Dahlia Malaeulu Author Visit

On Wednesday, 24th November, author Dahlia Malaeulu visited St Brendan's. Dahlia was scheduled to visit us in September but with New Zealand going into a snap Level 4 lockdown due the COVID-19 Delta variant before this and Level 3 restrictions following we had to reschedule. Dahlia's visit was definitely worth the wait!

Dahlia held three 45 minute sessions, adjusting her approach to the age of the student audience. She told us about how she got started writing books, originally writing stories to introduce her two young boys to the Samoan language through numbers, colours and days of the week. Her first three books, published in 2019, were Mase's Room, Lagi Spies and Malia Shares. These proved so popular that she has continued writing books introducing the Samoan language to older children, and babies, and also sharing with young adult readers stories of growing up in New Zealand as a young Samoan in the books Teina Samoa and Tama Samoa.

In all three sessions Dahlia prompted students to say the Samoan numbers and cultural items after her. She read and shared the board book Going to Te Papa - Asiasiga 'i Le Falemata'aga - Te Papa about important Samoan cultural items showing and sharing her knowledge of the items and handing examples around for students to see and touch.

Thank you so much for coming to visit us Dahlia, we hope you can visit us again one day!