I too am Auckland

I Too Am Auckland

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What are the educational experiences like for our Pasifika learners? This was a question we were grappling with at our latest Pasifika fono.

  • What are the assumptions we have about our Pasifika students and why do we have those assumptions?
  • How can we then illustrate the impact some of those assumptions can have on our students?
  • Have attitudes changed?
  • Or, do we as educators working in the Pasifika education sector need to speak more clearly or if needed, more loudly?

It is the 1990s, I am studying for an Equity exam at Auckland University. Like a lot of students from South Auckland, I'm on a budget, and I look like I’m on a budget. After taking a break from studying, I’m about to walk back into the library when a man bursts out yelling ‘there’s that suspicious-looking Polynesian kid, grab him’. I turn around to see who he is yelling at. It turns out, it's me. Just before they are about to pounce on me, one of the security guards recognises me, “Um, that guy is a student here”. Annoyed? Yes. Surprised. No. These experiences were fairly common. What was worse was when it happened in front of a crowd of palagi, and all eyes were on you, the poor kid from South Auckland. Sometimes, when you’re a minority, or you represent a number of minority groups, you learn to hide among the crowd; to find the little cracks and corners to squeeze yourself into, to avoid drawing attention to your differences. Humiliation. Frustration. Anger.

That was over 20 years ago.
Have things changed?

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Ka ‘akama’ara ‘ua rāi tātou iā rātou – We will remember them

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It is 2014, and I’m sitting at the Puanga Market in Avarua. Some of the locals are talking about the role of Cook Islanders in World War One. The tone is one of respectful remembrance. Many of our great grandfathers who returned did not speak about their experiences the horror and trauma of War — too much of a burden to share. An estimated 500 Cook Islanders and a significant number of Niueans served in WW1. This is a massive number for a country, which, at the last census, had a population around 15000. Most of them were in the Rarotongan Company, which served with the British in Sinai and Palestine as ammunition handlers.

Cook Islands celebration
Cook Islands commemorations in Porirua

It is ANZAC week 2015, and I am sitting in the Akapuanga Hall in Porirua at a Commemoration Ceremony. Names are being called out and descendants of those people are asked to come forward in remembrance of their tupuna. Most of us at some stage had been educated in New Zealand. There are questions. Why did we get involved? How were our people treated? Why were we not taught these things in school?

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Reflection on Tongan Language Week

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Malo e lelei

“Ala i Sia – Ala i Kolonga” – “Skilfull at Sia, Skillful at Kolonga”
( Appreciate being able to skillfully multi-task)

This week I’m talking with Losalima Magele• about her reflections on Tongan Language Week – Uike Kātoanga’i ‘o e Lea Faka-Tonga. This year, the theme for Tongan language week is: “Ko e kai ia ‘a e Tonga – Enriching Aotearoa with Tongan Wisdom”.

CORE Pasifika Team celebrate Tonga Language Week
The Pasifika Team celebrate Tongan Language Week

Tell us a bit about yourself …

Losalima Magele
Lima Magele

Tonga has over 170 islands. About 40 of them are inhabited. They are divided into three main groups – Vava'u, Ha'apai, and Tongatapu. I come from the beautiful island of Vava’u. I am married to a Samoan, so my children are bicultural and we live in Christchurch. I work in the area of Early Childhood Education, and a part of that has been providing PLD for teachers who work with our Pasifika families and helping to unpack the Pasifika Education Plan.

What are your impressions about Tongan language week?

It is important to encourage our children to feel confident in their identity, language, and culture particularly in this multicultural society. I also believe that this is an important part of being Tongan. This helps our New Zealand born children to establish and maintain good relationships with family members particularly those back in Tonga. This is also supported by what the research is telling us about bilingualism. Children who are going to school with a strong foundation of their mother tongue develop stronger literacies and switch on to education more successfully.

How can teachers support our Tongan students?

Here’s a story that I think highlights one of these points. I was called to a Primary School about 15 years ago. I was an Early Childhood supervisor in one of our Pasifika centres. They brought me in to help the school to support some of the Tongan students. The school could not work out what language they were speaking. It was a combination of English and Tongan but not distinctly either. What we found out was that the non-speaking English parents were trying to talk in English at home to their children because they wanted their children to be able to speak English when they go to school. We need our families to value and support their mother tongue when that language has a strong foundation – this makes learning English easier.

Teachers of Tongan students need to know their students and their world. Pronouncing their names correctly is a great initial step. It helps the students feel that teacher empathise and care for them. Of course a big part of that is being able to laugh with them, and understand something of their community life.

