On-Demand Adoption Courses
Are you looking for on-demand adoption courses to expand your knowledge and skills as an adoptive parent, foster parent, or professional? You’ve come to the right place! I’d love to share my unique “trifecta perspective” with you—as a clinician, adoptee, and adoptive parent!
I’m a licensed psychologist specializing in adoption, trauma, and racial identity development, and I have a literal lifetime of experience with adoption—as an international and transracial adoptee from India, adoptive parent to a child from Ethiopia, and professional who has worked in the adoption community since 2002.
Choose your on-demand courses below and take advantage of several features:
- View at your own pace, unlimited times over a 30-day enrollment period
- Earn a customized certificate of completion for each course that you finish
- Download full course slides
- Receive a link to resource lists compiled to complement each course's content
- Download a free parent discussion guide accompanying every Adoptees Like Me author reading video
- COMING SOON! Download full course transcripts
Foster & Adoption Organizations
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Course Descriptions
* Courses are listed in the order recommended for best understanding & building upon the concepts presented, but each course can be viewed independently or out of order, as well. New courses will be added each year.
Unit 1: Implicit Memories, Trauma & the "6 Fs"
This course will explain how implicit trauma memories are created, stored & activated, identify the "6 Fs" (fight, flight, freeze, friend, fidget, flop), & provide strategies for assessing & responding to activated implicit trauma memories. (30 min; $25)
Unit 2: The Seven Core Issues in Adoption
This course will address the seven core issues in adoption: Loss/Abandonment, Rejection, Guilt/Shame, Grief, Identity, Intimacy & Control. Details about each core issues will include the associated internal question & concepts, influences on decision-making, behavior, self-esteem & relationships, the continuum of struggles to superpowers, & relevant parent support strategies. (2 hrs; $85)
Unit 3: Attachment-Focused Discipline
This course will explore necessary components of trauma-informed & attachment-driven discipline, including guidelines of responding with intention, considering sensory needs, identifying & reflecting emotions, acknowledging mistakes & seeking repair, praising effort & progress, & engaging in collaborative consequences. (30 min; $25)
Unit 4: Prevention, Preparation & Positive Connection for Common Behavioral Struggles
This course will provide strategies for prevention, preparation & positive connection when navigating common behavioral struggles, including separation anxiety/transitions, homework, rage & aggression, lying/stealing/hoarding, argumentativeness, & bedtime. (1 hr; $45)
Unit 5: Parenting Transracial Youth
This course will describe basic racial terminology & concepts, common lived experiences of transracially fostered & adopted youth, the intersection of the Seven Core Issues in Adoption with racial identity development, the Hierarchy of Racial & Cultural Identity Needs, strategies having developmentally appropriate conversations about race & racism, & offer self-reflection questions for parents & caregivers to better understand their own potential biases. (2 hrs; $85)
Unit 6: How to Talk About Difficult Birth Histories with Adoptees & Fosterees
This course will address the fundamentals of tough conversations, processing of parental reactions to a child's history, reduction of negative internalizations around one's history, & guidelines for developmentally appropriate language & concepts for histories that include abuse, neglect & domestic violence, substance abuse, rape, incest, sex work, incarceration & human trafficking. (1 hr; $45)
Unit 7: The Complexity of Birthdays, Anniversaries & Holidays
This course will discuss the possible impacts of complicated adoption-related dates, emotions & behaviors associated with loss, & the concept of celebration vs. commemoration. (30 min; $25)
Unit 8: Supporting Your Teen & Young Adult Through the College Years & Beyond
This course will describe common traits of late adolescence & early adulthood, associated strengths & struggles, parent support strategies for this stage of life, & red flags indicating the need for potential professional intervention. (2 hrs; $85)