Bringing up children in NZ

[dharder]

I've been meaning to post this recently, and the other thread is probably some kind of nudge this way.

A short while ago, someone wrote that if they had kids, the decision between the UK and NZ would be a no-brainer (I'm never entirely sure what that phrase means, but in that context, I took it to mean that it would be a choice for NZ). Ever since then, I've been wondering why.

I guess what I am looking for is the NZ specific improvement. As I said in the other thread, I understand that life for a lot of people has improved (there must have been reasons why the wanted to move in the first place), but are any of those improvements down to the country, or really just because the circumstances have changed?

What kind of improvements would you consider particularly 'Kiwi', as opposed to, say, moving from a town into the countryside within the UK, or moving States in the US?

Daniela

[willsken]

I'll answer this as I think it's slightly different to the thread I started. I think we could have improved our lives in the UK if we had a lot more money. There is a big but though, because there are a lot of things in society as a whole in the UK that I couldn't stand. I think kids are forced to grow up very quickly there and that has nothing to do with where you live.

There is a huge difference in the attitude of the teenagers I teach here, to the kids I taught in the UK. The kids here are happy to talk to you and get to know you. They take an interest in me as a person and go out of their way to say hello and show an interest in my life and that of my family. It says a lot that Matt went to my school in the UK and he wouldn't advertise I was his mother. Here, I teach him and he calls me mum in from of the rest of the class. The kids here are just so much more tolerant. There are a couple of youngsters I teach here and when I look at them, I think how they wouldn't survive a day in a UK comprehensive school.

I find it hard to put my finger on exactly what it is. It’s that you can just be what ever you are here without having to hide or apologise.

So when I really think about it, NZ offers something to my kids I don't believe they'd get anywhere in the UK.

[Sam B]

Yeah, I agree with Willsken, children seem to be different here - less worldly maybe - this is specific to Cambridge - it may be very different in Auckland. It seems a bit more ok to be different - like my elder daughter. Very few are really fashion conscious, especially at primary, but also at the middle school. teenagers seem very different on the whole, more friendly and happy to talk to you.

Kindergartens here are very different to anything I experienced in the UK. I work with pre-schoolers and spend a lot of time in a wide range of different pre-school environments. I have never experienced anything like a NZ kindy in Britain - the range of equipment and facilities, the emphasis on independence and peer interaction. I made a DVD of one in action and sent it home to all the SLTs (speech therapists) in Cornwall and they couldn't believe it - 3 year olds swinging on monkey bars, using adult sized hammers and nails, hot glue guns, goats running around. Brilliant.

[dharder]

It seems a bit more ok to be different - like my elder daughter. Very few are really fashion conscious, especially at primary, but also at the middle school. teenagers seem very different on the whole, more friendly and happy to talk to you.

I'm probably just living in the wrong place in NZ then And I have actually been told that it is a rather sleepy suburb, and I am aware that it represents a certain type/class of people, not all of NZ.

My experiences looking around the school are not like that at all. The all seem somewhat similar to me, the sports they do, the interests they have, their outlook on the world, their value systems, in as far as they have them at this stage (and from what I can glean from my OH's writing exercises teaching at the boys school).

Ah well. I just have to hope they'll all be mad about sports...

Daniela

[Sam B]

Well - maybe you'll have to try a year in Cambridge or similar before you head back ....?

[willsken]

Or Waipuk!

[wiki]

I was the one who said we'd raise kids in NZ, despite choosing to live our kidless life in the UK.

I can't comment on education in other countries, because I've only lived in NZ and UK - it maybe that another country offers the rounded education I feel NZ gave me... but without going there and researching education properly, I can only vote between NZ and the UK.

For us, my comment came as a comparision of our own upbringings and educations.

On paper OH is the winner: a Phd in ancient history, published author and one of the most intelligent people I know.

Me, I had two years of polytech and my brain is a sponge only for popular culture tit-bits that are handy at morning tea gossip sessions about Brangelina or pub quizzes.

But reflecting on our experiences of schooling - OH at a selective grammar in Birmingham and me at a 170-pupil high school on the edge of Fiordland national park - we're both certain I had the better educational experience.

I was pushed academically, but my growth as a person was always more important to my teachers than how my marks reflected on the school. OH constantly felt like another competitve mark on the league tables. Any achievements were for her parents and teachers, not for herself. There was constant pressure for OH - and for me constant support both inside and outside school.

We got yearly ski trips, tramping and our own 400m running track, whereas they had to get the coach up to the boys' school and the only school trip was an A-level study trip for three classics students to Hadrians Wall.