I am reminded of a saying that I think sums this all up: “The culture of the child cannot enter the classroom until it has first entered the consciousness of the teacher”

Malo ‘aupito

Try some of these basic Tongan phrases:
Mālō e lelei 

Hello

Fefe hake?

How are you? (Singular) Mo fefe hake? (dual) Mou fefe hake? (plural)

Sai pe malo

Fine thank you

Ko hai ho hingoa?

What’s your name

Ko hoku hingoa ko Sione

My name is Sione

Ko ho’o ha’u mei fe?

Where are you from?

Ko ‘eku ha’u mei Tonga

I come from Tonga

 'Alu a

Good-bye to the person who is leaving

Nofo a

Goodbye to the person who staying

Fakamolemole

Please

Links

Quiz

Coat of Arms:

Tonga coat of arms
Source: Wikipedia

Adopted 1875 — the royal crown with the olive branch around it — three swords represent the three dynasties  or lines of the king of Tonga — the dove with the olive branch symbolises the peace of God — the 3 stars symbolise the main islands of Tonga which which are Tongatapu, Vava’u and Haapai.

The motto: ‘Ko e ‘Otua mo Tonga ko hoku tofi’a’ …

The challenge is: Can you find out what the motto means in English?

Losalima MageleLima Magele is an Early Years Facilitator for CORE Education. Prior to joining CORE Education, Lima was Early Childhood Education Adviser for the Ministry of Education, where she aspired to support and implement high quality outcomes for all tamariki within the context of Early Childhood Education. Lima sees herself as an advocate for all tamariki and their whānau. Her work is underpinned by a strong foundation of whanaungatanga, manaakitanga, integrity, loyalty, respect for others, and a child-centred approach.

Lima is the presenter at an Early Years Enable workshop: Engaging Pasifika fanau/ whānau in November 2014.

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‘Channeling captain planet’ – Nostalgia and Knowledge – Teanau Tuiono

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I like this planet. I live on it along with my kids, family, and those that follow my tweets of wisdom via Twitter. In the 80s I watched Captain Planet. Those of you of a similar vintage to me might remember him. He was a cross between Spandau Ballet (the hairstyle anyway), Richard Simmons (spandex), and had a blue mullet — classic 80s.

Captain Planet worked with a multi-national, multi-cultural 1 team of young people called, “the Planeteers”, who defended the planet from environmental disasters with five magic rings given to them by the spirit of the earth (Whoopi Goldberg). Often these environmental disasters would be personified with names that identified the issue like Sly Sludge (Martin Sheen), Dr Blight (Meg Ryan), etc.

In situations that the Planeteers could not resolve alone, they would combine their powers to summon Captain Planet, who possessed all of their powers magnified, symbolising the premise that the combined efforts of a team are stronger than its individual parts. I liked that.

Inspired by Captain Planet, I did an Environmental Science paper in the 90s — our lecturer Jeanette Fitzsimons introduced us to concepts such as global warming and overpopulation, along with an appreciation of the finite nature of our planet — that, despite its immensity and beauty and ability to sustain our western lifestyles, is very limited. (Those magic rings would be handy about now.) These experiences coupled with spending a lot of time at kaupapa Māori hui and wananga meant that I often wondered about these issues, not only from a Māori perspective, but also from the perspectives of other peoples from similar and not so similar cultural backgrounds.

My environmental bullet points of the 80s and 90s can be summed up as follows:

  • Spandex and blue mullets get exponentially un-hip as the years go by.
  • We need to have environmental advocates/leaders/heroes of those perspectives, particularly at the local level
  • There are different ways of understanding the natural world around. Societies from all parts of the world possess rich sets of experience, understanding, and explanation — particularly those with long histories of interaction with their natural surroundings.
  • Personifying our problems into easy villain caricatures is handy, but harder when you’re focussing, let’s say, our collective consumer behaviour, or something like overpopulation, which is a wider societal issue that requires collective responsibility, as opposed to taking out some B-grade bad guy. (If life was only that easy.)

Different ways of understanding the environment

One of the great things I’ve been able to do as a part of my working life is to visit and stay with different indigenous peoples in, sometimes, quite remote locations, working on supporting different Indigenous Knowledge 2 projects, and, occasionally, they come and stay at my house. Earlier this year I had Victor Steffensen stay. Victor is a traditional fire practitioner, using fire as a land management tool. I remember thinking to myself, this would be great for some of our students to do — some comparative learning, comparing concepts of conservation with our own.

