#52Ancestors, Week 35, Back to School

My Mum was a teacher – now retired.

When we were at primary school she used to help out in class with reading – what would eventually become reading recovery. Before she married she had trained as a nurse, but could not complete her training because nurses weren’t married women in the 1950s.

She decided to become a fully fledged teacher at some point in the late 1960s, but first needed to get some qualifications. This meant studying a couple of School Certificate subjects by correspondence and sitting the exam at the end of the year. It was probably good for our future years to see her commitment to study too. I have vague memories of Dad studying when I was much younger, but with Mum we would all be doing homework or study together.

Our move to Wellington most likely disrupted Mum’s plans, and for the first year there she worked at a clothing importer. In a dreary grey building which looked out onto the big deep hole in the ground which would become the BNZ Building at the Willis Street & Willeston Street corner.

She became a student teacher in 1974 and loved the experience – or most of it – graduating in 1977. I remember taking the day, or afternoon off work to go along to watch. Primary schools were where she worked. Khandallah, Newlands, Tairangi, Maraeroa…

Reading and literature were important, Math meh ! (until the 1,2 & 5 cent pieces were discontinued – then there were cages rattled). In the early 1980’s she was the teacher at Hutt Hospital’s children’s ward and in the later years of that decade began to specialise in working with children with special needs as they were integrated back into mainstream classes.

This role morphed to become Resource Teacher Learning and Behavioural and was itinerant; working with a group of schools in a geographical area. She became an advocate for children. Supporting their teachers; searching for solutions and opportunities to enable every child to be the best that they could be and often supporting their parents through the ups and downs that red tape creates.

Don’t tell her something can’t be done; there is bound to be a solution. This is a lady who is determined in everything she does. You need her on your side – you won’t get far trying to go against her, believe me.

Teaching lit her passion, and it is still burning even now.