Sendan Center
Sendan Learning Services
Sendan Learning Services provides multidisciplinary diagnosis and treatment of learning disorders, as well as academic support and family support.
Learning services we provide:
• Executive Functioning Coaching
• Language and Learning Assessment*
• Language and Learning Therapy
*Speech and learning assessments do not test for ADHD*
Learning challenges in children can be due to a single factor or a combination of factors, including:
- Language Processing (example: dyslexia)
- Executive Functioning (example: time-management or homework planning skills)
- Social Language Skills
- Cognitive Skills
- Anxiety
- ADHD
Research shows childhood learning disorders are ideally diagnosed and treated in a multidisciplinary manner
Executive Functioning Coaching FAQs
If you would like to schedule a learning assessment or are seeking treatment services:
The Learning Services Director will call you within 2 – 3 weeks of receiving the completed forms and intake fee, and sooner if possible. |
If you are already an established Learning Services or Executive Functioning client, click here: Learning Services – Established Clients
Learning Services Team:
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Learning Services General FAQs:
Do you bill insurance?
Sendan Learning Services are private pay only. We do not bill insurances or Medicaid/HCA. You will receive a rate sheet prior to treatment, and will be billed monthly for services received. Payment is due upon receipt of the bill.
How much do services cost?
ASSESSMENT:
Full language and learning assessments (comparable to psychoeducational testing) are available, as well as consultative assessments and screenings. The assessment is tailored to the specific needs of the client and family, and will be collaboratively decided on by Jennifer Gruenert and the family. Assessment, testing and report-writing is billed at $140 / hour.
TREATMENT:
Executive Functioning Coaching (study skills, organization, time management): $80 / hour
Learning & Language Disorder Therapy Services (language, memory, processing, dyslexia, social skills): $120 / hour
TEAM MEETINGS:
At hourly rate of all attending team members, as above.
Executive Functioning (EF) Coaching FAQs:
What is Executive Function?
Executive function refers to frontal lobe, “whole brain” organizational and management skills, including:
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- Working memory
- Response inhibition
- Task initiation
- Sustained attention
- Goal-directed persistence
- Organization
- Planning/prioritizing
- Emotional control
- Flexibility
- Metacognition
- Time management
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Who benefits from executive functioning coaching?
Children and teens who struggle to meet the day-to-day demands of home and school. These children may show poor awareness or inconsistent skills with time, situational awareness (difficulty reading the room), organization, planning, problem-solving, and other skills required to notice and manage everyday tasks and challenges. Most are also self-directed learners who demonstrate unique points of view, talents, passion, and creativity, but can tend to be very “out of step” with the expectations of their teachers and parents.
What does the onboarding process for EF coaching look like?
The Sendan EF Coach initially meets for two diagnostic interview sessions with the student and their parent or parents to learn about their child’s strengths, challenges, and mixed skills across a set of EF sub-skills. Parents are also required to view a recorded introduction to Executive Functioning presented by the Learning Services Director, Jennifer Gruenert. Based on the interview sessions and intake paperwork, the Sendan Learning Services Director meets with the EF Coach to develop an Individualized EF Coaching Plan targeting the specific sub-skills that the student needs to strengthen. The EF Coach then meets with the student, typically on a weekly basis for hour-long sessions. Sometimes sessions are scheduled to occur more or less frequently, for example, twice weekly to get new habits established or monthly/quarterly on a maintenance schedule. Sessions can be conducted in the family’s home, in-person at Sendan Center, or over the computer as a tele-coaching session.
What does an EF coaching session look like?
EF Coaching sessions tend to be highly individualized based on the particular student’s needs and readiness to take on learning challenges. The underlying goal of EF coaching is to develop the student’s executive skills, which are the skills used by each individual to accomplish the goals they perceive to be priorities. EF coaching helps students to bridge from external control (provided by parents and teachers at younger ages) to internal control (self-managing to set and achieve goals). This means that coaching rarely starts off with addressing the student’s biggest challenges. Many students we work with need to start with skills like practicing co-regulation (and then self-regulation) in the face of challenges and frustration, finding and using their intrinsic motivation, and practicing new EF strategies and approaches in the context of motivating, familiar, enjoyable tasks, like crafts, games, drawing, and other hands-on projects. As they develop the readiness to apply strategies to work that is truly challenging, the focus of sessions will also shift.
Most of our EF sessions take place in person at Sendan Center’s clinic in Bellingham (4201 Meridian St Ste 113, Bellingham, WA 98226), but we are also able to provide sessions over telehealth and, in some cases, we can provide sessions in the client’s home. Sessions are generally one-on-one with the client and their EF coach, but we are offering online group sessions over the summer (click here for more information).
How do we get started?
Complete and submit the Learning Services New Patient Forms and mail/drop off a $50 payment to the Sendan Center front office. Our learning services admin will call you to schedule the initial two assessment sessions.
If you would like to get a feel for what EF coaching can look like without filling out the intake packet and getting on the waitlist, we recommend attending our Executive Functioning drop-in group over the summer. For more information, follow this link: EF Skills Group