Donna

handwriting

I have taught at the early elementary level, predominantly special needs students, and am currently assisting mid and early elementary students in the their handwriting skills in conjunction with other skill-building instruction. I understand the methodology for teaching manuscript and cursive writing from my years in the classroom as well as a home-school teacher when my daughter was learning to print and write in cursive.

special needs

I have a master's degree in special education with an emphasis in visual impairments and I graduated with highest honors. I taught/re-taught students across the spectrum of disabilities for 16 years in all subject areas from pre-K through high school. My areas of strength are in reading comprehension, basic reading, written expression, and basic math through pre-algebra. I also have an associate's degree in Deaf Studies, including 6 levels of ASL, I graduated with highest honors.

Braille

I have a master's degree in special education with an emphasis in visual impairments from Michigan State University. As part of my master's program I took two classes in Braille and learned both Grade 2 Braille as well as Nemeth Braille (earning a 3.5 and 4.0 respectively in the courses). During my internship, I worked with young children who were learning Braille and also helped my husband, who is deaf-blind and had only learned Grade 1 Braille, improve his Braille comprehension. In the interest of helping my husband with his Braille, I transcribed several children's books for him in Braille. I am comfortable with working with young children and/or those just learning Braille.

sign language

ADD/ADHD

As a special education teacher for 16 years I had many students on my caseload who were identified as ADD/ADHD. At times, from the general education classroom, where I team-taught, I referred students for testing whom I believed to be ADD/ADHD due to their lack of focus, poor grades, inability to recall pertinent information, and/or were extremely disorganized. In addition, over the years I completed numerous surveys for the school psychologists in the assessment process to determine eligibility for services based on Attention Deficit and/or Hyperactivity with Attention Deficit. Throughout my teaching career I was continually advancing my knowledge of ADD/ADHD to better serve the students on my caseload. Though I am not a medical doctor, I was able to advice parents who had concerns for their students who were having difficulty in school and/or having reactions to their current medications. I was able to direct them to the proper resource for testing or guide them in their research of alternative medicines. On the average, approximately 1/3 of the students on my caseloads were identified as ADD or ADHD; thereby giving me considerable experience with the school-age child with this disability.

hard of hearing

I have an associate's degree in Deaf Studies from Mott Community College. As a former special education teacher and interpreter, I taught and/or interpreted for students age three through high school (I taught the 3-year old his first language). Finally, my husband is deaf-blind and I have served as his conduit for communication in a variety of situations.

study skills

I am a retired special education teacher and have taught study skills to children in both middle and high school. I have also taught test-taking strategies and reading for understanding using specific strategies to help the student comprehend and recall material. In addition, I have successfully taught test-prep strategies for this same age range.

phonics

I began my teaching career in a kindergarten classroom within a private school where I taught reading with a phonics-based program along with various other subjects. Later, I earned a master's degree in special education and began teaching in the public school system and tutoring children who were struggling in reading, primarily at the middle-school level. I used the Phono-Visual Method of with which I am quite familiar. These students were OHI, LD, as well as one deaf child who also had a visual impairment. I had success with most of my students in helping them to reach an acceptable independent and/or teachable level of reading with this program. During my teaching career, one of my rotations was to teach deaf, hard-of-hearing, and speech-impaired students at the pre-K/K grade-level. It was part of my job description to teach reading and to reinforce the lessons taught in their general education kindergarten class. A phonics approach was again used for these lessons. I had great success with these young learners and several were able to read at the second-grade level or higher by the end of the year. I have a working knowledge of the Phono-Visual Method (the program I tend to use in private tutoring or small settings), a foundation-level of knowledge of the Orton-Gillingham/FAST Method (which I continue to study), and a working knowledge of the Lippincott Program (the program I used at the private school). Finally, when my daughter was young, I home-schooled her using the Phono-Visual Method and she has been, and continues to be, highly successful in her academic studies.

elementary (k-6th)

I am a certified teacher in special education K-12 (as well as art 1-12). I have taught and/or tutored children in reading and math from kindergarten through the 6th grade (and beyond into high school). Though all of my teaching experience has been with special populations, with the exception of one year in a private kindergarten classroom, all of the students whom I taught qualified for services because they were deaf, hard-of-hearing, learning disabled, or otherwise health impaired. At the younger level (K-6th), I taught children to read or tutored them to help strengthen their reading skills and to become independent readers for their respective grade levels. In math, I primarily tutored K-6 students to strengthen their math skills, though I did teach elementary math through pre-algebra in special education classrooms for 6-8th graders. At the kindergarten level, while working with the private school, I was their primary teacher for all subjects (including science, social studies, art, reading, writing, and math). Furthermore, I passed the Michigan Elementary Proficiency Test for elementary teachers (total score 283, with a 3 or 4 proficiency mark in all subjects). I took this test to demonstrate that I was "highly qualified" to teach special needs children.

elementary math

writing

reading

English

ESL/ESOL

literature

proofreading

GED

SAT reading

SAT writing

spelling

ACT Reading

ACT English

vocabulary

grammar

Microsoft Word

prealgebra

I taught and team-taught pre-algebra at the high school level for several years. For struggling students, I worked with them on a one-on-one basis to help them to understand and apply the concepts of pre-algebra, not to simply memorize the steps.