Learning & Behavior Specialist II
Deaf and Hard of Hearing Auditory/Oral Specialist
Emily Watts |
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Office Hours in DeGarmo 524
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Education
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BiographyDr. Emily Harbin Watts is an associate professor in the Department of Special Education at Illinois State University. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Illinois in Champaign-Urbana, Illinois and hold both a M.Ed. and B.S. from the University of Memphis in Memphis, Tennessee. Dr. Watts teaches courses in assistive technology and physical disabilities/special health care needs. Currently, she is engaged in research that focuses on the use of Internet-based video conferencing as a service delivery alternative for providing technical assistance and consultation to rural educators and the families who work in partnership with them. Dr. Watts serves as a member of the Advisory Board for the American Council on Rural Special Education. For more than eleven years, Dr. Watts taught students with significant support needs and their families in community and public school settings located in rural areas of Tennessee and Nebraska. As community faculty in the area of Moderate to Severe Disabilities, she participated in the Kentucky Internship Training Program and served as Director of the Kentucky Early Intervention Services Technical Assistance Team while as a faculty member at Murray State University in Murray, Kentucky. Teaching Philosophy My philosophy of teaching and learning is based on certain basic underlying assumptions, beliefs, and values that serve as a framework for me. As a special education faculty member, one must model teaching strategies that reflect current "best practices" from the fields of higher education and special education. For me, this means that I am educating future teachers by implementing active learning and collaborative learning activities (e.g., group work and partner teams) in my courses and embedding the use of technology, web-based activities, role-playing, and case studies within the curriculum. Staying current in this ever-changing, technological world, is essential for faculty engaged in teacher preparation. Technology demands, now and in the near future, require that we do no less. Continuing to learn from fellow colleagues, university student, public school staff, and family members of children with disabilities is important to me and reflects my belief that teachers function best as communities of learners and not as isolated learners. Teaching assignments have included: SED 379 - Assistive Technology for Individuals with Disabilities SED 378 - Individuals with Physical Disabilities and/or Special Health Care Needs | |||||