Here in Aotearoa we refer to this type of knowledge (which has its basis in the arrival of our tipuna and its ongoing development) as Matauranga Māori. A definition from Landcare Research:

Mātauranga Māori can be defined as ‘the knowledge, comprehension, or understanding of everything visible and invisible existing in the universe’, and is often used synonymously with wisdom. In the contemporary world, the definition is usually extended to include present–day, historic, local, and traditional knowledge; systems of knowledge transfer and storage; and the goals, aspirations and issues from an indigenous perspective.3

Connecting with advocates

There are environmental heroes in our communities. I’ve been lucky enough to meet some of them.

As some of you will know, our long fin tuna are now endangered. This important issue was the focus of an interesting documentary called Saving Tuna (you can watch it on the Māori TV site) It highlights the work of Kaitiaki Bill Kerrison who has been helping eels to bypass river obstacles by guiding them into traps, and transporting them up or downstream by hand, and releasing them into tributaries along the Rangitaiki. There, they grow up to 1.5m long and can stay for up to 10 years before wanting to return to their ocean spawning grounds.

Another example is some whanaunga of mine from up in the Nōta, Ahipara — Reuben Taipari from Te Rarawa, and Heeni Hoterene from Ngāti Hine. I interviewed Rueben for a resource that I’m working on that looks at how the moon phases, along with seasonal changes in the natural world, would, among other things, inform planting and traditional food gathering practises. Passionate about the North becoming self-sufficient in terms of food, he also supports projects that encourage people to use land and sea sustainably, ensuring that it is nurtured, as it provides sustenance to whānau and hapū.

My point here is that often these people are in our communities, it is just a matter of finding them and connecting them to the teaching and learning of our students.

Incorporating Indigenous Knowledge into teaching and learning

UNESCO has a number of publications that can be requested as hard copy or downloaded as PDF:

On TKI there are a number of resources that use science as a lens to incorporate a Māori world view:

Have you heard of LEARNZ virtual field trips? They are a great source and learning experience for students and teacher:

LEARNZ promotional video from LEARNZ on Vimeo.

CORE’s LEARNZ virtual field trip programme provides opportunities for students to interact with experts across a wide range of sectors including environment, conservation, engineering, science, social science, and the arts. In 2014, conservation-based field trips in partnership with agencies such as DOC and regional councils include:

Footnotes:

1 The young people came from all youths across the globe: Kwame from Africa, Wheeler from North America, Linka from the Soviet Union (hands up if you remember the USSR), Gi from Asia, and Ma-Ti from the Amazon (Ma-Ti was my favourite — I had a similar haircut a number of times in my childhood).

2 Local and indigenous knowledge refers to the understandings, skills and philosophies developed by societies with long histories of interaction with their natural surroundings. For rural and indigenous peoples, local knowledge informs decision-making about fundamental aspects of day-to-day life. This knowledge is integral to a cultural complex that also encompasses language, systems of classification, resource use practices, social interactions, ritual and spirituality’. These unique ways of knowing are important facets of the world’s cultural diversity, and provide a foundation for locally-appropriate sustainable development. http://www.unesco.org/new/en/natural-sciences/priority-areas/links/

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What does it mean to be a Cook Islander in 21st Century Aotearoa?

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Kia orana kotou katoatoa i te aroa maata o te atua.…

It was Cook Island Language Week here in Aotearoa last week. It got me thinking about what it means to be a Cook Islander in 21st century Aotearoa, mainly because of kids really — specifically mine. I live in a rural village surrounded by animals, nature, farms. I tell other islanders it’s pretty much like living in the islands, except there was snow on the hills last week — Oh! and, we have less coconut trees and taro plantations here as well.

Cook Islands language looking forward
Photo: Darlene Tuiono

What our grandparents and parents are to us rubs off

In the spirit of looking back in order to consider moving forward (the 20th Century seems so long ago now) — I think back to when my family migrated here. They worked hard, and came here with that work ethic, along with a strong commitment to community. I think of some of the stories my grandfather told me, like when he was a young man and worked on the Makatea island, in French Polynesia, mining phosphorus, and how tricky it was in New Zealand back then when you did not have much English. He always had great advice like, “You talk a lot — you should go to University”, or, “You argue a lot — you should be a lawyer”. Being successful at school was integral to them moving here.

Leaving the home island and going to another country to work or to study is an experience that is fairly typical of Cook Islanders. In fact, so much so that Facebook now tells me that about half of my relatives from the Cook Islands no longer live in New Zealand, but in other countries. Cook Islanders travel a lot — if you saw the size of some of our islands you would know why.

I like to think that some of the things my grandfather talked about has rubbed off. I think also, that my generation would feel the same about their parents and grandparents about the values that they brought here from the islands. These things make us who we are, but they are also supported by other things such as language and culture.

