Kaupapa Māori Research

Retrieved from:

http://www.katoa.net.nz/kaupapa-maori

• What relevance does the topic of interest have to your Māori students?
• Have you taken into account the ways your students think, understand, interact and interpret the topic of interest? How would you know?

The intervention principles in the context of my research. 

Tino Rangatiratanga

I believe students need to have meaningful control over what they are doing.  Cultural well-being amongst my students will come in the form of choice of collaboration. Traditional ideals of learning and achievement of Kaupapa Maori are that the achievements of the group are shared by all. If they choose to collaborate in their work, they will all benefit. It cannot be meaningful control though if I just throw them all in the deep end to begin with. I must be able to slowly help them be comfortable with the idea of having everone in the class critique theri work. This will be a challenge.

Taonga tuku iho 

My students, judging from what I know of them AT SCHOOL interact in a very informal way. They are all part of each others community. When introducing a new way of interacting, possibly threatening as they will be critiquing one another, it is important that it begins as safe.  The students see competition as threatening, so it will need to be something we are doing together, that we can all benefit from each time.  Their understanding is not from listening either, it is from doing. There needs to be doing here. And most probably I will need to model the way to give and recieve constructive critisicm is a fun way, to bring it in lightheartedly but show to potential of the feedback when I actually use it. 

Ako

blogging, sharing, recipriocity, tuakana/teina are all considered ways of sharing knowledge despite the traditional Dictatorship style of modern Pakeha education.  The teacher will not be the only person with the advice/expert opinion. All students will be given opportunites to share their own knowledge and agree or disagree.  I will need to think about how to make sure students have choice though. Not just having to do the feedback the way I suggest via blogging. Sometimes they may just want to sit with a good friend and get some advice from someone they trust.  

Kia piki i nga rarurau o te kāinga

Thinking about access to chromebooks and needs of students, I want to be able to set giving feedback for homework, due to the fact that many of my students don't have wifi at home it will be important for me to ensure I give time for all students to participate.  A symptom of low socio-econmic factors in my area involves a lack of communication from parents and students about the work. This includes reasons such as working long hours to support the family, many children to give time to, and lack of access to online information (we are 1:1). The feedback cycle will hopefully give the students an extended vocab and ability to critique that would normally come from conversations with more mature whanau. 

Whanau

This KM Principle applies to my students in many ways, we have the iwi whanau that will be involved through research questions and discussion, as well as access via blogs. The students will also be building their school Whanau connections as they will be strengthening their learning connections through learning based conversation. Studies done by the informing science institute found a direct correlation between enhanced community inside the physical learning environment and the use of online conversation through feedback.  I am hoping that this will also play out in the community. If the conversation increases online amoungst whanau at home, perhaps the relationships and connections will strengthen also.  MY students already have a strong sense of belonging in their community and a strong learning focus at school. My hope is that their will be a 'sharing' of these values. 

Kaupapa

Everything feeds into everything. We will need to have a collective view of all things feedback, students and learning. This means classroom culture will need to be built to ensure the overarching ideals of constructive critisim are build effectively and maintained. Alternatively, the use of the peer feedback will in turn build the classroom culture. a Positive catch 22, culminating from the intergrated nature of all things.   

This also makes me think of Hauora, all students must be supported to have high self efficacy before critised through feedback. Each child individually must be supported to believe their feedback is valuable. Not just to take it. We can use this ideal to, to transfer the skills from writing into all other areas of life.  

The idea of supporting each other needs to be built into the fabric of all that we do.