It is a mixture of personal anecdotes, observations, skites about my son, Thomas and sometimes some things vaguely intelligent. For much more intelligent comments on education, social software and the like check out the blogs of my colleagues at www.core-ed.net
After almost 14 years and a big of nagging from Howard (well gentle questioning) I finally applied for my New Zealand citizenship. I must admit throughout the process I was quite ambivalent, and even on the day of the ceremony was not fussed about whether I did it or not. However once I was in [...]
In late September we had a great family holiday over on the Gold Coast, during which we travelled down to the Southern Cross University Lismore Campus (just across the NSW’s border) for my graduation for my Masters of Business Administration.
After all the years that my family have supported me through my study it was a lovely [...]
We had heard about all the theme parks in Aussie but we found a smaller, relatively unknown one just across the New South Wales border, fairly close to where we were staying at Burleigh Heads, which is in the southern part of the Gold Coast. Tropical Fruit World is an agri-tourist destination which (according to [...]
The area which is adjacent to our subdivision (housing estate) has won an environment award. Nine individuals, businesses and organisations from Kaitaia to Otago have been honoured for making an outstanding contribution to protecting the environment at the annual Green Ribbon Awards announced recently.
The Green Ribbon Awards are presented by the Minister for the Environment to [...]
(Ex) colleague Greg alerted me to the latest ranking of New Zealand blogs compiled by Ken Perrott (aka Open Parachute). It places CORE’s Director of eLearning Derek Wenmoth at 29th, and ex ICTPD Facilitator Greg Carroll at 63rd. It also has other NZ educators and friends of CORE in the top 100 including [...]
Kids don’t care how much you know ’til they know how much you care”
Cantrell & Cantrell (2009) Teachers Teaching Teachers. New York. Peter Lang Publishers.p1
Poor Thomas. A wee mishap with a trampoline and he has broken one front tooth and chipped another, as well as putting a tooth straight through his bottom lip. He has been incredibly brave, but is not enjoying what will be many visits to the dentist. Unfortunately they are adult teeth, so lots of work [...]
The weather has certainly cooled down (23 degrees today), down from 30+ which has been the regular this summer, however it is hard to think that winter is heading this way in the near future.
Two signs this week however have made me realise that the inevitable turning of the seasons is happening. First the newspaper [...]
We celebrated the new year with SingStar at friends Juanita and Philip’s house. We tried Singstar Abba, 80s and Rock Legends, but to no avail we were pretty useless at all of them.. not helped by the fact that the Reddish famaily can all sing! Although I think it would be safe to say that [...]
After our Swedish Christmas Eve we spent Christmas Day with Howard’s family for a Kiwi Christmas. For the first time forever (no-one can remember the last time) the whole family were together on Christmas Day, Nan & Pop, Howard and his 2 brothers, wives, nephews and nieces. Both Nan & Pop also had a widowed [...]
Our old friends Julie and Lollo, and their children Stefan and Kimmi are over from Sweden for a few weeks, hoping to experience a real Kiwi Christmas; however on Christmas Eve we helped them celebrate a Swedish Christmas. We set up a picnic in Victoria Square in preparation for the Carols by Candlelight service and [...]
For the first time since I moved to New Zealand I managed to find a church that holds a Christingle service, so Thomas and I went off to the Most Holy Trinity Church on Sunday afternoon. It is a lovely old Anglican church, surrounded by an old cemetery by the river Avon- reminded me [...]
This morning Thomas performed at the local fete with the Windsor School Kapa Haka group. It was a bit grey and damp underfoot, so the boys especially were a bit chily with bare chests and no shoes, but they all had a great time and did really well. Thomas is really enjoying the Maori culture [...]
We are just back from a lovely weekend in Twizel. We have one of the original houses in the township, built in 1968 when the whole town was developed to house the workers on the Upper Waitaki Hydro Power scheme, which ran from 1968 to 1986.
The town is located in the beautiful MacKenzie Country, and [...]
