At the end of my training day in West Texas, after spending the day with almost two hundred early childhood professionals from Head Start, the director walked to the front of the room. I assumed she was about to transition the group to their next activity, wrap up the day. Instead, she started telling a story.
This director, Mrs. Webbs, is strong. Brilliant. Steady. She moves and thinks with intention, so the moment she started speaking, I knew whatever she shared would be moving.
She told the room that two years ago, she’d met me at the National Head Start Association Conference. She remembered my keynote, but what stuck with her even more was a smaller talk I gave in the exhibit hall. From that moment, she said, she knew she wanted to bring me to West Texas someday. She’d been thinking about it ever since.
She told her staff she couldn’t remember all the specific things I’d said that day two years ago. But she remembered how it made her feel. And her hope, she said, was that as we spent the day together: talking about pencil moments, the importance of connection, using the CLARITY Model to see children’s behavior through a more compassionate lens, that her staff would walk away feeling the same way she had.
Then she paused and told us she was a religious woman, and she wanted to empahsize one thing:
“God bless you, Doctor Amy.”
My eyes filled with tears. Partly because of the blessing itself. But mostly because I understood what she was really saying: thank you for putting this work into the world.
This is my life’s work. I love watching professionals catch small insights, little glimmers, pieces of hope, and the realization that they can make a difference in a child’s life, and that in most cases, they already are.
I was so proud to be in West Texas today, and so struck by the collective wisdom in that room. We told dad jokes. We danced. We sang “If You’re Happy and You Know It.” And somewhere in between, two hundred professionals understood children’s behavior just a little bit more.
If each of them takes just one small tool back to their classroom and uses it with the thousands of children they’ll interact with over their careers, that ripple is enough. That’s the whole point.
If this story resonates with you and YOU want to be that somebody in a child’s life, you can do it and you can learn with us on November 4, 5, & 6. Join the waitlist here.
