Collection of Master's Work

for

Nekane M. Arriaga

This portfolio is a collection of the work completed whille in attendance at Grand Canyon University for the ascertainment of a Master's degree in the field of Special Education. The works collected here demonstrate the understanding and practices of a Master Teacher in the field of Special Education with emphasis in the area of emotional/behavioral disorders and mental retardation.

I am currently a special education teacher at Prestige Day School in a self-contained program for EDP students.  I wrote the current curriculum map for language arts, history, math, and science for Prestige. This curriculum map is consistent with the Canyon State Academy's curriculum which is also directly alligned with Arizona State Standards. I teach through various methods, depending on the student such as hands-on activities, sensory integration paired with the skill being taught, games, computer usage, and using Smartboard activities. The classrom highly structured with very little down time. I have two therapy dogs that are in the classroom daily and assist me in teaching. I also have another pup that my students are training for the classroom. In addition to teaching, I also coach diving for the Canyon State Academy.

On a personal note, I am a mother with the smartest, sweetest, most well-behaved daughter in the world! We have three Aussies who are used in my classromm daily and four cats. All of our animals are rescue cases. My daughter is especially interested in swimming and will be diving as soon as she is old enough to do so! We enjoy walking the dogs, hiking, camping, taking road trips, and helping others through volunteer work.