Paying to Join Clubs? Welcome to Auckland Uni

Hello Hello!

It's been another busy week in Auckland! This past week I was pretty much just getting used to uni and work life (note: they all call "university" uni here. So I go to "Auckland Uni"). My psychology class is still good and interesting, it's just hard to stay ontop of academic work when I'm working at my internship so much, but I'm sure I'll get the balance soon. My internship has been going really well, and at the end of this update you can see what I've been writing for my internship reports if you're interested. Riding my bike has been pretty good, but my muscles are SO sore!! Auckland is pretty hilly so parts of my route are definitely a struggle, but I'm getting more used to it and hopefully I'll be in shape soon!

The most interesting thing that has happened this week is my involvement in student univeristy life. Last week was o'week (aka orientation week) where all the clubs were set up in the quad to recruit new members. I joined three clubs: the canoe club, Jewish club and Dessert club. However, each club costs money to join, which I thought was really strange, since that it definitely not the case at Brandeis. Anyways these three clubs seem like they will be worth it. I had heard about the Canoe club from someone on my geography field trip during the summer term and she told me I had to join it! So $20 later, I am now a member of the canoe club. They run a lot of trips throughout the semester, most of which are free. I went on their first free trip on Saturday FROM 9 am - 6 pm. We met in the quad and took cars to Puhoi river which is about an hour north of Auckland. There were about 50 of us and only 25 kayaks, so we split into two with the first group paddling the first half and the second the rest. I was in the second group. Since we had about an hour until we had to be at the halfway point, my car went to a beach at the regional park for a bit which was a lot of fun. The water was pretty warm and it was beautiful there! Then we went to the halfway point and went into our kayaks. These kayaks were different than the ones I had grown used to in the South Island. They were one person kayaks and did not have rudders to help steer. The kayaks really responded to every move that your body made! I got better at it throughout the course of the day but I would randomly find myself spinning around if I made a wrong move. It was a lot of fun and most of the people were beginners so we were all crashing into each other. There were a lot of New Zealanders on the trip so it was fun to talk to them. We kayaked to a pub where we had a free BBQ which was really nice. Then we all headed back to our cars and went back to Auckland. It was a really nice day and I'm glad I joined the canoe club! The Jewish club is actually a Jewish union between NZ and Australia. They had their first event on Saturday night and it was a Purim party (one week late). It was located at the Orthodox synagogue nearby. Although I was really nervous about going (since I did not know anyone) I made myself go and it was a lot of fun. There were probably about 30-40 or so people there, so it was VERY differnet than the Brandeis experience. Most of the people knew each other but they were friendly and welcoming. It was interesting though because around half the people there were no longer in university and were in the mid-20s so it is not just a student club. The same was actually true for the canoe club. I think that most of the university clubs are for the greater Auckland community, and not just for students. The final club I joined is the Dessert club. The dessert club has some delicious events throughout the semester, but they also give you a card which entitles you to discounts at a bunch of different cafes and pastry shops! I have not used it yet, but am really excited to try out the different bakeries around Auckland!!

The other exciting things that happened this week was my trip to One Tree Hill, which is ontop of Cornwall Park. My internship is right near the One Tree Hill Park (no, not at all like the TV show). I met one of my other friends there after work on Friday and we biked around, hiked up the hill and got some ice cream. There are SO many sheep just roaming freely about the park which was really exciting for me! But everytime I would try to get close to them, they would run away. Don't worry I'll be going back to the park and expect to befriend lots of sheep! Anyways we made it to the top of the hill and the view from the top was absolutely wonderful! It gave me a really good sense of where I was in Auckland and made me realize how far the bike ride that I make every day actually is! One Tree Hill/Cornwall Park is really nice and I'm glad that it is so close to my internship so that I can take advantage of it! Also on Sunday there was a big music festival at a park right across from Auckland uni about 5 minutes away from me. It was really nice to just chill out there and get some food before going back to the reality of class and internship the next day.

