The Heart Behind Elm Sprouts
Emotional intelligence is the key to every child’s well-being and success.
Every child deserves to understand their feelings and feel confident expressing them. Elm Sprouts was created to make social-emotional learning approachable, transforming everyday moments into opportunities for growth, empathy, and connection. Together, parents guide children in learning to identify, understand, and manage their emotions, and take positive action in social settings.
Monica Au Yeung, Elm Sprout’s Founder
“Cultivating Compassion.”
Elm Sprouts was shaped by three parts of my life: my work as an educator, years of professional experience supporting children and youth, and my journey as a mother.
For over 15 years, I’ve worked alongside children in schools, group homes, and college programs — including those with autism and trauma-affected backgrounds. Through this work, I developed practical, structured strategies to help children understand and manage their emotions.
When I became a mother, those same strategies became personal. I applied them at home and witnessed how even young children can learn the language of emotions when it is taught with consistency and care.
Elm Sprouts was created at the intersection of professional experience and motherhood — bringing structured social-emotional learning into everyday family life..
At the core of emotional learning are three values I hold close: self-love, self-esteem, and self-confidence. They’re the seeds of every child’s emotional growth.
Self Love
I create open and non-judgmental spaces where respect and kindness invite honest sharing of thoughts and feelings. When you learn to care for yourself with empathy, compassion naturally grows and extends to others.
Self Esteem
Celebrate every step of progress, no matter how small. By embracing trial and error, you discover both your strengths and areas to grow, learning to give yourself grace and move forward at your own pace.
Self Confidence
There is strength in acknowledging how far you’ve come. Confidence grows when you recognize your progress, trust your abilities, and stand firmly in your own story with pride and calm assurance.
How Motherhood Shaped My Mission
Motherhood shifted my perspective.
What I once taught in structured settings became part of everyday life — during difficult moments, big emotions, and ordinary routines.
I began to see how powerful consistent emotional language can be at home, not just in schools.
It reinforced something important:
Children don’t need complicated systems.
They need steady guidance, shared language, and patient modeling.
Elm Sprouts grew from that realization — bringing practical emotional tools into the moments families experience every day.
My Professional Qualifications And Training
MANDT SYSTEM (2014–2019)
This training equipped me with the skills to develop healthy relationships, effective communication strategies, and successful conflict resolution techniques.
COGNITIVE BEHAVIORAL INTERVENTION (CBI) TRAINING (2014–2019)
This training focused on identifying and modifying thoughts, emotions, and behaviors that contribute to challenges. It included the Antecedent-Behavior-Consequence (ABC) framework and Positive Behavior Support (PBS) approach to promote positive behavioral change.
POSITIVE BEHAVIOR SUPPORT TRAINING (2019)
TRAUMA AND ATTACHMENT TRAINING (2019)
MENTAL HEALTH TRAINING FROM THE CANADIAN MENTAL HEALTH ASSOCIATION (2019)
BACHELOR OF ARTS | SIMON FRASER UNIVERSITY