Centers
Learning and Development Center
When children enter the classroom, they bring their unique gifts as well as challenges. Even if their gifts are exceptional, difficulties in reading, writing, listening, or math may leave them feeling frustrated, anxious, and inadequate.
The Child Mind Institute’s Learning and Development Center is dedicated to giving children the tools and support they need to manage their learning difficulties and succeed in school. Our dedicated team of clinicians provides diagnostic evaluations, neuropsychological testing, and personalized education plans that take into account your child’s learning strengths and deficits. Most important, our clinicians write comprehensive, user-friendly reports that offer recommendations for you and your child’s school and can serve as baselines from which to measure his future progress.
We also present free workshops for parents and professionals:
- Learning and Development Workshop Series
- Early Educator Lecture Series
- School Psychologist Roundtable Series
- Practical Parenting Workshop Series
Our workshops are livestreamed—so you can attend in person or participate online.
Summer Scribblers
Summer Scribblers is a five-day intensive writing program to help middle school children develop stronger writing abilities through an interactive, fun and scientifically proven program.… READ MORE
Evaluation and Neuropsychological Testing
We want to understand how your child learns best. We use evidence-based evaluation methods, including neuropsychological testing, to gain deeper understanding of how your child learns and processes information compared to other children of the same age.
By way of example, a child might be able to articulate very complicated concepts and yet struggle to read, or he might read very fluidly but have poor reading comprehension. Our evaluations and neuropsychological testing help us determine the nature of your child’s learning strengths and deficits. We need this information to develop your child’s individualized education program (IEP). The IEP includes practical strategies your child can use to compensate for learning deficits by using learning strengths.
During our evaluation process, we also consider how your child is doing emotionally and how he or she is interacting with family members, friends, and classmates.
Treatment
After a comprehensive evaluation and diagnosis, we do a feedback session with you and your child. This is when we discuss your child’s strengths and weaknesses. We also aim to build your child’s self-esteem as we create a team and a shared vision of what we’ll work on in treatment. We develop realistic goals for your child’s individualized education program (IEP) and also determine the services and accommodations your child will need at school to be successful.
The IEP is often what parents need in order to get a school to provide certain services and accommodations that a child is entitled to receive. We are available to speak with your child’s school, either in person or in a video conference, to share our recommendations and help communicate your child’s strengths as well as deficits when he needs extra services and learning accommodations—support he requires to reach his full potential. Since children often behave differently at school than at home—due to the academic demands on their learning disability—we help you and the school (teachers and other school personnel) work collaboratively to support your child’s academic development.
Conditions we treat include: dyslexia (difficulty reading), dysgraphia (difficulty writing), mathematics disorder (difficulty with mathematics), attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and attention-deficit disorder without hyperactivity (ADD).
To make an appointment, please call us at 212.308.3118 or request an appointment online.
Our Team
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Matthew Cruger, PhDSenior Director, Learning and Development Center
Child Mind InstituteMatthew M. Cruger, PhD, a leading clinical psychologist, has extensive experience conducting neuropsychological testing, cognitive ...
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Dominick Auciello, PsyDNeuropsychologist, Learning and Development Center
Child Mind InstituteDominick Auciello, PsyD, is a leading neuropsychologist with extensive expertise providing neuropsychological assessments to children ...
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Ruth Lee, MEd, ET/PSenior Educational and Learning Specialist and Director of Clinical Outreach
Child Mind InstituteRuth M. Lee, MEd, ET/P, is a professional educational therapist, a licensed special educator ...
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Rachel Cortese, MS, CCC-SLPSpeech-Language Therapist
Child Mind InstituteRachel (Eckenthal) Cortese, MS Ed, MS CCC-SLP, a licensed speech-language therapist, specializes in the evaluation ...
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Michael Rosenthal, PhDPediatric Neuropsychologist
Child Mind InstituteMichael Rosenthal, PhD, is a pediatric neuropsychologist with expertise in the evaluation and treatment of ...
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Steven G. Dickstein, MDPediatric Psychopharmacologist
Child Mind InstituteSteven G. Dickstein, MD, is a child and adolescent psychiatrist with extensive experience diagnosing and ...
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Natalie Weder, MDPediatric Psychopharmacologist
Child Mind InstituteNatalie Weder, MD, is a child and adolescent psychiatrist with extensive experience diagnosing and treating ...
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Susan J. Schwartz, MAEdLearning and Educational Specialist
Child Mind InstituteSusan J. Schwartz, MAEd, is a national expert in child development, reading and literacy, learning ...
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Dena Buchalter, PhD, NCSPPediatric Neuropsychologist, Learning and Development Center
Child Mind InstituteDena G. Buchalter, PhD, NCSP, is a pediatric neuropsychologist with extensive experience in the assessment ...
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Ken Schuster, PsyDAssociate Neuropsychologist, Learning and Development Center
Child Mind InstituteKenneth Schuster, PsyD, is a pediatric neuropsychologist specializing in the evaluation and treatment of learning ...
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