To have formed an understanding of how tikanga māori and tangata whenuatanga is practiced in the classroom, then develop and demonstrate my commitment to upholding Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership in the classroom through integrating mātauranga māori into my teaching practices and through learning sessions. 

Week 1

Action Plan - Observing and gathering information from my kaiako hapai to form an understanding of how tikanga māori and tangata whenautanga is integrated within their teaching practices so that I can connect and reflect on how ākonga respond to those practices, which enables me to develop my own practices to upholding to Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership as Kaiako. And to further develop partnership with ākonga, whanau and the teaching staff to understand the taonga every ākonga brings in their kete in the classroom.

Reflection

This week, I've observed that the students become somewhat lost when their regular teachers are absent. The teachers in our zones, including my AT, have been absent due to sickness and then unfortunately myself too towards the end of the week. The learners appear to act out of sorts when the relievers are there, such as not listening, being confused about their typical routine, being distracted, and not being happy to do the task, even though they were absent for two days. I mention that because it gives me an idea of how it might be when I'm a teacher and when I might be away. What steps will I take to prevent this from happening? Additionally, is there a chance that we may bring in the same relief? I realise that this may not be realistic given that we cannot predict which reliever we will receive on any given day, but it has made me consider the implications of my absence. Having said that, I have nonetheless had a lovely week as I work to strengthen my relationships with the students, their families, and the teaching staff. 

This week, the students continued to create and finish their pepeha's, and I helped them by writing and speaking te reo māori words while they created their pepeha's. TKI (2022) discusses the importance of using te reo māori included into your classroom as it includes curriculum principles; including Te Tiriti o Waitangi, cultural diversity and inclusion. Furthermore, describing the importance of including pepeha as part of the activities to do in your classroom, pepeha describes your identity and heritage by telling a story of the places and people you are connected to. I also sat with numerous groups this week as we reviewed the words on their pepeha. They enjoyed it when I told them that I am not an expert in the words either and that if we practiced together, we would become better at pronouncing them. I could tell that it made some ākonga feel less embarrassed to read their pepeha out loud. I also sat next to a new student in our classroom to write her pepeha, and we collaborated on it for approximately 30 minutes while using her tablet.  (click here for evidence of a couple of pepeha’s that I helped with Student A & B)

I've also been talking to my AT about the tikanga that is being practiced in our classroom, and she told me that it is done through the use of resources from https://maatauranga.co.nz/. For instance, this week, we are studying Tupaia and Captain Cook, and we are using the website above to help us navigate the experience of voyagers.  I recommended to my AT that we add a period of time where all students bring in their taonga and share with one another why this object is significant to them. This may potentially be their own self-led project in the afternoons. Prior to asking ākonga to bring in their taonga, I would construct a lesson plan to explain what a taonga is, why it is significant to māori culture, and why it is also significant to all of us. My AT advised that she would love that but we would have to see whether we can fit this in or not.

Week 2

Action Plan - Integrating te reo māori by continuing the school’s existing karakia, hui waiata and class instructions to show my commitment and respect for the learning environment. 

Reflection

Due to my days of full control, this week has been a very contemplative week for me. I feel that I have worked very hard to uphold professional connections and to incorporate Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership into my teaching practices and to ensure that it is at the forefront of my mind, so I am able to do it naturally. As a part of this partnership, I have set myself the aim of using the māori praise poster I created for our classroom during my classes to praise ākonga this week to incorporate te reo māori into our classroom. One learner questioned "what does that mean" when I used one of the praises from the poster. I went to the wall where the poster was hanging and stated, "It means excellent," pointing at the word. And I asked him, "Am I pronouncing that correctly?," to a learner who I knew spoke māori at home, and he responded, "I don't know." The other students then walked up to the poster and assisted me in pronouncing it. He then stood up and assisted me in pronouncing it once the other students were next to me, which indicated that he was hesitant to share with me but was more at ease when there was a group. I'm glad I had the chance to put one of the Tātaiako competencies, Ako - practise in the classroom and beyond (Ministry of Education, 2023). Along with our māori ākonga, I really loved learning how to pronounce māori words and having other students participate. (click here for the poster)

