“I remember the Year 3 - 6 students, 200 plus of them, presenting a skipping routine, together, to Tina Turner’s Simply the Best.
“That springs to mind when I think of Central School - Simply the Best!”
Other standout memories include the school’s Clown Day.
“I was dressed in a funny clown costume, with coloured hair. I was out on the field walking on stilts, when the principal brought out a new boy (8 years old) who was joining my class.
“This boy happened to be deaf.
“I often wondered what on earth he thought he was getting in to that day. We could only communicate with our hands, but we managed.”
This led to the whole syndicate, made up of four classes, learning sign language, which they used for a couple of years.
Another highlight has been the involvement of the parents.
“We regularly had Art & Craft weeks and our parents and grandparents came into school to teach knitting, crochet, making photo frames and mobiles.
“It was great to see young and old working together.”
As well as her many years at Central School, Mrs Beale is well known in Gisborne for her involvement with netball.
“I started playing netball as an eight-year- old in Christchurch and loved it so much that I have just carried on being involved.”
She played for Orange Grove, which later became Irish Rover, and Makaraka, and finished with Whangara Old Girls.
“The stint with Whangara Old Girls was at a time when I should have been giving Premier netball away but Ronnie Martin (coach) convinced me that I could cope. The other bribe was that she wouldn’t leave me on for the whole game. A good idea in theory, but more often than not, Ronnie would say, ‘no you are doing so
well, we need you there!’ Not what you want to hear as a 48-year-old playing centre!”
Her relationship with Ronnie continued and she became involved in managing the teams that she was coaching, including Poverty Bay A rep teams, GGHS Senior A teams and Gisborne age group sides.
“It has been a lot of fun over the years and we have been to many places in New Zealand.
“The highlights would be winning the U19 New Zealand title and taking the Girls’ High teams to the New Zealand Secondary Schools finals.”
Mrs Beale started at Central School in 1988, the year of Cyclone Bola, and became deputy principal in 2009.
She started teaching in 1970 and seven years later came to Gisborne, where her first job was at Kaiti School.
Family intervened before she took up her career again at Central.
She has seen a lot of change over her years in the classroom.
“I think the changes to education often go in cycles,”she says.
“When I first started at Central it was open plan, where we had teachers work with small groups while another teacher supervised a bigger number of students completing independent work.
“After a few years, individual classrooms were the flavour, so concertina doors were added and classrooms were more single cells.
“Now we have schools moving to collaborative classrooms, where there are several teachers working together in large working spaces.”
Mrs Beale said she feels for teachers now.
“Some of the students are not as respectful as they were back in the 90s and often require a lot of teacher time, which can mean less learning time for the others.
“If there was more assistance for these disruptive students and those with learning difficulties or class sizes were smaller, it would mean the majority of the students would get more quality learning.
“It would also mean that teachers wouldn’t burn out as easily and they would have more energy to deliver quality education to our next generation of New Zealanders.
“At primary level, we need the opportunity to teach all children to read, write and solve maths problems.
“It is too hard to pick up the pieces at high school level.
“I hope the government listens to what the teachers are saying and give them the assistance they need.
“Education is so important.”
Mrs Beale has been involved with the Gisborne Netball Centre for many years and hopes to continue helping out with publicity.
“I try to go to all of the Premier games in the season and send reports to the Herald and radio stations.”
Her three children are all sportspeople and have inherited a love for sport she shares with husband Jim.
“We have been very involved with our three children and their sports as they were growing up — fundraising and helping with tournaments.
“We believe sporting activities are very important for developing character and helping cement the bonds within families, so encouraged our children to do the best they could.”
Oldest son Simon played rugby and rugby league at representative level. Hayden played football for Gisborne City under Kevin Fallon for many years and also played for Napier City in the National League. And Rachel started playing hockey ,then moved to netball.
“She has had very good guidance from Ronnie Martin and has achieved well in her netball — Girls’ High teams, Gisborne, Hawke’s Bay and Waikato rep teams. Her highlight would have been making the Waikato BOP Magic netball team.
“She added to that highlight by being called back into the Magic team in July 2018 (aged 35) when they were hit by injury.”
Central School farewelled Mrs Beale at a morning assembly, where she was given a netball signed and filled with messages reflecting her passion for the sport.
Some of the students made up a special cheer for her, complete with sparkling pom poms.
Although she likes to be busy, she is looking forward to slowing down a bit and even occasionally eating breakfast in her pyjamas.
“I have loved my whole teaching career and it will be different next year, but it is time to give my brain a rest,” she says.
But if the phone rings one day in the new year with a call from Central School for some short-term help, Sherrill Beale will be happy to oblige.
That’s if she isn’t away making some more family memories with her children and grandchildren,in Hamilton and Brisbane. Or having a leisurely breakfast.
