Settling In

Well time is flying by it is almost a month since my last post and it only seems like last week. We are starting to get settled in. The house we are renting, whilst quite expensive, is perfect for us. It is on 3/4 of an acre so Dave and the boys are able to get out in the yard and kick the footy and run around and chase each other like mad things. We have 4 bedrooms so that means we have an office (yah - no more paperwork on the kitchen table) and it is 2 story so that means we have heaps of storage downstairs as well as a spare room for visitors.
Nick has settled into school really well. Left a message for the teacher to ring or send a note if he was having any problems and I haven't heard from her. They actually stream their kids. So they have an elite athletes Year 7 class and a social/recreational sports class and a music class and an arts class etc. Each of these classes gets extra time allocated to their speciality. Nick is in the social/recreational sports class.
Pat is a different story. He gets on really well with the other kids and likes his teacher. But his teacher is currently suspended ( yes the teacher). There is a bit of an uproar in the school at the moment as the teachers are wanting to do less of the paces (booklets that the students work through individually) and more actual teaching and not all the parents are happy about this. Up until last year it was a parent controlled school and many seem to think that they are still in charge. Patrick does not get on with the student teacher who is running the class in the teachers abscence. He has not spent very much time in class over the last 2 days as apparently "he doesn't exist to her and she is not going to listen to him as he doesn't listen to her" and he has spent the day sitting outside or in the office. There are numerous duty of care issues. I don't know that he has learnt a great deal there. At the end of his first week he brought home 27 pages of work that needed to be completed by monday (it was a long weekend). During the next week he brought home 8 pages of work on commas. He had told the monitor (like a teacher aide) that he didn't understand them. She explained them to him and told him he wasn't allowed to go to lunch until they were finished but he still didn't understand them and so he just put a comma after the first word in each exercise so that he could go to lunch and then brought them home for me to teach him how to do them. Students are supposed to do diagnostic testing when they arrive so that it can be decided what level they are up to in each subject and where they are to start. This hasn't happened. He was doing a maths book, english and SOSE. Once a week or fortnight he was going for a science lesson but they only have enough equipment for the teacher to do the experiment and the students watch. He has had 2 art lessons and he gets PE. He finished his Maths book last week but they don't have another one for him to go onto so he got a science book. They have a manual arts shed but no teacher and whilst they said they were looking into options and hoped to have it started before the end of the term I don't see this happening. He is supposed to be doing the Year 9 testing this week but apparently there has been some mix up and a boy in year 10 did they practice tests and he didn't and neither of them are doing the actual tests. There is plenty of other stuff as well. So we have been praying and have decided to look at Tullawong High. It has 1200 or more students but seems to have a reasonable reputation for discipline. It has a good vocational as well as academic program (according to its brochures). Have rung and organised an interview to have a chat about what they have to offer. Didn't bother sending Pat to school today and will probably keep him home until his teacher comes back from suspension or we decide to send him elsewhere.
I applied for and got a casual job at Coles (about 8 hours a week). Am also supposed to be starting tutoring at Tullawong but haven't heard anything back about whether there are any kids. So we'll wait and see. The government allocates $700 for tutoring to each student who does not meet the minimum standard on the Year 3, 5, 7 Testing. I did this tutoring in Victoria the only problem with it is that you don't get paid until the end.
Dave is going to Gympie 2 days per week. And is continuing to pick up some new customers. I have started to design some flyers and business cards so that we can start advertising down here.
We went to Toorbul fishing on the weekend. We were the only ones there and it was really nice to get out as a family beside the water and have a barbie and just relax. We are going to the Greek festival on Saturday with friends from Gympie and out to Bribie Island on Sunday with Dave's sisters family for a BBQ and some fishing.
Well better go. My job for today is to sort out the office and get all the boxes unpacked in here and put away.