ABOUT
BRAIN BUDDY
Hello!
I'm Nicole, the Founder of Brain Buddy! I'm an experienced Educator who specializes in 1:1 and Small Group Executive Functioning (EF) Coaching.
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Learn more about the benefits of EF Coaching here.
Why me?
When building your 'village of support', parents typically consider: "Can I trust this person?" and "Are they qualified?". Below you can find some of my key credentials that inform my Coaching Practice. You can also review some Parent Testimonials to begin building our trust, as well as check out my Coaching Toolkit to learn more about how I work toward your child's goals.
Education
I graduated at the top of my class from New York University where I received a dual Bachelor’s degree in Special Education and Childhood Grades 1-6, as well as a minor in Child and Adolescent Mental Health Studies. In my time at NYU, I also held an internship at the NYU Child Study Center in Parent-Child Interaction Therapy (PCIT). While interning under the supervision of nationally recognized NYC Clinical psychologist and ADHD expert, Dr. Yamalis Diaz, I realized my true passion for working with neurodiverse children, specifically children with ADHD and Autism Spectrum Disorder. It was a privilege to witness the progress the students made with treatment and fueled me to continue learning more about the importance of meeting children's mental health needs.
Experience
I now have over 10 years of classroom teaching experience in grades Pre-K through 4th grade across Vermont, California, and NYC, and hold NYS licensure in Special Education and Childhood 1-6.
My passion for working with neurodiverse students continued to grow while teaching in a 1st grade ICT classroom for 6 years in NYC (Harlem). The classroom was structured to provide small group and 1:1 coaching opportunities daily for our students. I was responsible for writing Individualized Education Plans (IEP), in addition to creating and implementing many behavioral plans and reward systems to meet the needs of my diverse student population. I found my passion for creating individual plans while coaching students on specific social emotional and executive functioning skills. Witnessing immense growth in my students, through data collection, I continued my quest to work 1:1 with children and their families.
Beyond
I was also given the opportunity to build my teacher toolkit with formal training in literacy development from The Lavinia Group for 6 years. Additionally, I expanded my knowledge of the Social Thinking Methodology with 5 years of professional development training with Social Thinking expert, Nancy Tarshis. I fell so deeply in love with the Social Thinking curriculum and the positive impacts it had on all of my learners, that I continued my studies into summer programs earning Continuing Education credits for Part 1: Me in the Social World- It All Starts with Social Self-Awareness and Part 2: Using Social Competencies to Navigate in the Social World. I also spent 3 summers attending the Teacher’s College Reading and Writing workshops at Columbia University to increase my knowledge of effective academic teaching practices to pair with the social emotional and executive functioning strategies I was teaching my students.
Brain Buddy!
As my knowledge grew and my love for working with students individually, I decided to take the leap and leave the classroom setting to pursue 1:1 and small-group coaching in Executive Functioning skills. This is how Brain Buddy Coaching came to life!
