You are only as good as your habits. Children who excel get a head start with excellent habits. 
 

Jim delivers workshops and presentations to elementary, middle and high schools, as well as colleges, and universities. Programs for students are taught during school hours or after-school. These seminars are a blend of concrete action steps and the inspiration to take those steps. 


THE LEADERSHIP ADVANTAGE: BEGINNER SERIES 

You read to young children to instill a love for reading and give them a head start in school. You teach your children to swim so they will enjoy and feel confident around water. You enroll in The Leadership Advantage to help your child develop one of the most valued traits in our society— leadership. Introduce leadership to your child when she/he is building life-long behaviors.

Topics covered in this class include:

  • Successful people have an attitude, try out this attitude for yourself

  • Develop your charisma in 5 steps

  • Practice 3 habits used by successful goal-setting super stars

  • Learn to handle fear with the Sarnoff Squeeze

  • Find out what the T'NACI monster is and how you can slay it

  • Discover a behavior that destroys friendships and what you can do about it

The premise of this class is that true leaders first learn to lead themselves. This leadership occurs in 3 character building areas: attitude, goal-setting, and self-esteem.

This is a four part class, two hours per class.

I recently found myself thrilled when my son animatedly recounted to me every detail of the Beginning Leadership Advantage class he was taking at school. He went on for an HOUR about it and this is a boy who rarely says much of anything about school. I was impressed to realize that he was learning leadership concepts, ideas and techniques that took me years of on-the-job training to glean.
— Tracey Vosper

THE LEADERSHIP ADVANTAGE: INTERMEDIATE SERIES 

As a graduate of the Leadership Advantage: Beginner series, your students know that true leaders first learn to lead themselves. They also know how to turn goals into reality, how to master their P.E.G.S.S., and how to walk away from the T’NACI monster. They are now eligible for the next level, The Leadership Advantage: Intermediate series. This is the next step for students who are developing the character-enhancing skills they need to lead themselves. Building on the foundation laid in the beginner series, this intermediate program takes students up the leadership ladder.

Topics covered in this program include:

  • Steps you take to build a resilient bounce–back personality

  • Erasing language that steals your power

  • Playing the “solution game”

  • "Pick a habit" star chart goal-setting practice

  • Discover how to benefit others and yourself when you power praise someone

  • Leaders brains are different–How you can grow a leader brain

  • Take a challenge that will rid you of one of the top power-draining behaviors

The Leadership Advantage is based on the concept that true leaders first learn to lead themselves. When you can build your own life in positive ways, then you are on the path towards helping guide others. As with the foundation laying beginner series, the intermediate series is filled with interaction, laughter, stories, puppets, magic, games, and surprises.

There are so many take-aways from your program and the common language we can use in the classroom and at home.
— Alisha Zare

THE LEADERSHIP ADVANTAGE: Advanced SERIES 

Taking up where the intermediate program left off, the advanced program continues to develop skills you need to lead yourself, with a shift towards the leadership skills needed to lead others. Students work on communication skills, learn how to influence people in positive ways, and practice techniques used by personality detectives.

Topics covered in this program include:

  • Learn how to "read" people

  • Use the RIQE technique for positive communication and improved results

  • Learn how you can use "attitude tattoos" to stay motivated

  • Practice the "killer-whale" technique for changing behavior

  • Play "robot soccer" to discover the importance of being specific

  • The fastest way to change your behavior—Positactics

When you can build your own life in positive ways, then you may want to think about helping to guide others. Jim's multi-sensory approach to leadership takes advantage of all that brain science tells us about how people learn. This program includes story-telling, slide shows, custom games, songs, puppets, magic, and loads of interaction to keep students engaged.

I attended Jim’s sessions and was floored by both the substance as well as the way he teaches. He does not just teach concepts, he has activities that help transfer the ideas into daily interactions. Every activity in class is intentional and thought through––helping make the concepts into lifelong habits.
— Vaibhavi (parent Stevenson School student)

SECRETS OF A SUPER MEMORY: BEGINNER SERIES 

This class adds the fourth R to Readin', 'Ritin', and 'Rithmatic. The fourth R is Remembering. A big chunk of your child’s academic success is based on remembering. From kindergarten to college, tests measure memory. This is a class in "memory literacy"–a universally beneficial skill. Skills are taught with an emphasis on academic subjects: reading comprehension, social studies, foreign language, spelling, science, and geography. Using the techniques learned in this class, students have:

