour therapy techniques to adolescents and adults with developmental disabilities and mental health diagnoses such as depression and anxiety.

Sara Peralta, M.Ed, BCBA
Board Certified Behaviour Analyst

Sara is a Board Certified Behaviour Analyst (BCBA). She completed her undergraduate studies at the University of Calgary, and has a Master’s degree in Education with a focus on autism and other developmental disabilities from the University of British Columbia. While completing her undergraduate studies, Sara worked at DSRF in the summer camp programs, and then later as a teacher assistant in the adult reading program. Sara was an assistant in Dr. Susan Fawcett’s FC-PBS parent training program for families of young children with Down syndrome. She has worked as a behaviour consultant providing support to children in a variety of settings for several years. She is enthusiastic about family-centred positive behaviour support and believes that a collaborative partnership with families is key to effective treatment. She is excited to be part of the DSRF team supporting families and individuals of all ages.