In another lesson I was taking (Inquiry - Pangea), the assignment was for ākonga to draw what they already knew about Pangea and produce a title page about it before we started doing research on it. Going around the room to look at ākonga's work, I paused to look at one of our learners' work because his title page had a drawing of a koru and a pounamu design on it which caught my eye. Wow, this is wonderful work, I would love to hear your ideas behind your artwork, I commented as I sat next to this learner, and he began to describe the following to me. "This is the globe, and I drew New Zealand because it's where I live but also because it's a part of Pangea, and then I drew these stars because my grandmother always tells me that our stars are important parts of our lives, so that's why I drew them, and then I drew my pounamu because it also makes me who I am and that's part of my world, and this koru here is what my grandmother wears." Then I said, "Thank you for explaining that to me; everything on this page has a purpose for you and is lovely; you've also shown that the continental drift and volcanic eruptions are parts of Pangea."Can you tell me more about this koru and pounamu?" he responded, "Yeah! It’s what my grandmother wears, did you know that only women wear that in māori culture”, I said “really do you know why?” and he said, “Yes because it means you are the core of the family and that’s my grandma”. I said, "Thank you so much for sharing that with me because you have taught me something about your culture, and I love that." I received a smile and a "you're welcome" from him. At the end of the day, I reflected back on this conversation and realised that I had applied another Tātaiako competency in the classroom: Tangata Whenuatanga, which is place-based, sociocultural awareness and knowledge (Ministry of Education, 2023). I walked away from this discussion feeling incredibly humbled and proud of the connection I had made with this learner, and I felt that because of this connection, I had earned his respect through understanding his world and his culture. He was delighted to share with me about his culture, and I could see he was pleased that I was interested in what he knew. This experience helped me to realise how crucial it is for teachers to be culturally responsive in addition to content knowledge. (click here for evidence of the learner’s title page).

I have established a routine this week of leading our class into our current karakia before we start in the morning, before lunchtime and leading us out in the afternoon. Combrink (2023), notes that "karakia help to calm a class, establish routine, encourage unity and signal the stepping into and out of a learning space" and I couldn't agree more because the times that we forget to do karakia (which is rarely) I notice that  the ākonga are out of sort. The karakia seems to engage them, and I have noticed that it calms them down and allows us to come together. Another source I came across and saved for my future resource kete is the Tākai website, which offers a wealth of advice on karakia as well as materials regarding mātauranga māori that have been compiled from whānau and other communities. 

Week 3

Action Plan - Planning and implementing lesson plans that connect to tikanga māori and tangata whenuatanga to demonstrate my commitment as Kaiako to Te Tiriti o Waitangi. 

Reflection

According to sport nz (2023), “Tapu Ae is a fast-moving Māori game. It shares the same pūrākau as Kī-o-rahi. It is fun to play and helps children to learn the significance of movement for Māori while providing the opportunity to use te reo Māori and Māori concepts in authentic game contexts. Te reo Māori and tikanga Māori.” For this week's focus I wanted to implement a PE lesson that incorporates tikanga māori (Tapu Ae) and enables our māori learners to feel included and empowered to be māori in our school through their well being by doing PE through tikanga māori. (Click here for this lesson plan) During this lesson I noticed that māori ākonga were engaged and instantly caught on to the game rules, due to this observation I asked those same ākonga to help me explain the game to their peers or guide them during the PE lesson and they did an outstanding job in helping me with that, another observation I made towards our māori learners, they looked proud to have a game that they are familiar with and is part of their world and they started to teach other learners the name of the ball (Kī) and how to say pass to me (karawhiua) and catch (hopu). Even though the game went well, there were teething issues as all ākonga hadn’t played this before but also I realised after reflection that next time it would be good to have bibs to recognise one team from another and to also have rippers because some ākonga were not being honest about being tagged. I spoke to my AT about this reflection so the next time they choose to do this game during PE, then those would be the things she would need to have in mind. 

Week 4

Action Plan - Observing other classrooms and kaiako of how they go about upholding to the Te Tiriti o Waitangi partnership. 

Reflection

Whilst observing the varying year levels through the school, it has enabled me to understand how the school practices and includes tikanga māori into their day. This mostly happens at the start of the morning and sometimes in the afternoon and definitely at the end of the day. Karakia is practiced throughout and some classes do waiata and some don’t, however, this observation has also helped me understand how I can include tikanga māori into my classroom in the future and take opportunities to include and practice te reo māori into the classroom. Some kaiako were confident in using te reo māori words in their classroom but some were not. I would like to work hard at including this into my future classroom. 