  • Memorized all 50 states and their capitals in under two hours

  • Learned 100 foreign language words in a weekend

  • Met 10 people at a virtual party and greeted those people a year later by name

  • Listed the 43 presidents of the United States in order after an hour of study

  • Been able to recite and explain the 10 amendments to the U.S. Constitution after one hour of study

Secrets of a Super Memory is interactive. There are a lot of games. Walk in on a program and you might see students using the memory skills employed by the Guinness Book record holder for learning foreign languages in a game called “snap.” Later you will see students physically acting out a story with a surprise memory ending. Watch as kids discover one of the secrets of super-spellers. At some point people may be juggling or playing memory games that cover constitutional amendments, geology, human anatomy, or botany. A number of the techniques used in this course come from Jim's book, Memory Smart.

This is a four part class, two hours per class.


SECRETS OF A SUPER MEMORY: INTERMEDIATE SERIES 

This class picks up where the Secrets of a Super Memory: Beginner series left off. In the first series, you learned 3 memory techniques: pegging, chaining and substitution. In the intermediate series we cover up to 9 memory techniques and practice using them on academic subjects:

  • Learn how to use VAKing to learn geology

  • Expand your SAT vocabulary rapidly with a cartoon memory technique

  • Find how you can use a simple code to remember anything with numbers at a genius level

  • Discover a method for holding large blocks of data in memory, and use it on interesting law cases

  • Practice a skill that will give you phenomenal recall for what you read

Secrets of a Super Memory: Intermediate is interactive. Again you will learn by playing. Walk in on the program and you might see students acting, distributing game cards to learn vocabulary, or passing rocks from the "quarry" to blindfolded geology students. The skills gained in the Secrets of a Super Memory: Beginner series allow us to look at more sophisticated memory techniques, like how to memorize a book. This is a big step towards becoming memory literate. A number of the techniques used in this class come from Jim's books, Memory Smart and How to Remember What You Read: How to Memorize a Book.

This is a four part class, two hours per class.


CREATIVITY AND CARTOONING: BEGINNER

Just like you teach a child to ride a bicycle, read a book, or play a musical instrument, you can teach your child how to be creative. It's a skill. There are a variety of tools that you have to master, but once you have them, it is like learning a foreign language. The earlier your child starts, the more competent she will become in speaking the language of creativity.

  • Find out how a cartoonist like Gary Larson and an inventor like Benjamin Franklin think alike

  • Construct a creativity wheel

  • Discover how to turn on your creativity with second-right answers

  • Learn how to use a creativity wallet just like Leonardo da Vinci (a pretty creative guy)

  • Play with the blender technique to come up with something that never existed before

Using cartooning as a tool, Jim Wiltens shows you how to increase creativity. Cartooning appeals to many children and introduces hands-on-training in coming up with imaginative ideas. The principles for coming up with a good cartoon are the same principles used by scientists, managers, film-makers, inventors, writers, entrepreneurs and anyone else who benefits from thinking different. Students can learn up to five creativity techniques:

While art techniques are taught, the primary focus of the class is hands-on experience with specific creativity skills. By the end of class, students will have a notebook filled with their creative ideas.

This is a four part class, two hours/class

Presenter's Background:

Jim Wiltens has sold cartoons to such publications as the San Francisco Chronicle, Bay Area Parent News Magazine, Western Winds, COMDEX,Sources, Blackbelt Magazine, and SKI . He is also the illustrator of six books: Edible and Poisonous Plants of Northern CaliforniaGoal Express!No More Nagging, Nit-picking, & Nudging, Memory SmartRemember What Your Read, and Camels, Skulls, and Cobras. Jim has used the creativity principles taught in this class in research environments, as a professional speaker, and in the businesses he owns.


I am so excited to hear the students using the language you taught them in order to be successful leaders. Just the other day, while observing students during a math tutorial, I overheard a conversation between two boys. One was complaining about a difficult problem, saying “I can’t do it.” The other responded, “don’t say that, say ‘I could if I......”, I complimented the student on the transfer of knowledge from your workshop to real life. I then commented to the teacher in charge, giving her the background. She now uses this phrase as a regular part of her tutorial program. Thank you again for fabulous tools you provided for the young eager minds at K.R. Smith!
— Diane Hemmes, Resource Coordinator for K. R. Smith Elementary School