Today we’d like to introduce you to Anaeli Ceballos.
Hi Anaeli, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
My journey into education has never followed just one path, but every experience has ultimately led me to the work I’m doing today.
My background is in psychology, special education, Applied Behavior Analysis, and education. Over the years, I’ve had the opportunity to work with children across a wide range of ages, abilities, learning styles, and needs. I’ve worked in behavioral settings, taught K–8 students in both core academics and enrichment subjects, supported children with autism, ADHD, dyslexia, emotional regulation challenges, and learning differences, and worked closely alongside families navigating their children’s educational journeys.
Through those experiences, one belief became stronger and stronger for me: before a child can truly learn, they need to feel safe, seen, understood, and connected.
I saw so many incredible children who were capable of far more than they believed, but who sometimes struggled in environments that weren’t designed around the way they learned. I became increasingly passionate about creating something different—an environment where we didn’t simply ask, “How do we get this child to fit into the system?” but instead asked, “What does this child need in order to thrive?”
In 2023, I stepped away from traditional educational and clinical settings and planted the seed for En Flor Learning Academy.
“En Flor” means “in bloom,” which represents so much of what I believe about children. Growth doesn’t happen at exactly the same pace or in exactly the same way for everyone. When children are given the right environment, support, encouragement, and tools, they begin to discover what they are capable of.
What began as individualized educational and behavioral support has continued to grow into a learning community serving more than 30 families. Today, En Flor blends foundational academics with social-emotional learning, emotional regulation, executive functioning, independence and life skills, creativity, Spanish, movement, mindfulness, and hands-on project-based learning. I’m also a registered yoga teacher, and incorporating the mind-body connection into education has become another meaningful part of my approach.
One of the things I care about most is helping children develop confidence beyond the classroom. I want them to understand that struggling with something does not mean they aren’t capable. I want them to learn how to problem-solve, advocate for themselves, ask for help, communicate their needs, work through challenges, and trust themselves.
That same mission has also inspired my work as a children’s author. Through my book, Two Sided Coin, I explore themes like confidence, empathy, boundaries, bravery, mistakes, and self-love—the same kinds of conversations that are woven into my work with children every day.
Looking back, En Flor feels like the culmination of everything I’ve learned throughout my career, but I also feel like we are still at the beginning of what it can become.
My motto is “Grounded Roots, Blooming Minds.” To me, that means giving children strong roots—safety, connection, confidence, self-awareness, and skills—so they have the foundation to keep blooming long after they leave my classroom.
Ultimately, I hope every child who comes through En Flor leaves believing a little more deeply in themselves and in what they are capable of becoming.
Can you talk to us a bit about the challenges and lessons you’ve learned along the way. Looking back would you say it’s been easy or smooth in retrospect?
It definitely hasn’t been a completely smooth road.
One of the biggest challenges has been learning to trust my own vision, especially when that vision doesn’t always fit neatly into a traditional educational model. My background exposed me to many different environments—behavioral, clinical, special education, and traditional classrooms—and while I learned something valuable from each of them, I also saw how easily a child’s individual needs can get lost when there are limited resources, large groups, rigid expectations, or pressure to move at the same pace as everyone else.
Creating En Flor meant stepping away from what was familiar and building something from the ground up. There wasn’t a perfect roadmap for the kind of program I wanted to create. I had to learn not only how to be an educator, but also how to run a business—developing programs, communicating with families, creating policies, managing schedules, handling the administrative side, and figuring out how to make the work sustainable while still keeping the heart of it intact.
Another challenge has been learning that deeply caring about families also requires boundaries. When you work closely with children and parents, you become invested in their progress. I naturally want to help, accommodate, and find a solution whenever I can, but I’ve had to learn that protecting my time, energy, and the sustainability of the business ultimately allows me to serve families better.
There have also been moments of uncertainty. Building something independently means there are seasons of growth, seasons of change, and plenty of moments where you question whether you are making the right decision. But each family that has trusted me with their child, each breakthrough I’ve witnessed, and each student who begins to see themselves as capable has reminded me why I started.
Some of the greatest lessons have actually come from the children themselves. They’ve taught me that progress is rarely linear, that struggling does not mean failing, and that sometimes the most important growth happens quietly before anyone else can see it.