Designed and implemented lessons based on curriculum and effective pedagogical approaches that provide me as kaiako to cater to all types of learners and create inclusive, supportive learning environments that result in rich learning outcomes. 

WEEK 1

Action Plan - Continuing to develop my knowledge and awareness of the identities and learning styles of ākonga to better meet their learning needs. And Observing my kaiako hapai to continue my development of effective lesson delivery with rich learning outcomes.

REFLECTION

This week has been quite informative with all the exposure to learning about the identities and learning styles of the ākonga to better meet their needs. For instance, there was one student I sat with in a different room because I noticed he went up to my AT and started crying, so I offered to sit with him in our teachers' offices and be with him while my AT can continue with the lesson. This learner has autism and maybe the start of depression as things seem overwhelming for him in a lot of situations. I offered to colour, cut paper, draw, and make various ribbon designs while he sat next to me, but he made no eye contact with me other than when I asked him if he would mind holding the ribbon for me as I made a plait, and he did so. When I asked him what he wanted to do, he didn't respond and so I said I will ask you questions and you can circle the Yes or No words I have written on the piece of paper, he shook his head and refused to put anything down on paper. So I decided to turn on some calming music and just sat beside him and worked while he sat there quietly.  After this a teacher aide came in and took over and he ended up going home. I felt sad that I couldn't help him, however, I went home and did some research to further understand his situation so if I were to sit with him next time I would be able to help turn it into a positive outcome. I found this website which was quite a helpful resource for me and one I have kept for my future classroom.

What I did get out of the exercise I did with this learner though, his classmates wanted to do the same activity with me. As a result, they approached me and asked if I could show them how to construct a plait. I answered of course, but they would have to wait until lunch. These two boys weren't too comfortable with me during my Prac 1A, but I tried really hard to connect with them during that time, and now I can see my hard work at building rapport with them has paid off. I taught both of them how to plait a ribbon during lunch, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I have noticed that those two learners always support the learner that I supported, especially when he has moments where he feels overwhelmed and starts to cry, they seem to bring such happiness to him and show a lot of manaakitanga towards him as well as be his kaitiaki (protectors).

I tried to get to know these two boys better by asking them what they like to do in their free time or with their family. One of them stated that he did flax weaving throughout the school holiday since his mum wanted a little mat for their home. The other responded by saying, "I've done one too with my grandfather. It was a fish, and I had to wait for it to dry". Their cultural background is māori from their school profile (which I have looked at during my Prac 1A). I asked if they both would be willing to bring their flax weaving in to show me because I'm quite curious to see it in person and find out how it was made. They answered, "Nah, it's not cool to bring that stuff in". I then said "what if we did a lesson about bringing something from home that is your taonga would you bring it then?"  and their faces lit up and they both looked at each other and one of them said "yeah I guess so!". My AT and I had a talk about whether or not I could design a session that includes bringing in their taonga, perhaps as a self-led project, and she thought it was a fantastic idea. I am eager to implement this in our classroom in the upcoming weeks.

According to TKI (Universal Design for Learning, 2022) UDL is to understand the diversity and variable needs of ākonga and design lessons in accordance of this, therefore, I wanted to make the effort into understanding learners' learning style and needs and adapting my teaching approach to benefit a rich learning outcome for the learners. I sat down with four learners needing help with a multiplication algorithm and taught them how we can go about solving the equation together. One particular learner said I need help and I really don’t get this. So I left that group after I had checked that they were all good with what they needed to do before I gave extra help to this learner. They were all good. I then asked the learner where she would be comfortable working, and she said she wanted to sit where her peers are not around her, so I took this learner aside and had a one on one session where I was going through the steps one by one and each step I would pause and make sure she is following, there were many times where she was lost and not following so we ended up repeating it quite a few times, but then in the end she got it and we both felt so achieved and happy, she even walked away thanking me and had a smile on her face. Another learner that I helped with his multiplication we were going through his 9 times table from 9 x 5 and onwards to 20. I showed him how groups worked in the timestable and we kept adding 9 to the previous number.(see picture of his book) 

Lastly during this week we had a staff meeting which was a workshop for PE & Hauora Lesson Plans. I had so much fun at this meeting, understanding how we can use the STEP model to change up PE games to suit the learners needs. The Step model is: 

S-space

T-task

E-Equipment

P-people/participation

We were taken through the steps of the STEP model (see this doc here) and then we had to go out in the courtyard and do it ourselves to understand this model. We then came back in to choose a game from the list that was handed out to us (see docs here) where we had to use the STEP model to adjust our lesson plan to the learners needs and learning style. Our group which consisted all the teachers from our Tīramaroa zones chose bench ball. We Decided to change the following to adjust to the learners needs and being inclusive of all learners:

S - we thought we can either make the set up of the court bigger because we teach year 7 & 8 ākonga but to make it more challenging for them too, we can make it smaller. We can also either do it in the hall or outside on the field.

