University of Florida - Gainesville

Catherine Flint, Alachua County
Hoggetowne Middle School
CARD Staff: Krestin Radonovich

Catherine Flint has been a teacher’s aide in a self-contained ESE classroom at Hoggetowne Middle School in Gainesville for two years. She is a student at Santa Fe College majoring special education. She loves working with children. She particularly loves working with children with special needs. Catherine is a mother of five children, three of which have special needs. She says that although it is her job as a mother and as a teacher’s aide to teach them that has not always been the case. They have taught her much more in life than she could have ever taught them.

Catherine is looking forward to completing her degree in special education and having her own classroom. She is planning on continuing her education in special education to receive her PHD in Special Education with a minor in Autism.

Proposed Project:

The PEPSA partners will participate in directed readings to learn about the Social Thinking ® curriculum developed by Michelle Garcia Winner. They will participate in a weekly group using this curriculum with children with autism spectrum disorder who are enrolled in the general education program. They will then develop a modified curriculum, as needed, to use in their self-contained ESE classroom for children with autism and other exceptional abilities in order to improve the students’ understanding of social roles within the classroom and community. (With Nelda Lopez)