Season 1, Episode 3
Teaching with resilience, starring Fawn Nguyen
Today on Beyond My Years, host Ana Torres learns from Fawn Nguyen, a math educator with over 30 years of classroom experience! Fawn tells Ana the story of her near-death experience being lost at sea while escaping Vietnam, and explains how it shaped the sense of gratitude she leads with in the classroom. She also discusses what it means to be yourself in the classroom, the importance of sharing your mistakes with your students, the merits of practicing advocacy vs. authority with students, and how she has dealt with feeling dismissed as a minority working in education. Taking all those lessons back to the classroom, Ana and Classroom Insider Eric Cross then discuss connecting with students through shared struggles and challenges.
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Meet our guest, Fawn Nguyen.
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Fawn Nguyen is Director of STEM Initiatives at Amplify. Before joining our team, she was a math coach in a 国产三级片�8 school district for three years, and a middle school math teacher for 30 years. She has received many accolades, including being named the 2014 Ventura County Teacher of the Year, Raytheon鈥檚 2009 Math Teacher Hero, and the 2005 Sarah D. Barder Fellow at the Johns Hopkins Center for Talented Youth. She has also been a keynote speaker and workshop facilitator at math conferences nationwide. In 2012, she co-founded the Math Teacher鈥檚 Circle in Thousand Oaks, California. From 2015鈥�2018, Fawn served as a member of NCTM鈥檚 Professional Development Services Committee.
Meet our host, Ana Torres.
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Ana has been an educator for 30 years, working in both the 国产三级片�8 and higher education sectors. She served as an administrator and instructor at various public and private colleges and universities and as a bilingual and dual language teacher, dual language math and reading interventionist, dual language instructional coach, assistant principal, and principal in 国产三级片�8 schools. Ana is currently the Bilingual and Multilingual Specialist on Amplify鈥檚 Product Specialist team, and delivers literacy and biliteracy presentations across the nation. Ana鈥檚 passion and advocacy for biliteracy and multiculturalism has led her to educate leaders, teachers, and parents about the positive impact of bilingualism and biliteracy in our world.
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Meet our Classroom Insider, Eric Cross.
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Eric Cross is a middle school science teacher who hopes to someday be a lifelong educator, like the guests on Beyond My Years! In each episode, Eric connects with host Ana Torres to discuss her guests鈥� best insights gleaned from their long and rewarding careers in the classroom. Then, Eric talks about bringing some of their wisdom into his current classroom and busy life.
Quotes
- 鈥淚n my next lifetime, I would still teach, I would go back to teaching. That’s how much I love it.’鈥� 鈥擣awn Nguyen
- 鈥淚t has to be an exchange. We can’t be just receiving, asking kids to be [themselves] and yet we ourselves are not.鈥� 鈥擣awn Nguyen
- “[Seasoned educators] are experienced and experience means good and bad. We want to learn from both. I certainly didn’t want a mentor who never made a mistake, 鈥榗ause I’m not gaining anything.” 鈥擣awn Nguyen
- 鈥淚t’s about separating the behavior from the person. And another thing, separate what they don’t know at the time from what they’re capable of.鈥� 鈥擣awn Nguyen
