Rattana Chanruam, Thai Department

Rattana Chanruam is from Ratchaburi and grew up in Bangkok, having studied her Bachelor’s, Master’s and PhD all within the field of Education. Rattana has taught Thai Language and Culture in international schools for 14 years and spent one year in the US teaching Thai language at the Thai Temple of LA through a partnership programme with the Faculty of Education, Chulalongkorn University. She also participated in a research project through the Ministry of Education to develop the teaching of Thai curriculum. Rattana had the opportunity to visit the IB Organisation in Geneva, which sparked her interest in the IB Programme. The IB Career-related Programme (IB CP) further inspired her to develop a similar programme for Thai schools, focused on Best Practices. Since then, she has helped to establish a partnership between public schools and vocational schools to provide opportunities for local Thai students to develop job-related skills in a similar manner to the IB CP. This programme has now been promoted to public schools across Northeastern Thailand.

Rattana expressed that she was drawn to the challenge of working in a large school that taught the IB Programme, which led her to apply for the position at Bangkok Patana. She has noticed that local Thai teachers retain a long tenure at the school, demonstrating that they are well taken care of. She loves adapting her lessons to better serve individual learners, recognizing that students will have varied strengths and learning styles. She enjoys learning from her students in return and growing together through each academic year. Throughout her first year on campus, Rattana seeks to take on more responsibility within the scope of her position by participating in professional development opportunities and learning from her teacher colleagues. In teaching Thai Language specifically, Rattana hopes to focus on and clarify the learning pathway from Primary to IB, encouraging a variety of topics and curriculum-alignment. Outside of education, Rattana is passionate about traveling internationally in an effort to gain new perspectives and open her mind to new, innovative ideas.