Ways to spend the day with your kids . . .
If the weather’s good enough, schoolgirls Amy and Emma Gernhoefer may get to ride their scooters along the Auckland waterfront today instead of going to school.
Amy, 10, and Emma, 7, are among 468,000 primary, intermediate and special school students whose teachers will be on strike, in most cases leaving parents, grandparents and others to look after them.
Their mum Carol Gernhoefer, who runs a website called Auckland for Kids, said they would probably go to their favourite playgrounds, or perhaps to the museum.
“Their ideal day, if the weather is good, is to go for a scooter ride along the waterfront and visit their favourite parks,” she said.
“If you ask them what’s on their list, it would be like, ‘Can we go to Rainbow’s End?’ I’d be like, ‘No.’
“I haven’t planned our day. We may pop along to the museum for a bit, but if the weather is good we’ll probably go outside.”
A few places around the country have organised something special for the strike. Wellington Zoo has already sold out all 30 places for a fun day modelled on its school holiday programmes.
“Kids can learn about the animals and help make little parcels where the animals have to figure out how to get in to get some treats,” said marketing manager Zel Lazarevich.
In Auckland, council spokesman Michael Smith said one-day holiday programmes would run at West Wave in Henderson, Moana-Nui-a-Kiwa in Ma¯ngere, Allan Brewster Pool in Papatoetoe and Howick Leisure Centre.
But others, such as Auckland Museum, have not organised anything special because no one was sure until the last minute that the strike would go ahead.
“Our butterflies exhibition is aimed at probably early primary school,” said communications manager Nicole O’Brien. “There’s also a large digital wall where kids (and adults) can create their own unique digital butterfly and set it free in the digital garden, which has been hugely popular.”
Gernhoefer took her girls recently to a Pillars to Post exhibition at the
Auckland Art Gallery, open until September 16, where visitors can build their own small cardboard houses.
A giant-sized, interactive Bug Lab at
Auckland Zoo, created by Te Papa and Weta Workshop, is open until August 26.
Gernhoefer said one of the best new playgrounds in Auckland has been created on the Royal Rd Reserve in Beauchamp Drive, Massey.
“There’s a bike track, a ginormous big slide, climbing frames, all sorts of things,” she said.
Other favourite playgrounds for her girls are at Takapuna Beach and
Onepoto Domain on the North Shore.
Keryn Grogan of the Parenting Place, whose husband Sean will take a day off work to look after their 6-year-old son Daniel, said Daniel would probably want to go back to school to play in the playground.
“Sean is more of a make-up-plansas-they-come-along kind of guy,” she said.
“My son will probably want to go outside and play kick with him on the lawn. Or play some board games.”
She urged parents to do “something out of the ordinary. It’s an opportunity to create a memory.”
The MetService is forecasting showers over most of the country, with rain from Wairarapa to Canterbury gradually clearing during the day and a fine day in Otago and Southland.