Hello dear ETIA Instructors,
Welcome to our first ETIA Newsletter for 2020! My name is Kathryn Tonges and as your new President for ETIA Ltd I am very much looking forward to sharing with you some exciting changes that will be happening to support you in your endeavours as an instructor. I am also State Executive Officer of ETIA QLD, and a National Trainer.
Firstly let me share a little about myself. I trained as a P.E.T. instructor in 1978. Yikes, 42 years ago! As a young teacher I picked up the P.E.T. book at the University of QLD bookshop and was so impressed I began applying the skills in my classroom.
I have had a very enjoyable working life with much variety. I taught from early childhood to tertiary level with 20 years teaching Children’s Services at TAFE. During my career as a teacher and as an advisory teacher I reviewed many different parenting programmes and found Parent Effectiveness Training outstanding.
I have been a coordinator of a Commonwealth and State Government funded family support programme, linking socially isolated families with relevant support services and training volunteers to provide in-home support.
Whilst living in Beijing for seven years because of my husband’s work, I conducted P.E.T., B.Y.B. courses and Instructor Training for expatriates. I subsequently co-authored a book with other P.E.T. instructors whom I trained, to help expatriate children cope with changes. I have written for parenting magazines both in Beijing and Australia, and blogs for my website The Parent Within.
I continue to teach Parent Effectiveness Training courses in Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast and as a qualified coach, I coach parents online. I have also loved teaching the Be Your Best course to many groups of people over the years. I enjoy reading especially in the field of self-development – in other words working on myself! My passion is effective communications and helping people build quality relationships.
I have been happily married to Glenn for 43 years and feel blessed to have two precious sons, two daughters-in-law and three delightful grandchildren. I reside on the Sunshine Coast, love travel and because of my time as an expatriate have many cherished friends all over the world.
I love meeting people and I very much look forward to connecting with each of you. I look forward to working together to create a supportive community of instructors throughout Australia. We have a product in the form of our courses that is unmatched. I want so many more people to experience the benefits of these amazing skills. I am sure you do too.
I look forward to hearing about your needs, sharing our new ETIA Ltd website, sharing the ETIA National Management Team strategic plans, and importantly guiding you through the changes in the latest GTI P.E.T. Instructor Guide, Workbook, Power Point and Role Play cards.
Warmest regards,
Kathryn Tonges
M: 0466582315
