Alexa Gaynor - Spanish Instructor

Alexa Gaynor was born and raised in Portland, OR and has spent her life dedicated to her many passions, which include language, yoga, dance, food, and travel. She enjoys working with people, and in addition to teaching at Tierra, she teaches Spanish at David Douglas high school. Her family history inspired in her an affinity for other cultures from a very young age, as her maternal grandmother came to the U.S. from Peru in her 20’s, her mother was born in Argentina, and both her parents spent time living in Brazil as adults. Alexa has also had the great privilege of living abroad, in London for one year, another in Ecuador, and six years in Spain. She holds a Bachelor’s degree in Spanish language with a minor in French from Portland State University as well as a Master's degree in Education with a focus in World Language teaching.

She is thrilled to be able to draw on her wide range of skills to teach the motivated and enthusiastic students she’s met at Tierra. Her teaching style is dynamic, engaging, and playful, and at the same time, patient and nurturing. Alexa emphasizes conversational practice in her classes and strives to help students draw logical connections that shed light on grammar, phonetics, and other communicative structures. Alexa hopes to share her love of language and travel with her students, as well as give them a feeling of competence and success in their own study. She’s found the small-group classes at Tierra to be an ideal setting for students to learn not only the foundations of basic structure, but to be able to put it to practice and use the language in meaningful communication.

For fun, Alexa cooks, goes out to eat, spends time with friends, does yoga, hiking, travel, art, and loves the great outdoors!