My Qualifications
For more then 30 years, I have been playing, laughing and learning with kids. I started my career as a Nursery School Teacher for 4 years where I learned to work with 92 families a week in the cooperative setting.
Next I worked for 20 years as a Resource Teacher with 5 years of that as a supervisor for the family and children programs aged 2-18 years. As an Itinerant Resource Teacher, I visited family homes, daycares, schools and community settings.
11 years ago I made the leap to leave the public sector and opened Affinity Consulting, a home-based business for kids, teens and families.
I hold diplomas in:
Early Childhood Education
Recreation for Special Populations
Resource Teacher
Certified Irlen Screener
On-going training in autism, sensory processing, regulation, anxiety, inclusion, behaviour supports and strategies, social skills, communication, developmental screening, attachment, etc.....
I am very blessed to have been able to follow my dreams and passions of working with kids for my career to date. Since I was a little girl I just knew what I wanted to do and was the kid who helped out in the special classes (that was the school's words not mine) during recess.
As a teenager I attended a conference, volunteering in the children's room, there was a boy who did not use words to speak and I was astonished that others thought he had nothing to say. He did, we spent the time looking at and laughing at books.
In college, I met a little boy named Christopher who only lived 5 short years and I was honoured to laugh and play with him. His body was twisted up in a fashion that made others turn away and drew me in. He taught me so much including the start of my curiosity of how sensory input affected people.
When I taught Nursery School there was a little boy named Stephen who was a curious fellow, he liked to read cookbooks with me about how to cook lobsters. Back then I wore different coloured high top running shoes with the opposite coloured socks (miss those days) and that is what he asked to have for Christmas. He named his black cat after me, Miss Mac (many of the kids could not pronounce my last name). I used to arrive at work early so I could play with him, I was intrigued by the way he thought and how he processed things. I would assume that by today's criteria he would be diagnosed with Autism so I thank him for sparking the curiosity that some brains really do work so differently then others.
There have been countless children who have made a lasting impact on my teaching style. I wish I knew then what I know now as there are so many things I would have done differently, but with time comes experience. I am sure that in another 20 years we will look back on our approaches now and wonder what we were thinking. New learning is so exciting!