Speaking of my internship, I think this would be a good time to go into my updates that I've been writing for BU. But just a side-note before: one of my kids makes the "Zoolander" face a lot and it is hilarious! Anyways, here we go:

March 5, 2010

The past two days at the Carlson School Oranga classroom have been really good. I’ve gotten much more comfortable with the children, staff and the environment there. On Thursday I was asked to do the fitness exercise with one of the children, but after explaining that I still did not feel comfortable doing it on my own, I was able to watch another teacher and she explained the different steps to me. We then worked on counting and reading and I was able to work with two children, another teacher and an occupational therapist. It was nice to see how the teacher’s go about teaching the children academically. I was able to have a chat with my head teacher during morning tea time which was great. I explained the different components of the internship, my worries and expectations. My head teacher was very receptive to the conversation and it went very well. After morning tea we had drama where we acted out a story about a zoo-keeper which was fun. During the talk with my head teacher, I had expressed to her my interest in seeing how the Carlson children are integrated into the mainstream school. Later that day two of the Carlson children went to the kapa haka, and I was able to join. The kapa haka appears to be a combination of music, dance and Maori class. There was a mainstream class there with the two Carlson kids and we learned a new song and did a few hand motions. The Carlson child that I was sitting next to was laughing at me attempting to sing the Maori songs, but I had so much fun! Later that afternoon we did some work on the computer. On Friday two of the children were sick, as was one of the teacher’s assistant, so it was a pretty low-key day. After fitness we worked on counting and reading. The head teacher asked me to start working on counting with two of the children with animals and cards. I was a little intimidated since I had not worked with the children by myself before, but after a bit of trial and error it worked out well. I would have the children take an animal out of the bag (to work on the fine motor skills) and then go over how many animals they had on their desk. Then I would show the children the different number cards and have them point (or in any way that they can indicate, since it varies) to what number they thought they had. Then we read some stories to work on English. After morning tea we had art where we put marbles in paint and rolled them across a cut out of a zebra and tiger to make stripes. It was really interesting to see the different ways that art can be accommodated so that these children with motor impairments are able to participate. After lunch we did some more computer work and then the week was over.
It was definitely a long week, but the days went by pretty quickly. It was also interesting to just talk with the teachers and discuss differences between our two cultures such as driving. Overall, I feel much more comfortable in the classroom than I did at the beginning, and am looking forward to seeing what happens next week!

March 8, 2010

Today when I arrived at the Carlson School Oranga classroom I realized how much more comfortable I felt there than I had the previous week. I knew more what to do and was able to help get the children out of their wheelchairs and started with fitness. After a little bit of confusion, we were able to head out with three out of the six children (the other three had colds) to go swimming! I was the only one of the teachers to bring my togs (bathing suit) so I went into the water with one of the physical therapists and the kids. The pool is located at a Christian center that they let the classes use during the week. The pool was "solar heater" but was much warmer than I expected. Each child has to be held by one adult, and having the experience of actually swimming with the kids gave me a whole new idea of what Cerebral Palsy is actually like and the children's physical abilities. In the water, the kids are able to try to move more than they are able to in a typical environment, especially since they are not constrained by equipment and things which attach to their legs. We tried walking, kicking and jumping. It was so exciting when I would repeat requests for a child to walk, and then feel like I was not getting through only to have them make a physical motion a moment later. We played with the bubbles and the kids even got to ride around in a little inflatable boat. It was a lot of fun. I feel like I was able to learn a lot more about the children's abilities and physical therapy surrounding Cerebral Palsy in general. After that it was off to the university to go to class!

March 9, 2010

Today was one of the children’s birthdays! It was pretty exciting and was fun to see one of the kids who is usually quiet and reserved get really excited about her birthday. We had a party during morning tea time which was really nice and delicious. Other than that, the day was fairly normal except that one of the teacher’s aides was out, so there was a lot for me to do. I helped do some prep work in the morning for a language program we did about the zoo. We have been doing a lot of zoo activities to prepare for our big zoo visit on Thursday. The speech language therapist used some really interesting devices to help with the activity where the children would press a button that had a pre-recorded message that she had made where she asked a question. This way the children felt that they were more involved. We did more work on counting and recognizing numbers, which is emerging to be a big math theme. In the afternoon we did jolly phonics and worked on some more letters.
Since I have been in the Carlson Oranga classroom for a little over a week I thought I would share some cultural differences I have noticed. First of all, the classroom in general is much more relaxed than those in the United States. Also what is interesting is that one of the teachers aides is from Japan, and she gets really frustrated by some of the other worker’s laid back attitudes. She is normally the one who gets angry if other teachers show up late or do not do a task in a timely manner. Watching her frustration, I realize that Japan and American cultures are more similar in that respect that New Zealand culture. Everything in the New Zealand classroom is “cool” and there does not seem to be much stress or frustration. If a child is not listening or responding, the teachers do not normally get frustrated, or if they do it takes them much longer to show their agitation than it would in the States. I’ll be sure to report more as I see the differences emerge.

That's all the update for now. Let me know if you have any questions or comments!
Hope all is well with you!!