G'day Mates!!!!!!!!!

Again I have been rubbish at keeping my blog up to date but I have been working so so hard lately. The days of Donnie the waster have well and truly gone (well until we leave Melbourne and head off on our adventures!!) The work itself is enjoyable- I get to do the nice part of teaching with no paperwork! The down side is getting up at 5.45 in the morning!!!!! Yes Dad in the morning!!!!

I have continued to work at the same school in Berwick doing CRT work (supply teaching to us poms). So far I have taught prep (rec), Year One, Year 3 and Year 6 (11 year olds) .The older year 3 kids (8-9 year olds) were not as bad as I thought they would be- I just had to be a bit meaner to them- I soon won them round. The other day I also had Year 6 (can you believe it Jules!). Admittedly I only had them for one hour in the computer suite (basically they knew more about the computer program than me so they got on and basically ignored the pommy teacher in the corner!!)

The other day I also had to be the music specialist (how funny is that Jules! - you know me and music). I had to teach all the prep kids a very patriotic song called ‘The Green and the Gold’. It tickled me to think that maybe the preps will be singing it in assembly with a slight brummie accent! Indeed one of the mothers of a kid in prep said that when her child read to her, she pronounced a couple of words with an English accent! The mother thought it was “so cute”. Think of what I could do if I was here long term!!! They would forget G’day and “no worries mate”. Instead they would say “Alright bab” “Ta ra a bit!”

In the last seven weeks I have worked with kids from 6 months old to 11 year olds- I am definitely gaining good experience down under! I still like the preppies (rec) and Grade 1s the best! They are cute and say funny things! The other day I greeted a Grade 1 class and explained that I was not an Australian so probably sounded different to them. “Nah” one aussie kid replied “you’re just English”. It was the way that he said it that made me laugh! It’s actually surprising how many ex British kids there are at the school. In every class there’s a couple of kids who used to live in Britain (lots of Scots- they will do anything to escape the crap Scottish weather!!).

It’s a sad fact that none of the kids have heard of Birmingham- they only know London and Edinburgh! They always ask if Birmingham is part of London?! The younger kids have asked me if I know the Queen!! Yes I have tea at her house every Sunday I told them!!! I am going to make it my mission to tell them all about Brum (excluding the dodgy bits)

Anyway I will sign off for now

Donnie the Worker!