Pyjamas lift spirits at Riverdale unit

From Probus, with love . . . pyjamas and assorted knitted garments for Riverdale School Special Education Centre, all the way from Blenheim. Showing the gifts are (from left) teacher aide Melanie Worsnop, Rotary Club of Gisborne secretary Lyn Davis, Apikaira Marsden-Matenga, Miracle Hayllar, Primrose Reihana-Manuel, Riverdale deputy principal Jacque Vercoe and teacher aide Sheenal Singh. Picture by Liam Clayton

It’s not only bananas that love their pyjamas.

The children of Riverdale School Special Education Centre think theirs are cool, too.

These pyjamas — packed in three banana boxes — came all the way from the South Island . . . Blenheim, in fact.

The Probus club there wanted to let children and their whānau know that people from far away were thinking about them and wishing them well.

Probus clubs bring retired or semi-retired people together for pleasant company and interesting guest speakers.

The older people of Probus in Blenheim wanted to do something for the younger people in Gisborne but they needed a go-between.

So Probus in Blenheim got in touch with the Rotary Club of Gisborne. Rotarians started Probus in the 1960s, and many Rotarians join Probus once they have retired.

Rotary club secretary Lyn Davis is a visiting neurodevelopmental therapist with the Child Development Service of Tairāwhiti.

When she heard about the Probus gift, she immediately thought of Riverdale School.

“This is the only primary school in Gisborne that has a unit within the school specifically for children with very high and complex needs, and that provides a learning environment with specialist staff and a high level of support to meet their needs,” she said.

With support, some of these children could go into mainstream classrooms, she said.

Children in the unit needed routine. An event like Cyclone Gabrielle affected them and their whānau more than it would others, even if they were not directly affected. Many whanau were helping friends and relatives cope with the upheaval.

When school closed because of the weather, it upset the routine of children with neurodiversity, Lyn Davis said.

That made them more difficult to care for, and wh    anau often needed to juggle work and other commitments to care for them.

In a thank-you note emailed to Blenheim Probus, Riverdale School deputy principal Jacque Vercoe said the Special Education Centre whānau had all been affected in some way by the cyclones and continued wet weather.

“To receive your koha was a ray of sunshine that we have not had in a long time,” she said in the message.

As well as pyjamas, Blenheim Probus sent other items that included underwear and hand-knitted singlets, slippers, scarves and hats.

And for 1990s children who recall the preschool TV show about bananas in nightwear, the theme song lyrics are:

Bananas in Pyjamas

Are coming down the stairs

Bananas in Pyjamas

Are coming down in pairs

Bananas in Pyjamas

Are chasing Teddy Bears

’Cause on Tuesdays they all try to catch them unawares.