Kyle Pruett Speaking Topics

• Neglect: The Silent Epidemic

  Kyle Pruett offers an eye-opening perspective on this most overlooked soon to be ‘discovered’, form of trauma in childhood. Pruett begins with a review of the compelling research on the power/prevalence of neglect, and how differently it impacts children and families than its more obvious (but frequent) partner, abuse. Forms of assessment and subsequent treatment are reviewed for efficacy, and why concerned clinicians and practitioners need to be thinking in more complex ways about this near epidemic is addressed with plenty of “what-to-do-about-it” advice and Q&A.

• Music as Brain Food

  As neuroscience advances, we are provided with new images almost weekly of how experience shapes the growing brain. Music has emerged as a remarkably influential architect: enhancing, connecting, and strengthening parts of the brain that are crucial in memory, problem solving, cognition, and emotion management to name a few. How this happens to whom, when, and why makes an intriguing illustrated (visual and auditory) story, with Kyle Pruett tying Lady Gaga to Beethoven and beyond. Dr. Pruett’s lifelong experience as a professional musician makes the Q&A segment of this presentation both animated and full of useful advice for parents and educators of the listener/performer/educators.

A Global Perspective on Paternal Engagement & Family Well-Being

Why are so many cultures who are worried about the well being of their families turning to paternal engagement as a way to lower the risk of further family weakening? Strong evidence-based programs, illustrated by journalistic narratives and video images from Turkey, aboriginal reserves in Alberta, and mixed ethnic groupings in California, serve as base of discussion with audience about how co-parenting influences have the capacity to change communities for the better in profound unforeseen ways.

Practical Neuroscience for Parents & Teachers

In this presentation, Kyle Pruett offers plain-English narration of the parts of the brain and gene science explosion that relate to changes in parenting and/or educating our children in the 21st century. His visually rich explanations highlight what we have now come to understand about the incredible power of experience to shape our genetic building blocks into unique assets and liabilities. Audiences leave this discussion with a new vocabulary, visual imagery of and respect for the plasticity of human growth and development across generations—the very bedrock of resilience. Respect for the limitations of our current understanding is highlighted during the Q & A.

New Horizons in Father Engagement: What to Do with Dad After You Have His Attention

Now that paternal involvement in the lives of children has been flagged as important to both child and family well being, many questions arise about how the nurturing world is to make room for father’s contributions, given that 1) those contributions differ from mother’s, and 2) child-centered systems (including the family, educational, and healthcare) aren’t currently shaped to easily integrate his contributions. Co-parenting no longer uniquely references parenting after divorce, serving instead as the marquis for the next phase of the real-world of paternal engagement—how parents tag team to raise their children across time, or not. Research and public policy are woven together with clinical realities of the diverse world of paternal and grandparental engagement where non-traditional arrangements expand almost daily. Advice is tendered throughout, ending with the signature audience-engaging Q&A of Kyle Pruett presentations.

Not Too Young to Notice: The Impact of Violence in Today's World on Infants, Toddlers & Preschoolers

As a cascade of public and personal violence seems to fill the early years of this century, parents and caretakers alike find themselves facing harder and more frequent questions about the effects such events have or will have on their youngest children. Dr. Kyle Pruett reviews the newest psychological and neurobiological science to help us understand • in plain English • the mechanisms by which such experiences impact our children and ourselves, and their potential to change us and our worldview in both helpful and not-so-helpful ways. Active Q & A will focus on advice for conversations and behavior techniques that reduce the stress of such events on our youngest children. Dr. Pruett's audiences leave feeling better understood, and equipped to help their families adapt to this increasingly familiar 21st-century context.