When moving to Australia, it is important to recognise that you are making a significant choice not just for yourself, but for your family as well, leading you all to a brighter future.
Your children are a huge part of the move and this page has been created to help you share your stories of how your kids finally settled and what helped with the transition.
To add you stories to this page please click on the button below.
Toddlers
”Moving country can be a huge adjustment for any one, but with toddlers it's massive.... We have found that they only really miss their routines and grandparents. The grandparents spent months learning to skype so we could all keep in contact and with the routine, well that just took some time. The kids have started in day care and made some new friends now. They are loving the beach and parks and now have more of an out door lifestyle.
The Appleton Family
”Routine, Routine, Routine! We tried our best to keep to our 2 year olds routine when we moved over. Kept with the whole bath, book, bed routine too. She took a few days to settle which we were actually really happy about as we the parents took longer!!
Barry
”Facetimes weekly. Constant update messages & video’s. You could even set up an email account for the baby then on their behalf obviously send pictures & diary updates to the important people & receive them back. Like a long term keepsake electronic diary. As the child gets older they have all the video’s & pictures to look back on (like grandparents singing happy birthday) & vice versa. Then when you visit or they visit its an excuse to have an additional xmas or birthday partys just for fun 🤩 means the child gets double the celebrations & double the presents 👍🏼😂 I’m sure there will be mums where you move looking for playdate buddies & you’ll all make new friends who can support. Good luck
Jade
Pre Teens
”When we arrived in South Australia our boys were almost 3 and just turned 6 years old. They're complete opposites to each other, Reuben is quiet yet Tobias is very confident. They're now almost 5 & 8 and they have both settled very well. They both absolutely love life! School, Scouts, Soccer, biking, walks, beach and city events & shows... can you blame them?! For kids and adults alike, I think the key is to get out there, do activities and meet people. Our boys any ourselves now have a great circle of friends, some are previous DUC clients too. Whenever we're not at work we're doing something with friends and SA has sooo much to offer!
Dave Wilson
Making a regular time to speak with Grandparents is also a good way to help kids settle. We purchased a Portal TV Camera. It sits on top of the TV and zooms in/out to get the whole family in. My wife's family have one too so when we speak with them it's a great quality conversation for all of the family.
”When we moved over, our boys were 7 (Jamie) and 9 (Bradley).
Lisa Chambers
Our youngest settled well, but Bradley is a little more social and had made a circle of friends in the UK.
We made a real effort to socialise and get to know other families with kids, and help the kids to make friends.
We also encouraged them to invite friends over, and also go out to the local park to get to know other kids.
Both have settled well and now have their own circle of friends. Neither really talk about the UK anymore, so I guess we achieved our goal!
”Alright, I may be too liberal, but the iPad was used a lot in the beginning as a distraction for our 7 year old. Do I feel guilty, No! It helped him to relax, and gave us time to sort the massive pile of things we had to do.
Gary
”We moved over when our Harry was 3. He had a very special bond with his nanna in the UK so we was expecting him to find it hard but in-fact quite the opposite, he settled well with being at home with myself to start with for about 2 - 3 months, where we went out during the day to parks as a way to getting chatting and meeting people,
Tanya
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before we made the decision to get him started and settled into a kindy program, we researched the area we were living in to make the sure the transition from kindy into school down the track went smoothly as in our local area they offer leap into prep and he actually started school with a kindy friend.
He integrated well attending kindy 2 days a week initially before I started work and then attended 3 days once I started working part time. And has enjoyed and settled well into school life without any issues.
As you will probably gather he did begin to ask where nanna was and expressing he missed family members but this was ok and all normal, we managed with explaining each time he asked they lived a long way away, showing him a world map so he understood the distance along with encouraging family facetime calls to help with this.
Keeping a good routine, talking about the people you leave behind and integrating with kindy’s, schools and sports activities is all great options to in helping settle the younger people who make the move over.
”Before making the big move we had planned a recci holiday to Australia, this was important for us to not only scope out the suburbs, work etc, but for the kids to get an idea of what Australia was like. Keeping them involved and part of our plans were really important to us, so they didn't experience a big move out of the blue. We explained the process and the plans with them.
Starting a new school was more nerve racking for me than it was them I felt, I certainly cried more than they did!! There are brits always making the move and they aren't ever the 'new kids' for long. They made friends so quickly at school and by meeting kids in the neighbourhood!
Life gets hectic once you're both working, so make sure you make time to take them on lots of adventures still and show them why you fell in love with Australia.
Teens
”We have a teenage daughter and she was the only person in the family who didn't want to make the move, she didn't want to leave her friends. It has taken a few months but Ele is now happier than she has ever been! We had her choose 2 sports that she would like to play (netball and dance class) and she has made some great friends from both. Team sports have been amazing for Ele. She has been updating her close friends in England on her adventures via video chat and WhatsApp.
Kate
”You may find you just have to choose your battles, and give in a little more than you would like with your teenager to begin with. We needed to remember that Sarah was allowed to deal with the move in the way she needed to. The tiredness caught up with her, and she slept loads in the first week. Lot's of treats, calls with friends and family helped her settle.
Jamie
”Our teenager (Jack), like most teenagers is addicted to his phone. We encouraged him to make an Instagram account and a facebook page so he could post about his move. This helped to keep his friends and family updated, and he even made friends along the way too!
Tracy
