Pamela Karavite ~ Portfolio
Seeking Significance...
Educational Showcase
A Master of Arts in Education, with concentrations in both Special Education and Leadership, yields skills related to decision-making, problem-solving, and collaboration as it pertains to the effective education of students with disabilities. As a behavioral and instructional consultant, I will need to be aware of several key factors that inform decision-making in order to develop thoughtful and responsive instruction for students with disabilities. Some of these factors include attention to the school and classroom environment, instructional and behavioral methods, curriculum, evidence-based practices related to effective teaching and learning, communication and problem-solving skills, and the specific needs of students' with disabilities, to name but a few. Through my program at Michigan State, I have developed the knowledge and skill sets that special education collaborators require to perform their roles, and this page comprises highlights that showcase my journey.
Creator of Compelling Experiences...
An important goal of educators is to create compelling learning experiences for their students. By compelling, I mean more than catching and holding their attention, more than eliciting gasps and laughter. By compelling, I mean moving the students to see, feel, and respond in new ways. As an educator, my job is to inspire, provoke, and make students think and feel. I want students to see more and be moved to new ways of learning. In this section, I'm showcasing videos I've created, taking something ordinary and making it a bit more extraordinary. My hope is to convey my ability to be creative, and my desire to look at education in new and exciting ways!
Film and television professionals create the "magic" that can draw us in, hold us, and change us. Forgotten Souls is a walk through the humane society, and my attempt to change the way the deserted animals' story is told. By losing sounds, adding just the right music, and utilizing captions, I believe I've turned an ordinary experience into a compelling, moving experience.
Forgotten Souls...
In this video, I've transformed a typical morning with my children, and pushed my audience to feel the chaos and urgency that comes along with getting four children to school on time.
Morning Chaos...
Architects and interior designers are masters at working with space and materials that evoke specific experiences. The "look and feel" of a space has a powerful effect on us. This video was meant to take it a step further... contrasting an average space with an exceptional space. After capturing my images, I've added music and captions to sell you on one experience verses the other; hopefully, evoking deeper thoughts and feelings.
Architecture & Interior Design...
Leader...
This section samples a look at the requisites of a learning organization; particularly, reflection and productive reasoning on the part of leaders.
There are a multitude of factors that effect student achievement, but this paper focuses on the Time and Team relationship and detailing its integral role. Efficient use of Time by students, teachers, administrators, parents & support staff can greatly affect a student's performance.
Impaired language skills, and the inability to communicate effectively, are prominent behavioral markers of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Creative teaching methods have been shown to make a difference in the development of communication skills in individuals with ASD.
This presentation introduces Imaginative Therapies: Musical Interaction Therapy, Emotion Recognition Interactive Software Therapy, and Animal Assisted Therapy. An autistic individual cannot process emotional content through spoken words; however, they can learn to process emotions through creative therapies.
Educator...
Celebrating the individual differences and needs of students, a special educator is armed with the tools to assess, and intervene to help each student succeed in school.
The presentation and paper below tackle the assessment, and designing of successful interventions for a wonderful young man that I am proud to call my son. When I began this journey, I would have never guessed that I would have an opportunity to help one of my very own. I am happy to report that he is currently in the 6th grade, and continues to do well!
The importance of preparing a student to be a skilled reader and writer is a widely embraced value. Reading and writing skills are critical to negotiate our way through life. When a student struggles with reading or writing, it is important for teachers to develop creative strategies and interventions to help them along. With that being said, this presentation summarizes the progress made by my student this semester, including the skills and objectives for the literacy areas instructed including pre-intervention/post-intervention progress.
When we read fiction novels, we are taking in narrative text. This type of text tells a story and generally uses a lot of emotion. The opposite of this is expository text, which exists to provide facts in a way that is educational and purposeful. True and deliberate expository text will focus on educating its reader. In this video, I'm using poetry as expository text to teach how to identify the main idea and prosody skills. Informational text is important, but my student needs to be apprenticed into the thinking and reading strategies associated with expository comprehension first. Our short poems will help her master this skill before we move on to larger, more informative passages.
Reading Apprenticeship is an approach for improving students’ comprehension by using specific strategies learned in the classroom. The goal of the Reading Apprenticeship approach is to assist students in becoming more competent readers of both academic and recreational materials. This video demonstates the use of many of these strategies.
A NOTE FROM MY INSTRUCTOR...
"Pam,
As always, you met the course expectations, and exceeded them!! I read your powerpoint presentation, and I watched the awesome video of Mandy reading Amelia Bedelia. First of all, you really did a fabulous job on Reading Apprenticeship. You explained it clearly, and the powerpoint presentation is persuasive and attractive. Second, no one else implemented the lesson, videotaped the lesson, and analyzed the results. You just completed Project 4 (just write a lesson plan). I was stunned and excited for the two of you. Great job!! I awarded 150% - 15/10 points for this homework because it was absolutely superior.
Some things I noticed. It is clear that your instruction in teaching Mandy to break up multisyllabic words is working. Mandy read the words: “Hollered”, “chuckled” and “flattening” (??). All of these were multisyllabic words, and all involved affixes (suffixes). As I remember, both were difficult on the Core Phonics Survey. However, Mandy took the time and figured out the words on her own – Incredible results. Good for you!! I am not sure this would have been feasible several months ago.
I also loved the wonderful way that you invited Mandy to work out the text before reading the page with the sentence: “Don’t be a ping pong ball”. You called it pre-reading, and you suggested that Mandy could work on the text by reading it silently. She called it a Cold Read!! She is exactly right, and it revealed that the two of you have been working together on reading fluency. Did you notice that, after the rereading and rehearsal, her expression (Prosody) was greatly improved? She used so much expression when she read that section of the text a second time. The extra silent rehearsal and rereading paid dividends. Amelia Bedelia is a great book for working out the difference between literal meanings (how Amelia Bedelia interprets the text), and the inferences (what is intended by the character).
I also noticed the great tools and richness that you brought to the lesson. I noticed that the posters were very helpful. Posters offered visual reminders and a language for using the strategies. You asked Mandy to use a number of strategies, including SUM (summarize), Inference, Predict, Connect. I noticed that Mandy’s connection was really perfect!! She mentioned that she “was excited on my first day of school.” That type of connection can help her to understand the character’s motivation and actions. That was a great connection. Another time Mandy made an excellent prediction was when you asked her about what she knew about glue (glue sticks and adheres, so Amelia Bedelia would be stuck). She predicted that “Ms. Edwards is a teacher and her job is to help students.” [she’ll help Amelia Bedelia]. That was a wonderful prediction because it tied her prediction to the character’s subsequent actions and motivations. In fact, she nearly justified her prediction (without prompting) by saying that it was the teacher’s job to help.
One time I noticed that you invited her to use a strategy that you didn’t name. You told Mandy to “Close your eyes and imagine you are Amelia Bedelia” (e.g., page where she sat in the middle of the room with the hamster, travel posters, letters around her. That is “Visualizing”. Great strategy to use.
With all the richness in your lesson, you still managed even more. You used: Stop and Jot!! She seemed to like it because she even reminded you that she should stop and jot at the end of the page. That’s amazing. You made it meaningful and purposeful at the end of the lesson by reminding her that she could look back at her notes to retell the story. You tied everything together.
It was a lovely lesson, Pam. Such a great job!!! Thanks so much for the video. It really helped me to see Mandy’s progress. She is doing a great job with you. It was refreshing and rewarding. It brought me great pleasure."