Reflection on a lifetime of teaching

Life-long educator: Janet Bodle, an educator in the Gisborne district for 58 years. Picture by Liam Clayton

Janet Bodle is an educator extraordinaire. The 82-year-old  recently retired and talks to Loren Sirl about her extensive and varied career spanning 58 years.

Gisborne born and raised, Janet always knew she wanted to become a teacher. At the age of five and on her first day of school she came home in tears. Her mother told her later, she had cried because she hadn’t learnt how to read on her very first day of school. And she so desperately wanted to learn so she could become a teacher.

Janet had some early years of practice in her makeshift classroom made up of dolls and teddy bears.

“That’s all I wanted to be,” she said.

Another setback, thankfully short-term, was heading her way. When her own schooling was completed, she set out to accomplish her dreams by applying to Ardmore Teachers’ College in Auckland, but wasn’t accepted. Instead, she had to reconcile herself to a job as a receptionist at State Insurance. One day a client came in to pay his account. It was her previous Gisborne Intermediate school principal, Mr Grono. He was shocked to see her behind the desk.

“Why are you not teaching? You were born to teach,” he said. Mr Grono set up a panel interview with the Ministry of Education at Hawke’s Bay and Janet’s story finally began.

Studying at Ardmore teachers’ training college in the early 1960s was a time of ‘great fun and learning’. She recalls the engineers at the far end of the college who used to play pranks on the teaching fraternity. Flour bombs and the setting up of a loud speaker in the dead of night that would boom through the college, “Hoo ha, we’ll get you!”.

Learning speech and drama as extracurricula activities encouraged her to acquire accreditation of those subjects. This saw Janet later becoming a speech and debating judge throughout all Gisborne schools.

Janet’s probationary first year of teaching took place at the local Riverdale School. She then moved to Awapuni school where she was infant mistress for new entrants up to Standard 1. She also taught sewing to the senior girls and led the drama, choir and ukelele groups.

Married on Waitangi Day 1965, to the late Rodger Bodle, she recalls the surprise ukulele guard of honour that serenaded the couple on the day. Janet and Rodger went on to have three children. She is proud of her “amazing, supportive family”. Their family motto has always been to “pay it forward” and the golden rule of “do unto others, as you would have them do unto you”. With this in mind, Janet always had the goal of wanting to give back to the community that she was raised in.

A position at Kaiti School saw her supervising open-plan classrooms of up to 200 students. During the 1970s she took on a role at St Mary’s Catholic School under the watchful eye of Sister Maree Terese, a “quirky, full-of-fun woman who would walk around with an arrow tucked under her arm”. The anxious group of Standard 1 and 2 students had been experiencing some issues and Sister Terese wanted someone who could inspire and help the children.

“I don’t care how you do it. I just want these kids to want to come to school, to have the love of learning,” she said. This role inspired Janet’s ongoing involvement working with special needs children. Janet became very interested in “finding other ways to help children”.

She was included in the first reading recovery programme set up to support children experiencing difficulties in literacy. She continued her career path, taking up a new role as a guidance/learning teacher at Kaiti, also working at Gisborne Intermediate and Ilminster.

During the 1980s Janet started to research dyslexia. It wasn’t acknowledged in those days. Janet connected with UK educator and author Neil MacKay who wrote the widely used resource book, Removing Dyslexia as a Barrier to Achievement. This resulted in Janet setting up a seminar at Mangapapa and inviting Mr MacKay to speak – an opportunity for all teachers of the Gisborne area to increase their knowledge on the subject.

“Neil talked about dyslexia so positively and called it a learning preference rather than any deficit,” said Janet.

This inspired Janet to want to learn about autism, and ADHD as well. By 1999 the services provided in schools for special needs children had begun to expand. A two-year diploma was introduced to become an RTLB (resource teacher: learning and behaviour). This particular service worked alongside schools and families to provide learning support where needed.

“I have yet to meet a family who doesn’t want the best for their child,” she says. The RTLB service provided those tools to get to that place. Janet praises the techniques they use.

“A strong student voice is important as well as a whānau voice — it’s a collaborative approach.”

Relationships and building trust with the family provide the basis for this.

Every school has a liaison RTLB who provides that needed support and guidance. They also set up a register in the school of special needs students. This also includes the “tall poppies – the very clever ones who also need support as they are often forgotten,” said Janet.

Janet was recognised for her work, acquiring the Gisborne Civic Award in 2020 for service to education and the Kiwibank Hero Award for the district in 2021.

She is proud of the respect she has gained within the community of education. All her teaching has been in Gisborne.

“It’s a privilege because I’ve got to know second and third generations through teaching.”

One leader in her field who has made an impression on her career has been Jenny Mosley, who founded an international behaviour management and wellbeing programme. Key factors in that programme included  connecting, continual learning forever and giving and taking notice.

Other names were Sir Mason Durie, a leading Māori health advocate, and Bill Rogers, an Australian education consultant who lectures in what Janet says is “a fun way, where the students are left feeling good about themselves”.

Dr William Glasser, who Janet got to know in his 80s before he passed away in 2013, also resonated with her. He was an American psychiatrist, a developer of good workplace practice, including the school environment.

Before her retirement, Janet was able to spend time sharing her knowledge, by inducting new educators and becoming a mentor as well.

Although a “newbie” to retirement, Janet enjoys coffee with friends and exercising. She also sits on the committee of the Heni Matoroa Childrens’ Trust, which provides local funding for disadvantaged children.

“It’s been a life full of teaching and wonderful years,” says Janet.

Janet can surely tell her five-year-old self there is

no need for tears now. She has well and truly fulfilled her calling.