“Self-care means giving yourself permission to pause” – Cecilia Tran

Join Heidi Kutchin and Shelly Sender for a preview to the conference and learn about self-care and amazing ideas to bring to your staff meetings.

Presenter Bio:  Shelly Sender has been dedicated to the field of early childhood education for 34 years.  She has an undergraduate degree in Psychology and a Master’s degree in Education Administration and Early Childhood Disorders.  She has served as the Early Childhood Education Director at Temple Emanu-El Dallas for the past 10 years, where 330 children and 96 staff members are a vital part of her life.  Shelly lives in Dallas, Texas, and has a husband of 33 years, three amazing children, ages 30, 28, and 22.  She has owned and operated an early childhood school for seventeen years, as well as owned and operated a farm business where children were strongly connected to nature.  Shelly believes that children are competent  and their opinions are very important.  Therefore, she is very passionate about the Reggio Emilia  methodology, which aligns with this belief.  Strong relationships and inquiry based learning are very relevant in her work with children.  Shelly has served on several child advocacy boards, as well as the CJE - Center for Jewish Education, in Dallas. She is very committed to her volunteer work in the Jewish community in Dallas.  Shelly wants to instill in every child a lifelong desire to learn, as well as inspire the educators she is blessed to work with, to continue to grow and learn professionally.

Co-Presenter Bio:  Heidi Kutchin embraced Early Childhood education at Temple Emanu-El  over 23 years ago starting as a classroom teacher.  She is currently the Pedagogy Adviser where she ensures pedagogy alignment (Reggio inspired) throughout the school and develops and supports teacher documentation. Heidi mentors educators in curriculum, environment and professional development. She is passionate about learning along side early learners as well as adult learners.  She has developed and organized multiple workshops and conferences nationwide. Heidi attended the International Study Group in Reggio-Emilia, Italy in 2017. She has a Bachelor's Degree in business from the University of Texas at Austin. She resides in Dallas with her husband Josh, and two sons.