Language makes a culture unique

It is language that makes those specific things in a culture unique. Words give meaning and provide nuances to the values and histories of a place, and its connection to people. This is supported by what we know about bilingualism.

The most difficult thing however to bring from the 20th century into the 21st is the health of our indigenous Cook Islands languages.*

It has become so serious that it has been predicted that there will not be another generation of speakers of Cook Islands Māori Rarotongan in New Zealand. This language has dropped inter-generationally to levels as low as those of New Zealand Māori (5-8 per cent of school-aged children) before the revitalisation of te reo with the Kohanga Reo and Kura Kaupapa Māori movements.

Serious questions for young Cook Islanders and educators alike

These are serious questions for my generation of New Zealand-born Cook Islanders. There have been opinions put forward (and I agree with them), that since the Cook Islands, along with Niue and Tokelau, are ‘Realm’ countries, that there should be official support for these languages, and that should be supported by a National Languages Policy. Those ideas have been around for a while now.

I think this would go along way to protecting, rejuvenating, and maintaining an important connection to our pacific cultural heritage.

That is big picture stuff, and while us mere mortals in the community and schools might not yet be able to move the legislative/policy mountains to make this essential step reality we can at least take some small steps in a direction that supports the identity of our Cook Islands students. Cook Islands students, like all Pasifika students, can have a wide range of identities at play. A third generation New Zealand-born Cook Island student could have completely different needs to a Cook Island student who has just arrived in the country particularly if they are from the outer islands.

Simple beginnings and small steps

We can start this journey simply, I believe, by getting our students / children’s names right. I remember as a child finding out that my father’s name wasn’t the English name that everyone called him — they called him Tony — his actual name was Teanau , my name, and that people called him Tony because it was easier for them to wrap their tongue around.

I, of course, never got called Tony, or T, or any other abbreviation. My mother is a Ngāpuhi — who generally don’t go in for that sort of thing. She would routinely tell my teachers that they were not to abbreviate, or give me a nickname. It used to make me cringe when this happened, but I’m glad now, or else I’d probably be known as Thomas, or Jack, or something like that — it was tried when I was 11, and then stopped. Mother must have had a word.

I remember dreading the beginning of the year, as teachers would read out names, and inevitably get to mine and stumble over it for 5 minutes or so. Every now and then, a teacher would get it right, and my ears would prick up and I would pay attention because obviously this teacher knew a thing or two.

I have no doubt that there are Cook Islands and Pasifika students sitting out there around the country who have had, or are having, a similar experience.

Another step is participating in Cook Islands Language week. If you missed it this year – don’t worry there is always next year. Cook Islands Language Week /Te 'Epetoma o te Reo Kūki ‘Āirani celebrates the identity, languages, and culture of the Cook Islands.

Those of you with some command of Te Reo Māori, Cook Islands Māori is very similar. I tell my Māori friends that it helps if you try channelling the sun, drums, and food of the Cook Islands — it helps with the accent.

mou i te ko, mou i te ‘ere — take up the challenge

meitaki ma’ata, kia orana e kia manuia.

 

*Notes

Languages
Three distinct Polynesian languages are spoken in the Cook Islands:

  • Cook Islands Māori is an Eastern Polynesian language, belonging to the same language family as New Zealand Māori and the languages of Hawai‘i and Tahiti. It has a number of distinct dialects.
  • The language of Pukapuka is a Western Polynesian language, belonging to the same language family as the languages of Sāmoa, Tuvalu, and Tokelau. Pukapuka Island’s inclusion as part of the Cook Islands has resulted in some Cook Islands Māori terms and expressions being adopted into the the Pukapuka language.
  • Palmerston Island has its own unique and distinctive mixture of Cook Islands Māori and English.

Dialects
Cook Islands Māori has a number of dialects. Speakers of one dialect can understand the others. The dialects are:

  • Aitutaki
  • Ātiu, Ma‘uke, and Miti‘āro (Ngāpūtoru)
  • Mangaia
  • Manihiki and Rakahanga
  • Rarotonga
  • Tongareva (Penrhyn).
    The dialect of Rarotonga is the most widely used and standardised dialect, both in the Cook Islands and within Cook Islands communities in New Zealand. Learners of Cook Islands ancestry whose heritage language is that of Pukapuka or whose heritage dialect is other than that of Rarotonga benefi t from learning the Rarotongan dialect as a lingua franca because they are part of the Cook Islands community. Learners of Cook Islands Māori who are not of Cook Islands ancestry normally begin by learning the dialect spoken in Rarotonga.
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