Te Rawhiti Marae

By -



I was fortunate to be asked to go on the the 4 day trip to Rawhiti Marae in November. I went with about 20 Māori students from Kata O'Donnell's tutor class and 3 other teachers. The purpose of the trip was to familiarise the students with Māori tikanga in a remote settlement on Māori land which is quite different from what they are accustomed to.



Activities were run by WaiNot Tourism and featured a forest walk, snorkelling, fishing with nets, cooking pippis on the beach, swimming and jet ski riding. The students were kept busy from 7.45am until about 10pm at night. It was a great way for them to bond together well away from school and to have new experiences learning new skills.




What did I learn from This? I learned more about ways of working with Māori students,the importance of tikanga, eating, sleeping and working together. It was fascinating to be in such a remote untouched environment and to see how the students behaved and related differently from when they are at school. They were more relaxed, eager to participate and contribute, respectful and really enjoying the learning. A great experience.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Appraisal vs Certification

By -
Image
At a recent meeting with PCTs there seemed to be some confusion around evidence for appraisal and evidence for certification. Appraisal Appraisals are about   " improving teacher capability and student outcomes " (ERO). That is why the teacher's goals are linked to the vision and goals of the strategic plan of the school. Often there will be a school goal, a department goal and a personal goal. The appraisal process is  focused on valued outcomes for students, from goal-setting, evidence gathering and analysis, observations and professional discussions to the annual report (ERO). Attention can de directed to priority students and evidence from teachers' inquiries can form the basis of an appraisal discussion. So teachers choose their own goals within the guidelines & parameters set by the school. Originally this process did not include the Registered Teacher Criteria but the Practising Teacher Criteria are now being used in appraisal. There has been confus
Read more

Pepeha

By -
This week we focussed on our pepeha . I do have Māori heritage and know my ancestral line but have not been brought up as Māori. I have developed my pepeha using screencastify (see read more)
Read more

Learners leading learning

By -
Image
For our PCT professional learning yesterday we looked at the reading "Learners in the Driving Seat" by Chris Watkins . Watkins begins the reading with asking the students to point their index finger to the ceiling then to point to who is responsible for their learning. Most will point to the teacher. This is certainly the case with the 11 beginning teachers that I am currently working with ie that they take responsibility for the students' learning but as Watkins points out " research demonstrates that when students are driving the learning it leads to: greater engagement & intrinsic motivation students setting higher challenges students evaluating their own work (self & peer assessment) better problem-solving" He then provides some very good questions to ask (rather than tell) for Before Starting, On the Road, and Journey's end. These equate well to John Hattie's feedback questions "Where am I going?" (Learning Intention/g
Read more