My BEAUTIFUL BOOK (Written by children)

 I was recently farewelled from my part time teaching position at Te Uku Primary School, near Raglan. The farewell assembly was memorable. My speech was simple. Why have I been at the school for four and a half years? To help and to care and above all to be kind. I have taught at every class level and loved it and I view it as being a privileged teaching position. 
I then told the students sitting in front of me that I see in them, hope, joy and potential. I added, they were all precious and special. 
I enjoy teaching writing. My goal was for each student to proudly say, I’m a writer. 
And so to my beautiful book. I was presented with a unique, beautifully appointed book, ‘A Collection of Stories from our Lives’, written by Te Uku School Tamariki/children. Outlined below are a number of excerpts from their stories. 
‘I will miss you Matua (male teacher) Steve. I like it when you read the stories in your book (The Trouble with Twins A memoir). ‘I liked the story about your first day at school’. ‘When I was little, mum left the door open at night and the outdoor dog slept on my bed all night!’ ‘Once, my mum told me to not climb a big tree, but I did anyway. I climbed to the tippy-top and I got stuck’. ‘I love you Matua Steve, because you read us the story about your older sister driving your mum and dad’s car.’ ‘Thank you for being a kind teacher’. 
You’re welcome kids. I miss you.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

SHARING KINDNESS with the WORLD

Since starting my kindness blog in March 2023 and sending it firstly to family and friends in New Zealand, today, readers in 75 countries have read my blog. I continue to write what I think people need, not what they necessarily want.  Starting with my own country, the list begins…New Zealand, Australia, Fiji, Cook Islands, Papua New Guinea, Singapore, Philippines, Malaysia, Indonesia, South Korea, Japan, Thailand, Vietnam, Taiwan, China, Nepal, Russia, Ukraine, Sri Lanka, India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Turkey, Spain, Italy, Switzerland, Greece, Portugal, Lithuania, Serbia, Albania, Uzbekistan, Kryrgyzstan, Czechia, Bosnia/Hertzegovina, Hungary, Germany, France, Netherlands, Poland, Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Finland, Armenia, Romania, Croatia, Slovakia, United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, USA, Jamaica, Mexico, Honduras, Brazil, Argentina, Chile, Peru, Bolivia, Equador, Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Iraq, UAE, Egypt, Iran, Jordan, Tunisia, Morocco, Rwanda, Kenya, Ghana and South Africa....
Read more

GRANDMAS and GRANDKIDS

Grandmas are everywhere. I’m married to one. Their many kindnesses to their grandchildren are honoured in this blog post.  Let me start with my grandma in Auckland. Grandma Webb would host her six grandchildren every Friday night for fish and chips, followed by calcium cookies for dessert. This can’t have been easy for her as we weren’t always on our best behaviour! My mum would let our daughters do baking, preparing cookies for the oven on her kitchen floor (covered with newspapers). They would create a tray each and according to mum were always perfect. With mums help they also created their own oil paintings.  My wife Val (Marzie or Jamma to her eight grandchildren) has spent countless hours over the years with them. Our oldest grandchild Jackson was picked up after school and did his homework with her. They have enjoyed many cafe breakfasts together and Jackson has never turned the offer of a breakfast or brunch down. Now, Jackson’s sport is MMA (Mixed Martial Arts) Val me...
Read more

A bit BROKEN

Life can be extra tough at times, as we all know too well.  I remember talking with a friend a few years ago and he said, “You know Steve, we’re all a bit broken.” His insightful comment made me think that we need to stop pretending that things are ‘tickety-boo’ when they are not. Be real, ask for help and let people be kind to you.  I used to tell a story to audiences about a girl I knew who was hit by a runaway car and tragically died a few hours later. She was sitting next to me on a bank and I felt the wind of the car as it smashed into her. I was 10 years old and she was a similar age.  After the story telling I spoke with the audiences about life being precious and to spend all the time we possibly could with our children.  One year I told this story (titled ‘And the car came down’) to an audience of refugee teachers at a refugee centre in Cape Town, South Africa. For the first time ever, I had to stop speaking as warm tears filled the bottom edge of my gl...
Read more