In many ways, building En Flor has required me to practice the same things I teach my students—flexibility, resilience, self-advocacy, confidence, and the willingness to keep going when something feels difficult.
The challenges have shaped the business just as much as the successes have, and they’ve helped me become much clearer about what I want En Flor to stand for: a place where children and families feel supported, understood, and encouraged to grow in a way that is truly their own.
We’ve been impressed with En Flor Learning Academy , but for folks who might not be as familiar, what can you share with them about what you do and what sets you apart from others?
En Flor Learning Academy is an individualized educational & behavioral learning community created to support children as whole people.
My work blends academics, behavioral support, social-emotional learning, emotional regulation, executive functioning & life skills. I work with both students & clients, many of whom have autism, ADHD, dyslexia, learning differences or emotional and behavioral needs, as well as children who simply thrive with a more individualized approach.
What makes En Flor different is that I don’t believe academics, behavior & emotions exist separately.
A child may be fully capable academically but struggle with frustration, confidence or task avoidance. Another may need support learning how to communicate what they are feeling, navigate friendships, understand boundaries, regulate big emotions or advocate for themselves. Sometimes the barrier to learning isn’t the academic skill itself — it’s everything happening around it.
That is where a lot of my work happens.
Social-emotional learning is a major part of En Flor. We work on understanding emotions, identifying needs, building confidence, communicating assertively, developing healthy boundaries, perspective-taking, navigating friendships, coping with disappointment & learning how to pause and respond rather than simply react.
Behavioral support is also a significant part of my work. With my background in psychology, special education & Applied Behavior Analysis, I look beyond the behavior we see on the surface and work to understand what may be happening underneath it. From there, we can build meaningful skills around communication, regulation, independence, flexibility & everyday functioning.
Education at En Flor is highly individualized as well. Depending on the student, we may focus on reading, writing, math, Spanish, executive functioning or project-based learning, but I always want learning to feel meaningful and connected to real life. We incorporate creativity, movement, mindfulness, independence & hands-on experiences whenever possible.
One of the most important parts of En Flor is the relationship I build with families.
I work closely with parents and caregivers to understand their goals, concerns, priorities & hopes for their child. I want to know what they are seeing at home, what feels difficult, what progress would be meaningful to them & what skills they would most like their child to develop.
I never want families to feel like they are simply dropping their child off for a service. I want them to feel like we are working together as a team.
That collaboration allows the work to evolve as the child grows. A family may initially come to me for an academic concern, but over time our goals may expand into emotional regulation, behavior, social skills, independence, confidence, communication or challenges they are navigating at home or school.
Trust, consistency & reliability are incredibly important to me. Families are allowing me into a very meaningful part of their lives, and I don’t take that responsibility lightly. I want them to know that I will show up, communicate openly, follow through & genuinely care about their child.
Over the years, I’ve had the privilege of supporting more than 30 families, and some of those relationships have continued through different stages of a child’s life. I’ve watched students & clients grow, celebrated milestones with their families, supported them through difficult seasons & adjusted our goals as their needs changed.
Those long-lasting relationships are one of the things I am most proud of.
The feedback from my students, clients & families means so much to me because they often describe growth that can’t always be measured by a grade or test score. They talk about feeling understood, becoming more confident, learning how to regulate emotions, asking for help, developing independence & feeling more comfortable being themselves.
To me, that is what growth really looks like.
“En Flor” means “in bloom,” and our motto is “Grounded Roots, Blooming Minds.”
The roots are the skills underneath everything else — confidence, connection, emotional awareness, communication, resilience, independence, self-advocacy & feeling safe enough to learn and grow.
My goal isn’t to make every child learn, behave or communicate in exactly the same way. It is to understand who they are, recognize their strengths, listen closely to the goals their family has for them & provide the individualized support they need to continue growing.
I want En Flor to be known as a place where students, clients & families feel genuinely known and supported — where emotional and behavioral development matters just as much as academic growth, and where relationships are built on trust, consistency, communication & care.
That is the heart of En Flor.
What do you like best about our city? What do you like least?
What I like best is how there’s an opportunity to have the most enriching day, anywhere you go. Music, food, community events, it’s all out there in high integrity. I love Austin and all of its elevated excellence and heartwarming quirks,
Contact Info:
- Website: https://enfloratx.com
