Meet the Geckos Team:
Teachers & Staff
The Teachers
Martina Thaler
About Martina
Martina has a Graduate Dip Ed (Primary) and has taught German at primary school for six years. She is an active member of the AGTV (Association of German Teachers Victoria). She is teaching our Foundation – Grade 1 non-native class and is a native German speaker. Martina joined Geckos in 2013 as our very first teacher!
Sophia Kent
About Sophia
Sophia is from Germany and was raised bilingual german-english. She is a certified speech pathologist B.Sc. with more than two years of experience providing professional speech pathology services to patients of all ages with speech, language, voice, fluency and cognitive disorders. She worked predominantly in paediatric environments such as in kindergardens or primary schools where she practiced individualized and group therapies. Sophia joined the GECKOS Team in 2019.
Dr. Bernd Kalinna
About Bernd
Ich komme aus Deutschland wo ich Biologie studiert habe. Seit meiner Promotion in 1990 lebe ich in Australien. Nach meiner 24-jährigen Tätigkeit and verschiedene Instituten und Universitäten, habe ich einen Master of Teaching abgeschlossen und arbeite seitdem in der Sekundarstufe als Biologielehrer. Bei GECKOS arbeite ich seit 2015 und unterrichte Sekundarstufe und Erwachsene. Ausserdem koordiniere ich das DSD Programm für GECKOS.
Edgar Sebald
About Edgar
My name is Edgar Sebald and I am a German teacher. I am both an Australian and German citizen. I have lived and taught English and German in Nordrhein Westfalen, Germany, Osaka and Wakayama, Japan and now in Melbourne, Australia. I love teaching German and it is great to learn new languages! I myself can speak English, German and Japanese fluently. My hobbies are traveling, cycling, hiking, camping, golf, swimming, dining, dancing, fishing and karaoke.
Lachlan Denton
About Lachlan
Hallo, mein Name ist Lachlan und ich komme aus Australien. Meine Partnerin, Anila, war früher die KIGA Lehrerin und als sie sich entschieden hat Geckos zu verlassen, war ich froh zu übernehmen. Zu dieser Rolle bring ich meine Erfahrungen als Musiker, der weltweit auf Tournee war und über zwanzig Alben veröffentlicht hat.
Unter der Woche arbeite ich als Disability Support Worker und baue Möbel. Dadurch bringe ich eine Leidenschaft für Kreativität und eine verständnisvolle und empathische Herangehensweise zum KIGA.
Ich denke, dass lernen durch Musik sehr effektiv ist und es auch Spaß macht. Ich habe meine Gitarre immer dabei und freue mich darauf mit den Kindern zu singen.
Eva Brightling
About Eva
Ich heiße Eva, und fange 2021 bei GECKOs als Kindergartenlehrerin an.
Ich habe 2015 einen Schüleraustausch in Deutschland gemacht in einer kleinen Stadt namens Limburg an der Lahn, und habe seitdem ich eine Liebe für die deutsche Sprache, sodass ich die unbedingt weiter lernen wollte. Ich bin jetzt im 7. Semester eines humanistischen Studiums an der Monash Uni, wo meine Hauptfächer Deutsch, Linguistik und Spanisch sind.
Ich habe 2019/20 nochmal in Deutschland gewohnt, diesmal in Berlin, wo ich ein Semester an der Freien Universität absolviert habe. Ich freue mich, dieses Jahr Teil des GECKOS Teams zu werden!
Janine Kieburg
About Janine
Janine is a native German speaker from the Berlin region. She has studied German and French as a teacher in Berlin and the Ruhr. Her expertise comprises half a year in a lycée-collège (secondary school) in France, about four years at a German Steiner School on the secondary and high school level and two years at a German Gymnasium (higher secondary school). In the latter two positions, she did not only teach the aforementioned languages but was also a class teacher. Since April 2019, she is living in Melbourne.
Melanie Gualano
About Melanie
coming soon
The Teacher Assistants
Elena Cruz
About Elena
Ich war von 2013 bis 2018 GECKOS Schülerin, aber ich habe in 2019 als Lehrerassistentin zu arbeiten angefangen. Ich studiere Deutsch an der Schule und werde vielleicht in Deutschland studieren. In meiner Freizeit lese ich oder ich gucke Filme an. Ich singe, tanze und schauspiele gern.
Ben Schley
About Ben
My name is Ben Schley and I am going into Year 11 this year. With my background being German, I have had no chance not learning the beautiful language of German. I have learnt German at GECKOS for 10 years and also 3 years at high school. In my free time I like sport, Cricket and AFL in particular, reading, listening to music and playing video games. I am now a teaching assistant at GECKOS.
The Staff
Eva Murer
Principal
About Eva
Eva is a native speaker and holds a Master degree in Educational Science as well as a Grad.Dipl. Primary Teaching. She works for several public school during the week and is also a language assessor for the ADF. As an enthusiastic reader, she is working for SBS as part of the podcast team of Abenteuer Lesen – Reading Adventures, a weekly podcast on SBS German.
Simone Costa
Admin
About Simone
Simone is the Office and Social Media Manager at Geckos and will graduate from La Trobe University with a Bachelor of Media and Communications (Public Relations) later in 2022. A native English speaker, Simone studied German while in High School and is now continuing her studies in the Geckos adult class.
Simone’s professional background is in community relations and admin in the public sector and recruitment in the education not-for-profit sector. In her free time, Simone enjoys reading books, playing computer games and practising German, of course!
The Geckos Board & Committee
The Geckos Board is made up of a group of friendly parent volunteers who work together to strengthen our Geckos Community. There are 4 scheduled Board meetings each year where official business is addressed, but the board is always working towards one project or another. They work behind the scenes to raise funds for many projects, the biggest of which currently is our new library. One of the fundraisers for the library was our December Bunnings Sausage Sizzle – a great opportunity to get to know our school community and to have lots of fun!
We hope to have this up and running by mid-year 2021!
Feel free to approach any of the members or our principal if you feel you have some level of expertise that will help us in our endeavours or if you’d just like to join the team and help us towards achieving our many goals.
Heidi Stephens
President
About Heidi
Having attended a Saturday morning German school as a child myself, it was very important to me that my children had the same opportunity. I recollect a strong sense of community & I have fond memories of our German community Christmas celebrations.
With 2 children at Geckos since its foundation, I have loved being part of the Board for the last 3 years to help build this sense of community & lay the foundations to create similar memories for all of our students.
Alexander Murer
Vice President
About Alexander
Mitbegründer von Geckos Inc 2013, hat an der Schule als Direktor/ Lehrer und in verschiedenen Board-Funktionen gedient. Alexander hat Musik-, Mathematik- und Geschichte Lehramt Oberstufe studiert und mehr als 20 Jahre als Opernsänger gearbeitet. Momentan arbeitet er als Head of Arts/Tec am MSC in Mansfield und unterrichtet bei Geckos Inc die 2/3 Muttersprachler Klasse – und ist natürlich als Vizepraesident auch im Geckos Inc Board.
Max vom Kolke
Treasurer
About Max
Max has an extensive financial background which he utilises to help Geckos in his role as the Treasurer. He has worked in Tier 1 Investment Banks in Germany and London before migrating with his family to Melbourne.
Max has 3 children attending Geckos at the moment and in his free time he enjoys playing hockey.
Enrico Kunze
Secretary
About Enrico
coming soon
The Board Assistants
Satta van Daal
IT & Website
About Satta
Satta is a Designer from Germany who has been living in Melbourne since 2003. His son is a student at Geckos.