Building my inquiry

As I begin the journey as a CoL Teacher in the Manaiakalani Kahui Ako I am beginning to think about Inquiry. My context is development of the NZ/Aotearoa History Curriculum - and my goal is to identify areas where my inquiry will make a powerful contribution to wider school and cluster goals.

• At this stage of My inquiry the focus is to:

• identify valued learning outcomes which include but are not limited to achievement outcomes

• Profile: Investigate the nature of the students’ strengths and gaps in relation to valued learning outcomes in detail 

• Focus on the issue of student learning

What are the key learning objectives that teachers see in respect to Aotearoa New Zealand History? How does the new Curriculum fit with the learning that has already taken place?

I am really keen to connect with teachers from across the Kahui Ako to understand what the reality is for their learners.

First I need to understand before I can create and test my hypothesis in regards to the teaching and Learning of Aotearoa History

Embracing Local Histories

 Last Friday I had the privledge of facilitating a tour of Tamaki, led by Matua Wade Harley from Ngāti Pāoa, for a Year 9 class at Tamaki College.

We travelled to five locations, Maungarei, Mokoia Pa (Panmure Bridge), Mauinaina Pa (Marist Rugby Club), Te Whanake (Point England Reserve) and Wai-o-rohe (Karaka Bay).

We learned the stories of the land, of arrival, of battles fought, the signing of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and we looked to the future with the up coming construction of a new Marae for Ngāti Pāoa. This was the first time that Matua had taken a group of students out on such a Hikoi.

I had two main objectives of the tour. Firstly it was to listen and learn the stories of Ngāti Pāoa and the Tamaki Area. The second was to observe how learners engaged with the local histories. Can Trips to local historical sites provide valuable learning opportunities by increasing student engagement?

I have to say that the engagement levels for this class were outstanding. There were moments where the students sat silently and were moved by the stories being told. It was clear that the students enjoyed themselves.

I plan with the support of SLT to take more of these tours hopefully getting every year 9 student to attend at some point. 

 

Histories at Tamaki College

 It was great to catch up with Mr Russel Dunn, Deputy Principal of teaching and learning at Tamaki College, to discuss his vision for the Aotearoa New Zealand Histories Curriculum (ANZHC) at Tamaki College.

Currently there is no seperate ANZHC at Tamaki College. History is taught within the social studies programme in years 9 and 10 and then becomes an option for NCEA at Years 11, 12 and 13.  However the introduction of this new curriculum does provide an opportunity for colleges such as Tamaki to engage with and critically evaluate stories of our past, particually in a local context. 

Russel was clear that the new ANZHC "Must be given the mana it deserves". This, from my perspective, was great to hear!. Russel was especially excited about the opportunity to embrace the new curriculum with the front half of the NZC. Relating to others, critical thinking and collaberating are all Key Competencies that can be explicitly taught using the contexts within the ANZHC.  

Russel cautioned that as we embark on the journey of embracing the ANZHC we must be mindful of the lense that we are using.  We have to be mindful for instance of the Treaty of Waitangi not just in a historical context but how it remains relevant to all New Zealanders today. 

Thank you Russel for your time - I am excited to see how we can incorporate the new ANZHC into both Tamaki College and the Manaiakalani cluster.

Connections in the Secondary School space

 It was fantastic to be invited to and participate in the Social Science Manaiakalani Departmental discussion. This initative connects secondary school teachers in the same subject area in order to collaberate.

Kerry Boyde Preece from Manaiakalani led the round table discussion and we were fortunate to have Maria Perreau from the Aotearoa Social Science Educators' Network join the korero.

Kerry introduced the Manaiakalani Kaupapa of Learn Create Share and spoke about the out reach that Manaiakalani has around Aotearoa.

The discussion centred around the development of new resources, Workshop videos/PD available for teachers, scaffolding of assessments, using digital technologies such as pod casting, digital strategies for NCEA assessment.

I really enjoyed the korero about how we can make learning in Social Science more engaging for students - something they want to do for more than just credits.

I am really looking forward to be continual participation in these deparment discussions later in 2022

Introducing Myself

Kia Ora, Malo e Lelei, Talofa Lava, Fakaalofa Lahi Atu, Bula Vinaka and Hello

My name is Scott Mansell and I am a new across - CoL teacher in the Manaiakalani Cluster for 2022. 

First a little about myself. I am married to a wonderful woman (Wendy) and am the father to Liam, who is 12 going on 18. I have been blessed to be the Teacher in Charge of History for Tamaki College since 2012. I love my job and my students

The focus of my new CoL role will be to support teachers and schools with the implementation of the new Histories curriculum. After a student led petition, which was started by Otorohanga College gained 13,000 signatures, was presented to parliament, it was evident that there was a desire to place more emphasis on New Zealand History    In September 2019 it was announced that the teaching of Aotearoa History would be compulsory in all schools from 2022, to be taught from years 1-10. It is expected that schools make a start on the implementation of this curriculum should begin in 2022 with full implementation by 2025. Covid-19 has delayed this by one year.

I believe that this shift towards a prescriptive curriculum is a positive step. Currently, in social science, we have some rather broad Achievement Objectives. For example, at Level 5 of the curriculum, Students need to learn that people move between places and how this has consequences for the people and the places. There is no requirement for this to have any focus on Aotearoa New Zealand. The context could be, for example, Irish migration to the United States. In other words, under the current curriculum framework it is entirely possible that students can graduate secondary school without knowing history that is relevant to them. To quote the draft curriculum document, this is “Learning that can not be left to chance”. It is possible for learners to graduate from secondary school with no real insight into the history of their own country. The stories that are important to modern New Zealand, be it the loss of land following the Treaty and subsequent settlement process, the Spanish Flu epidemic or the Dawn Raids.  

Thus the pivot towards a focus on Aotearoa histories is exciting. I feel that the more educated the population is with regards to their own country, the better they are able to contribute to and participate in society. 

I look forward to working with teachers and learners as we embark on this new and exciting journey. 

DFI Day 2

Back to Papakura Central School for Day 2 of DFI.

Today was about a few things, but mainly the overall theme was working smarter not harder. Technology is great but  efficient use of it will save time. And teachers all need more time!

We are all familiar with the google suite and have used their most common apps often. Gmail, Calendar and meet became our go to tools especially when distance learning is needed. But I discovered today that there is far more than meets the eye with many of these tools. For example the ability to colour different calendars can make navigating the site (or app) a lot easier.

Tab rationalisation is also a useful concept for those of us who are guilty of having far too many tabs open at any one time. I did not know that this can impact the performance of my Macbook and will need to ensure I am better at closing them. My homework is to try some of the tools that were shown to help me with this.

I am looking forward to continuing DFI in term 2!

DFI Day 1

Today I began my DFI journey, as I undertake the Across School Kahui Ako role in the Manaiakalani Cluster of schools in Tamaki. 

A DFI, or Digital Fluency Intensive, is a series of 8 1 day sessions focusing on using digital tools in the classroom effectively. These skills are important pedagogical skills to have in a modern classroom.

Today we focused on the history and kaupapa of Manaiakalani, getting an understanding of the reason it came into existence and the goals around educational equity.

We were given a brief overview of the Google Apps suite and then were given a deep dive into Google Docs. I could really see the benefit in particular of using the Table of Contents function for Docs with my students as they undertake their research assessments. This functionality will enable students to organise their work effectively which is a key element of the task.

The highlight of the day was the learning that I undertook around formatting in Google Docs using images. This was not something I was overly confident in before, but I gave it a go and below is my creation. Not the most advanced, but it is a start.