Having a smaller school certainly helped me (although we were in the same-sized primary school). Our parents are also hugely different - although socio-economically very similar. Those differences have had a big impact on our development, but again, I would credit those differences to the countries our parents live in.

For me, choosing to raise children in NZ is something I cannot put down purely on curriculum. Possibly the UK is more academically driven, but I don't like the way the education system achieves what it does in the UK. Academic achievement should never come about from a sacrifice in personal development.

I think NZ is a safer, more supportive and nuturing country to raise children. The pressures in the UK are constant - whereas children in NZ have the option to take things at their own pace. If I were to have kids I'd want them - with my love and support - to find their own place; their own happiness: whether that meant university, polytechnic, dairy farming or cray fishing...

The only thing I'd encourage my kids to do that wasn't really an option for me at school in NZ is to learn a foreign language or two. That was the only thing I felt was a hole in my education when I arrived in the UK.

We'd never live in Auckland, and Southland is mercifully uncluttered, but we feel the UK is too crowded to raise children healthily.

We also feel that teachers in the UK are too overworked and that reflects badly on their classes (OH's mum was a primary school teacher for 30 years so we know what she had to put up with - marking and lesson planning til midnight and always battling against a shortage of resources) Whereas teachers I know in NZ have time to play sports, be part of volunteer fire brigades and ambulance services and we saw a play in Gore the other night where half the cast were teachers. They've got time to have a life, and their students see that and know it's possible.

I feel I've just focused on schooling here - but the other pluses for NZ will be mentioned by others: the beaches, the bush, the back yards, the bare feet...

I didn't get to go to the British Museum, National Gallery, Rome or Athens as a child - but that didn't stop me learning and loving them as an adult and I don't think the 20-year delay did me all that much harm.

I guess it comes down to what you personally think is best for a child: for me, that's happiness.

[James 1077]

For us it was reasonably simple - in the UK we wouldn't be able to afford to live in a house in a decent area without Eleanor going back to work; over here we can.

On top of that there was no way that we would have allowed our kids anywhere near a state school in the UK (Eleanor is a science teacher and has taught in both state and private) but over here the kids seem better behaved, the schools look better and the schooling system doesn't seem to be about testing, testing and testing but more like the UK private school system where they encourage the kids to have interests and focus on being good at those - regardless of whether they are academic interests.

The rest of what the kids will get out here (outdoors lifestyle, safety, quieter streets etc) they could probably get in the UK countryside but that would mean that I would never see them as I would be commuting for hours each day and also Eleanor is a London girl who could never live in the countryside (in her own words it isn't that she pops into the city all that often - but it is reassuring to know that it is there!).

[wilson182]

What kind of improvements would you consider particularly 'Kiwi', as opposed to, say, moving from a town into the countryside within the UK, or moving States in the US?

Daniela

Initially our biggest improvement in raising our daughter here is exactly that. Here we have the opportunity to raise her in a small township as opposed to a large city in the UK. We did not have the funds for that lifestyle in the UK. My mum has highlighted other benifits though. She came here in March and compared the childhood/children here to that of my neices in the UK, and that of schoolchildren she encounters over there. It really echos what Wilsken and Sam B have said, they are less worldwise, there is less peer pressure to conform - they have the opportunity to be children longer. I have no problems with the education system here either - I experienced it for a while in the UK and they seem comparable to me. My dd was put forward a year to match her skill level and is constantly challenged that level.

[Carol]

To put this in context.... when we all went back home for a holiday at Christmas time in 2005, my younger brother told me not to let my boys wander around on their own through the towns and villages (as they were used to doing in NZ) as they would be a "prime target" because they had no UK streetwise awareness.
(They certainly have a NZ streetwise awareness..... but it is a different league in the UK)

Another example - a good friend of mine has just been back to the UK with her 4 kids - the oldest is almost 21 and a well built lad.
He went off to find a fish and chip shop one night - and was surrounded (and intimidated) by 3 youths on bikes - hoodies up - and fairly obviusly weapons (knives) in their pockets. He was mortified. Chose to ignore them and walked off as fast as he could. He said he couldnt live there......a nd was pleased to be back in NZ.
(This was not in a city btw but in a small village)



On the flip side......
A huge void here in NZ for us (and is getting worse for me ) is not having the family back up that everyone takes for granted growing up close to relatives.
I miss that every day - and even more so now that they are teenagers.


But weighing them up - we made the better choice I think.

And that's without even starting on education!