Meet the New Teacher – Donna Frye – Primary Year 1 Teacher

Donna trained at the University of Winchester, after university she worked in Southampton before moving to Spain to teach. Most recently, she taught in Yangon, Myanmar for three and a half years.

“I grew up in rural Dorset, my village had less than 15 houses in it. We didn’t have a pub or a shop, the nearest shop was 10 miles away! In addition to teaching I also took some time out to travel and even worked for a season in the French Alps. I loved it in Yangon, so I am used to South East Asia, I’ve traveled a lot around the area. I’ve spent quite a bit of time in Thailand. The traffic in Yangon was much worse than Bangkok so Bangkok traffic seems peaceful in comparison!

Living in Myanmar is what inspired me to do my Masters in Reconciliation and Peace Building through Winchester, I try to link it to Peace Education. So, I don’t have a lot of time. Outside of school, I try to improve my Spanish conversational skills, love attending my fun and feminist book club and I am also a fan of board sports and can’t wait to try wakeboarding in Thailand.

I decided I wanted to become a teacher in Year 10 when I did work experience in a nursery and thought, yes this is what I want to do. By the age of 15 I knew just loved this. Ispend the whole day laughing, that is why I love my job. I have the best job in the world. I think it is really important that a teacher is someone who puts the children first in everything they do. Someone who is passionate and flexible and changing the learning to suit the needs of the student.

My first reaction to Bangkok Patana School was Wow! The thing with Patana is, if you work in international schools you already know it is going to be amazing before you get here because you know its reputation. The size and scope of it was quite surprising, the resources and size are amazing.

I would like the parents to know that I will always love to talk with them, I really enjoy communicating with parents about school, about life outside school, about their child. To never be afraid to come and talk with me, I am always here for a chat if there is time. I would much rather they came and spoke to me about everything.”

Read about all our new teachers here: https://www.patana.ac.th/new-teachers-2019-20/