Behavioral Health Collective

Annie McLaughlin, BCBA—and education lawyer, Alexandra Rosenblatt—join Erika to discuss this tricky area in which they specialize and provide some insight on how professionals can help collaborate with school teams and families throughout the IEP process.

Shalini & Sumanta Das—both BCBA and OT, and Founders/Directors of Symbiosis Pediatric Therapy—join Erika to discuss the multidisciplinary nature of their clinic and plenty of insights for both OTs and behavior analysts who are working together. They also impart some wisdom about collaboration that they have honed over the years.

Tina Gunn (M.Ed., BCBA, DATA Team) and Julie Grundy (M.Ed., Teacher, DATA Team) join Erika to discuss working together to support students with complex needs in school settings. They both serve students and school teams in district support roles and have worked together on teams to design and implement the Practical Functional Assessment and Skill Based Treatment process (PFA-SBT) for some of their learners. Julie and Tina discuss their work with students, how they have collaborated both as a teacher and BCBA but also with large school teams, and finally impart some wisdom that they've learned over the years of working in their district-level support roles. This is a conversation not to be missed by teachers, educators, school district staff and behavior analysts working in schools!

Featuring Jandy Flores, a BCBA and Lorena Castillo, pre-K classroom teacher, this conversation talks about getting young kids excited to learn to read. Jandy is known as The Reading Behaviorist and describes her business and charity in this conversation. Jandy and Lorena discuss their professional collaborative relationship and the behavioral-based strategies they use to increase motivation in young children to want to learn to read. Jandy is in a very niche area using behavior analysis to set kids up for reading success by setting up the MO to do so. This conversation is great for preschool or pre-k teachers as well as BCBAs working with young children.

Erika chats with Georgiy about how he uses behavior analysis to teach his students to invest and understand basic financial concepts. He also shares some insights on being a BCBA with a side hustle and a dose of work-life balance. Funancialism has so much enthusiasm for the work he does and just hearing his passion for it is inspiring!

Nick Green chats with Erika about starting up his business, BehaviorFit and how he offers a unique behavior analytic approach to fitness coaching services. Nick shares some insights from his experience building his business and some resources for other solopreneurs or BCBAs aspiring to strike out on their own.

This conversation highlights not only the research this team is doing but the collaborative relationship between psychologist Dr. Krista Johnston and BCBA Monica Millar. Whether you're working across disciplines as a BCBA and a psychologist, or serving clients with IDD, ASD and anxiety, this conversation will be of interest to you!

Hilary and Nicole join Erika to share more about their work with families towards healthy sleep. If you or a family member has any challenges with sleep, this is a great conversation with some solid takeaways. Nicole shares their best advice for healthy sleep habits and Hilary shares some wisdom for parents of babies and young children to set them up for long-term sleep success.

Amelia Bowler joined Erika Ng to discuss highlights from her book and provides personal and professional insights about supporting a child with an ODD diagnosis. Amelia's compassionate and insightful approach to working with this unique group of children is due to her being a parent of a child with an ODD diagnosis and also an experienced clinician serving families in this area. Listen to understand more about Oppositional Defiant Disorder.

Dr. Katie Saint from Appleton, Wisconsin joins Erika to discuss the intersection of counseling and behavior analysis to serve adolescents, adults and families with her unique lens. If you have an adolescent struggling with behavioral and mental health challenges, listen in as Katie discusses when to see a dually certified professional and the benefits of counsellors having a behavior analytic background.

Behavior Analyst Alexia Stack joins Erika Ng to discuss what trauma-informed behavior-analytic services can look like. This conversation is great for anyone, even if your child hasn't experienced trauma. Alexia highlights how behavior analytic services are flexible and individualized, and how behavior analysts collaborate with other professionals.

Michael Maloney joined Erika Ng to branch out from reading interventions a little bit and discuss the criticism trap. This is something all families can struggle with. It can become a problem as it breaks down rapport and the relationship between a parent and child. Listen to learn how to identify, fix and avoid the criticism trap.

Today, Courtney Bilton joins Erika to discuss the use of values-based parent-coaching. This framework is founded in Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT). She shares how it has shifted her own parenting perspectives as well. Courtney takes a humble approach recognizing that even the most skilled professionals don't have it all together when it comes to parenting. Courtney also describes what parent coaching may look like for families and when they might consider reaching out to a parent coach for additional support and direct coaching. 

Michael Maloney joins Erika Ng again to discuss the science of learning by combining evidence-based techniques called Precision Teaching, Behavior Analysis and Direct Instruction. Michael's current teaching procedures use these three practices which are all based in behavioral science. 

Board Certified Behavior Analyst Caitlin Ball joined Erika Ng to discuss behavior science in everyday life. This episode is a great primer if you're totally new to learning about behavior analysis but also good for anyone who has been following the podcast and wants to know more about the basics of the science.

Katie Rinald joins Erika Ng to discuss common challenges with toilet training for all sorts of children, regardless of their diagnosis or age. The goal of this episode is to give families hope that even if they have been told their child will never be toilet trained, have been barred from accessing community resources due to not being toilet trained or simply have given up as they've tried everything -- toilet training is possible!

Erika Ng had a conversation with Michele Shilvock, a Behavior Analyst and local pioneer in multi-disciplinary service delivery. Having been in the field of behavioral health for 22 years, she has a lot of insights to share. Her passion for providing robust services to children and youth is evident in this episode. 

In this special episode, we had a parent who joined a practitioner to share their story. Adrianna Horne, a homeschooling parent of a neurodiverse family joined Michael Maloney to talk about remedial reading. Hearing directly from Adrianna as a consumer of behavior analytic services was a powerful conversation and is not an episode to miss!

Gabrielle Stigant joins Erika Ng to discuss her niche work with neurodivergent females and social skills instruction. She describes some of the differences between males and females who are neurodivergent and how females can be overlooked, but in need of support.

In this inaugural episode of the Behavioral Health Collective Podcast, Erika introduces herself as the host of the show. She is a Behavior Analyst located in British Columbia, Canada. She shares the vision of the podcast which is to share some of the great work happening in the field of Behavior Analysis to improve the lives of children, adolescents, parents, educators, and the greater community. Erika shares the goals of the Behavioral Health Collective which includes sharing evidence-based information with families and educators while advocating for better access to services to improve behavioral health for individuals. Join the community by listening in, sharing feedback, or requesting specific topics!