Dates

• Existence: 1937-

Biography

Patricia Louise Turpen was born in 1937 in Scottsbluff, Nebraska to Thelma Turpen and Stephen Turpen, the youngest of three sisters. Her family was musical, and she played and taught piano. She graduated from Abraham Lincoln High School in 1955. She married and changed her last name to Peterson.   Patricia Peterson studied elementary education and Spanish at Graceland College in Lamoni, Iowa, graduating in 1974. In 1977, she spent two month at New York University, Puerto Rico, studying bilingual education. She also traveled to Spain in the summer of 1989, and lived for two years in Mexico City.   Peterson dedicated her teaching career to English as a Second Language (ESL) and bilingual education. She was the owner/director of Los Chicos Pre-School in Lamoni, Iowa. From 1975 to 1986, she taught ESL grades 5 to 8, in West Liberty, Iowa. In 1986, Peterson moved to Texas where she taught at a bilingual elementary school in the Pasadena Independent School District. From 1994 until her retirement in 2000, she taught Spanish language immersion in Robbinsdale, Minnesota.   Patricia Peterson married Thomas Wiese in 1995, and changed her last name to Wiese. She has five children.

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