Deanna’s practice combines a science-based knowledge of behavior and positive psychology to help children and parents develop effective skills that foster meaningful change. She uses a broad-based holistic approach in order to help children gain critical developmental skills and coping tools for difficulties. She works closely with parents to implement practical, evidence-based strategies to help with specific areas of need and to build a more positive parent-child relationship. Deanna fully collaborates with doctors, teachers and others who work with the child to ensure that all parties are fully aligned on how best to comprehensively support the child and parents. 

Deanna specializes in these areas:

  • Emotion Regulation
  • Impulsivity and Self-Regulation
  • Executive Function Skills
  • Adaptive Skills
  • Communication Skills
  • Social Skills

Deanna provides services for children ages 3-18 years old for support with:

  • Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD)
  • Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD)
  • Executive Function
  • Self-Regulation and Emotion Regulation
  • Social Skills

Services:

Parent Coaching: The focus in this area is education on ADHD, ASD, or other social-emotional and developmental difficulties. Parents learn how to fully support their child’s needs, the underlying factors that cause behavioral challenges, and new parent skills to develop a more positive parent-child relationship. Parents also learn how to support their child in developing his or her skills. Connection, validation, structure and boundaries along with scaffolding support for lagging skills are key in supporting children with extreme impulsivity and emotional difficulties.

Child Behavior Therapy & Coaching: This treatment involves a careful and therapeutic approach to skill development including: assessment of the child’s needs, behaviors, skills and learning style; development of concrete goals and supportive strategies; direct one-on-one teaching of skills; and measured tracking of progress. For young children and/or children with high support needs treatment methods are play-based. 

PEERS® Social Skills Treatment: The Program for the Education and Enrichment of Relational Skills (PEERS®) is an evidence-based social skills intervention for preschoolers, adolescents and young adults with ASD, ADHD, anxiety, depression and other socio-emotional challenges. This is a 16-week group program for parents and their child. Individualized therapy incorporating this treatment one-on-one is also provided. 

Executive Function Coaching: This area involves direct one-on-one or group skills training in: self-motivation and task initiation, sustaining attention, working memory, planning, organization and time management, response inhibition, self-regulation, emotion regulation and flexibility. This is a strengths-based approach in which the child is the leader in the process while still working towards concrete goals and using evidence-based strategies. This enables the child to learn about their processing styles and needs, as well as which systems work best for him/her. 

Classroom Support: This type of support includes working with the child’s classroom teachers to implement individualized supports for the child to help manage challenging symptoms of ADHD, ASD or other difficulties in the classroom that may be barriers to learning.