T- changing up the task, so instead of being benched for those that got out by the ball, they can throw balls to their team members so they are not standing around and not moving their body. 

E- for equipment, instead of dodge balls we can use rubber chickens or small balls to help with their motor skills of catching and throwing.

P- We also said we can change it up by having year 7’s in one group and year 8’s in the opposing team so then we are making it fair. 

I have taken a lot out of that workshop and I am so lucky that I got to attend this early on in my teaching career.

Week 2

Action Plan - Further familiarisation and understanding of the relevant NZ curriculum learning areas to ensure ākonga are being appropriately lead into achieving learning outcomes. 

Reflection

This week I have involved myself in extra curricular activities that the school has to offer, so I can continue to familiarise myself as to how this can enhance learning outcomes and ensure ākonga are being appropriately led into achieving those outcomes. I have attended Jump Jam during lunchtime (click here for evidence) this is basically an Aerobic program that helps with kids fitness as well as have fun doing so, whilst I was watching the lesson of jump jam, I went up to the teacher during the dancing session (when she had time to talk) and I found out that she does this as a volunteer role additionally to being a teacher in the year 5/6 zone. They practice once every week and they get to perform it in term 3. I saw the learners that were part of jump jam and they were enjoying themselves and when I spoke to them and asked how they felt about being part of it, most of them said they were really proud to be part of a fun dance group. I thought it was an amazing way to take part in fitness and have fun at the same time but also helps boost ākonga confidence.

Another program they run at this school is Code Club, it is also run by another teacher from year 7/8 zone and he does this as a volunteer role during lunchtime. According to Code Club (2014)  “Code Club is a program of Digital Technologies and Hangarau Matihiko is about helping students see their potential as creators of technology, not just users”. I did not know this information before and have never heard about it before. I now understand the importance of it and why it’s run in the school. It's amazing that once again another teacher has taken on this additional role to help learners enhance their learning potential and gain an extra set of skills of creativity. During this session, I saw the ākonga create a maze from scratch and create a pathway for their character to walk through, but everything they did was designed by them on their own devices, this session was for year 5 and 6. I saw that the learners were doing so well and were enjoying themselves which was quite rewarding to watch. (Click here for evidence of the session). And Lastly, we had cross country this week too. I offered to help set up, however, the teacher that was in charge of this had already had many helping hands therefore didn’t require help. I asked my AT if she was comfortable with me running alongside the ākonga so I can encourage and support them during the run, and she was happy for me to do so. I ran with the year 7 and 8 boys the 1km and 2km, it was so much fun but also felt really good encouraging students to keep running and keep going. (click here for photos)

I also attended a staff meeting to learn more about technology which enhances students' learning through the approach of Universal Design for Learning (UDL).  We had an employee from Apple that came along to show us some tips and tricks that can be done on iPads to help learning. I learned that we can create a collection of bookmarked pages on one page on the ‘Notes App’ . I also learned how we can add a bookmarked page as an app on the homepage of an ipad. (click here for evidence of slides they presented).

This week I have also focused on familiarising myself with the NZ curriculum as I wrote my lesson plans during my 3 days of full control. I have found myself starting become faster at writing a lesson plan because as I teach the content I start to gauge where I want to head next with the ākonga’s response to the lesson and their interest as well as their next learning step, which then enables me to scaffold ākonga into our next lesson. According to Hunter (2007), the use of scaffolding assists students as they learn new abilities, bridges the knowledge gap between what they already know and what they need to know, and simplifies complex concepts for students to understand. Scaffolding has enabled me to also think of future lesson plans and what I think ākonga would benefit from learning according to what they show interest in within the classroom and how I can tie it within the NZ curriculum and our learning progression. (click here for all lesson plans folder)

I also have taken on feedback from my AT continuously throughout this week to ensure that I am leading ākonga on the correct path of learning and that my delivery of the lesson plans are effective.

