Lianne's new primary school

Pigeon Mountain Primary School

Within a couple of weeks of arriving in Auckland, we went on the lookout for a new school for Lianne. The novelty of being out of school hat worn off, and she was keen to go back to some form of normality. On recommendation from some other British ex-pats we visited one of the local schools, Pigeon Mountain Primary, and were given an instant tour around. We were very impressed with the layout, both inside and out, the schools philosophy and it's environmental policies. Lianne was impressed too and wanted to stay there and then, especially when she noticed hardly anyone was wearing any shoes! It took a couple of days to get her uniform sorted, and off she went.

Although she was very keen, it naturally took a little while for her to feel settled. Delamere School back in England had only 68 children, compared with 450 at her new school. Her class is very multi-cultural with many children having migrated from China and other Asian countries. She's been very fortunate though in that her teacher migrated from Britain herself whe she was 12, and had just recently returned from England where she'd been teaching for a number of years. As such she's been able to understand Lianne's level of education to date, and guide her along in those areas unfamiliar to her.

During the first few months here, we did notice though that the whole migration experience had affected Lianne. She regressed for a while with her reading and spelling ability (though she quickly picked her reading back up again as is now at the highest reading level in her class), and we're still trying to get her maths back to the level she was at. On the other hand though she has embraced all new experiences that have come her way, and has become a real 'outside girl'. She has discovered she loves running - is currently training twice a week for an inter-school Cross Country race towards the end of August. Thinking back to the last sports-day she attended at Delamere, where she laughed so much that she couldn't run to save her life, this is quite a change!

She was very proud when after a few weeks practice, she came 2nd overal in a poetry recital competition that was held over 3 classes. I think that boosted her confidence level a great deal.

Her class-mates have all been very friendly from day one, but to start with it seemed like Lianne didn't allow herself to get too friendly with anyone. Instead she often talked about her friends Grace, Hannah, Anna, Charlie & others back in the UK. It was almost like she didn't want to 'betray' their friendships by making new ones here. Now, a few months later she is slowly making some new friendships, and goes round to play at other people's houses.

Here's a picture of her and Tyler at a recent school disco. Making friends like the ones mentioned before will take time.

We have no doubt that with the warmer weather approaching, Lianne will quickly turn into a little Kiwi and go barefoot whenever she can!