About me
Dr. Maria B. Serpa, Professor Emerita of Education and Bilingual Special Education at Lesley University, holds a doctorate in Bilingual-Special Education from Boston University. Her dissertation research focused on early Portuguese Literacy and Assessment in inclusive bilingual education, followed by the study of NIza's Model and the Freire method, among other approaches in Portuguese and English. She began her literacy teaching journey as a certified elementary education teacher in the Azores, Portugal, before coming to the USA. In MA, she became a bilingual early Portuguese literacy teacher and, later on, a pioneer Portuguese bilingual learning disabilities specialist who taught students with disabilities of various ages to read proficiently via Portuguese. As an experienced bilingual Portuguese Literacy teacher-researcher, Maria de Lourdes has been a trainer for the SAPO test and she loves this foundational dimension of teaching and learning that impacts students for life. She has authored and validated the SAIL Test of Portuguese Early Literacy and has adapted the Orton Gillingham (OG) method to the Portuguese Language. She also specializes in the science of reading in English as a home language and English as a second language using UDL, emphasizing the practical understanding of the similarities and differences in teaching culturally responsive Portuguese literacy and its implications for students with and without disabilities in bilingual education.
