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Ms. Kate Ahern
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Greater Lawrence Educational Collaborative
Hometown:
Haverhill, MA
Class Information:
Room Number: 323
Students per Class: 7-12
Class Description:
This classroom located in a run down building in the city of Lawrence, one of the poorest communities in Massachusetts, serves 7-12 learners ages 14-22 from the surrounding cities and towns of Massachusetts and New Hampshire. The students love to learn and focus on functional academics, life skills, vocational training, speech and language, motor skills and more. All students in the classroom have more than one disability that impacts his or her ability to access learning. These disabilities includes fine and gross motor issues (including para and quadriplegia), communication disorders (including students who communicate with high tech communication devices), low vision and blindness, hearing impairment, autism and other forms of pervasive developmental delay and rare chromosomal disorders. Some of the students (at the moment three) have progressive, fatal diseases. In spite of the learners challenges they are hard workers who wish to have full and satisfying lives.
Position:
teacher of learners with multiple special needs
Needs:
What our classroom needs most are basic supplies and technology. We are always in need of basic things like paper, glue sticks, adapted paint brushes, etc. We also always need technology. In our recent move between buildings we had a color printer stolen and a computer broken. We do not have a digital camera or a digital video recorder, despite the need for them for state mandated alternative assessment. We are lacking in some of the excellent software available for special needs students and "make due" with demo versions, out of date copies on out of date machines and we often do with out. Our greatest dream is to have enough computers to go around and an interactive whiteboard on the wall.
Personal Information:
About Me:
I am a special educator, teaching since 1998. I have been in my current job since 2001. Outside of work I write a blog for other teachers of learners with multiple special needs and I enjoy reading, writing and camping.
College and Degrees:
I attended Simmons College in Boston as part of the Kay Dunn Scholars program which grants a combined BA/M.S.Ed. in five years. My graduate school GPA was 4.0.
Activities:
camping, writing, knitting, blogging
Favorite Books:
The Harry Potter Series, Wicked and Son of a Witch by Gregory MacGuire, anything by David Sedaris, Dorothy Allison or Harriet McBryde Johnson
Favorite Quotes:
"No one can make you feel inferior without your consent." -Eleanor Roosevelt "My heart is singing for joy this morning! A miracle has happened! The light of understanding has shone upon my little pupil's mind, and behold, all things are changed!" -Annie Sullivan "If you have told the child a thousand times and the child still does not respond, it is probably not the child who is the slow learner." -RobertFisher
Interests:
teaching, assistive technology, knitting, audiobooks, technology in general
Employment History:
1994-1998 Simmons College 1997-1999Franciscan Children's Hospital, Kennedy Day School 1999-2001Somerville Public Schools, Massachusetts 2001-presentGreater Lawrence Educational Collaborative, Massachusetts
Why Do I Teach?:
I teach because it is my calling.