Week 3

Action Plan - Consistently monitoring ākonga's responses to the lesson in order to gauge their understanding and design lessons that are tailored to their needs and prefered learning styles. 

Reflection

This week I have continued to monitor ākonga’s response to lessons and due to this I decided to develop a lesson plan that incorporates growth and help them to have a ready to learn attitude. Over the past few weeks that I have been observing I noticed that ākonga tend to put themselves down by saying “I am dumb” “I can’t do this” “my friend is better at this than me.” I felt really sad that I was hearing a negative learning attitude towards themselves and I wanted to implement a lesson where they have a ready to learn attitude and are ready for growth. I planned a lesson (click here for lesson plan) that was inspired by Dr. Carol Dweck. She has done amazing work around mindset for education and I have read some of her books throughout my degree in BA (majoring in Education) and I wanted to inspire our ākonga through her Growth Mindset vs Fixed Mindset work and what that means to us as learners. According to mindset works (2017), The attitudes of students towards failure piqued Carol Dweck and her colleagues' interest more than 30 years ago. They observed that although some children bounced back from even the tiniest setbacks, others were heartbroken. Dr. Dweck created the phrases "fixed mindset" and "growth mindset" to characterise the fundamental assumptions people have about learning and intelligence after examining the behaviour of thousands of youngsters. Students understand that work makes them stronger when they believe they can get smarter. As a result, individuals invest more time and effort, which raises their level of achievement. 

During the lesson, I noticed all ākonga were engaged and were keen to share their ideas and their thinking of where they put themselves on Dr. Dweck’s Summary of Dweck’s Mindset continuum (please see slide 3 on my lesson plan), I observed that many were honest to themselves and knew where they were on the continuum and some were not sure about it at all. The activity I had planned afterwards engaged the ākonga to notice the things that they are currently good at and the things that they can do better at (please see last slide of my lesson plan), this helped with connecting to what they have just learned about and get them to recognise their mindset with their learning and set goals for themselves as that’s part of growth mindset. Afterwards I saw that many ākonga wrote a lot into the section of what they are good at and struggled to write what they need to work on, after probing and some help from me they started to get a grasp of what they needed to write down for their goals of what they needed to work on.

Lastly, at the start of this week we have had a new system roll out on Monday about different zones of regulation to encourage positive behaviour in the school. Since Clearview is a PB4L focused school, PB4L is a rewards system which rewards 98% of the children which aligns with the clearview school values. This new behavioural system was developed through the PB4L team (consisting of four staff members from the school) due to behaviour management issues during class and break times. We had a brief staff meeting on that Monday morning before school started to catch up as to how this system should work and what to expect. (Click here for evidence titled Tīramaroa Thermostat & Tiramaroa Behaviour Indicators). My observation of this system as the week progressed I noticed varying behavioural issues that are usually prevalent had declined and the system was working, this system enabled ākonga to reset themselves by the time they had either got their first yellow strike or the second strike. Each Learning block allows them to reset themselves by starting fresh on the next learning block. According to Ministry of Education (2023), “Positive Behaviour for Learning (PB4L) initiatives help parents, whānau, teachers, early childhood centres, schools and kura  address behaviour, improve children's well-being, and increase educational achievement.” 

Week 4

Action Plan - Observing other classroom and kaiako of how they go about design for learning in their classroom. 

Reflection

During my observation of the varying home bases for varying year groups I have noticed that each group year level kaiako adjust their lessons to suit their age groups, for example, for new entrants they had code as a whole class and sounded out letters, where as the next year level sounded out the words as a whole class but then had to write letters down into their work books and the next year level sounded out the letters, then words and then wrote them down and then wrote a sentence. I noticed that kaiako had to adapt as they went along with their teaching, if something did not go to plan or they went over time they had to adjust and make it work by rolling with it and moving on to the next thing. It is a very special skill to have; the ability to adapt and go along with varying situations. The reason why I say this is because for many years in my working life, I have always worked into a disciplined manner and quite structured as that’s how my brain functions. However, having the opportunity to observe kaiako and watch how they adapt as the day rolls has been a privilege, it has helped me gain the skill of how you are able to change and work with whatever situation is thrown at you. I also have learned as a result of these situations it is ideal to be prepared with your lesson plans ahead so if you had to change anything during the day you are ready to adapt and roll with it.