Events
Space Craft Training: Transform Your Environment, Transform Outcomes
Tuesday, 27-May-2025 
10:00 am -
1:00 pm
mt
Event Details
Space Craft Training
This training highlights how environmental messaging is continuously observed by humans—including staff, clients, and others in caregiving and therapeutic contexts—and how it directly impacts behavior, use of space, and the sense of safety in a setting. Participants will learn how intentional, well-crafted environmental cueing, tailored to the specific context, can support children and adults in regulating, relating, carrying out ideas, and achieving goals ranging from developmental milestones to productivity and therapeutic outcomes.
Practical strategies will be shared for strengthening environmental cueing to clearly convey behavioral information and the intended purpose of a space across a variety of settings. Participants are encouraged to bring photos of their own workspaces to the session in order to leave with individualized strategies they can immediately implement.
This is a hands-on, applied training designed for direct-use by practitioners. It is not a train-the-trainer or consultant-level session.
By the end of this session, participants will be equipped to:
- Understand the concept of Atmospherics and how the physical environment shapes perception and experience
- Recognize the impact of environment on regulation and therapeutic work
- Define environmental cueing and its relationship to behaviour
- Articulate the value of reducing visual stimulation in therapeutic settings—and learn effective strategies to create calmer, more focused environments.
- Identify simple, budget-friendly environmental modifications that enhance regulation in offices, clinics, and classrooms.
About Dr. Kristie Brandt
Dr. Kristie Brandt is an internationally known teacher, clinician, and consultant, specializing in infant and early childhood mental health, trauma, reflective supervision, and Touchpoints. She is also an Assistant Clinical Professor of Pediatrics VCP at the University of California Davis School of Medicine. In 2002, she founded and directs what is now the 15-month University of California CPE Napa Infant-Parent Mental Health Fellowship that has trained nearly 700 Fellows from around the world. She was the Chief of Public Health in Napa County, CA and retired after 25 years of public service. While there, she developed the Therapeutic Child Care Center for children 0-5, and in the process became acquainted with Dr. Bruce Perry and his NMT work. She has studied, clinically implemented, and developed early childhood and reflective practice applications using Perry’s concepts for over 27 years. Dr. Brandt also worked closely with Dr. T. Berry Brazelton, and taught with him globally for over two decades on Touchpoints and child development.
She is lead editor of the book “Infant & Early Childhood Mental Health: Core Concepts & Clinical Practice”, author of the book “Facilitating the Reflective Process: An Introductory Workbook,” and has authored or co-authored numerous journal articles and chapters.
Brandt earned her Master’s and Doctorate at Case Western Reserve University, and completed a post-doctoral Fellowship in Infant-Parent Mental Health through the Child Development Unit at Boston Children’s Hospital. She is endorsed as an Infant-Family & Early Childhood Mental Health Specialist and Reflective Mentor through the California Center for Infant-Family & Early Childhood Mental Health, and is also endorsed as an Infant Mental Health Specialist & Clinical Mentor through the international Alliance for the Advancement of Infant Mental Health and Michigan Association for Infant Mental Health.
She is an active member of the American Psychiatric Nurses Association, and is also a licensed and board-certified nurse practitioner and nurse midwife. She is a Newborn Behavioral Observations (NBO) trainer through Boston Children’s Hospital Division of Developmental Medicine’s Brazelton Institute., on the national training team for Brazelton’s Touchpoints, and the Touchpoints Site Coordinator for Napa, CA.
In 2019, Dr. Brandt received the Distinguished Alumni Award from her Alma Mater, Case Western Reserve University FPB in Cleveland, Ohio. She has also received fourteen awards for her work focused on the mental health, wellbeing and development of infants and children including: The Alicia Lieberman Infant Mental Health Leadership Award from the California Association for Infant Mental Health (2023); Phyllis Rae McGinley Champion for Children Award ChildTrauma Academy Neurosequential Model Network (2017); U.S. House of Representatives Certificate of Special Congressional Recognition for Serving the Mental Health Needs of Children (2015); and the Touchpoints Distinguished Leader Award from the Brazelton Touchpoints Center, Boston Children’s Hospital (2013).