Nicole Fravel
Teacher/Owner
Ms. Fravel is a certified teacher, museum educator, and curriculum writer with over 15 years of experience educating young children. She holds a Master’s of Education from Stanford University and keeps up to date with current research and practices through memberships in the National Association for the Education of Young Children and the International Reading Association.
Ms. Fravel began her career teaching in public elementary schools and an Even Start preschool before accepting a challenge to help close the achievement gap for African American and Latino children. She served as School Partnership Director for a non-profit consulting organization working with schools in low-income communities.
In 2005, wanting to spend less time on the road and more time with her own children, Ms. Fravel accepted a position as early childhood educator at a well-regarded children’s museum, supervising programs for children under 5. In addition to creating programs for the museum floor, she created and delivered parent-child art, music, and science workshops for toddlers and preschoolers and outreach programs with nonprofit partners such as Head Start and the United Way. The educational curriculum she created for the museum includes a 10-week PeeWee Mariachi program combining music and language learning for toddlers and preschoolers; math, science, music, and art curricula for museum outreach programs; K-3 classroom guides for teachers to use in conjunction with school field trips to the children’s museum; and a pre-K through grade 5 educational curriculum for a science and math based exhibit that was sponsored by the National Science Foundation.
In her various positions, Ms. Fravel has trained Americorps workers and college-aged museum staff on such topics as, “Learning Through Play,” “The Stages of Infant Development,” and “Teaching Writing to ESL Students.” She has been an invited presenter at the San Jose Smart Start conference, conducting workshops on combining music and art with literacy and math instruction.
Wendy Hendren
Teacher
Ms. Hendren grew up in northern Mexico, and studied abroad in Vancouver, B.C. and the at University of Arizona. Upon returning to Mexico, she taught English at Instituto de Idiomas Brenda Coronel, a primary school in Los Mochis. She is fluent in English and Spanish and has used both languages in jobs as varied as translation services for a law office, customer service, office management, and retail sales.
While taking time away from the corporate world to raise her three children, Ms. Hendren worked as a classroom volunteer at a local elementary school. It was there that she rediscovered her passion for teaching. She is excited about the prospect of returning to work with children, sharing her native country’s language and culture, and learning alongside the Wildwood Nature School community.
