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uLearn21 – Thriving cultures and futures

Posted on August 27, 2021 by Janelle Riki-Waaka & Josh Hough

Janelle Riki-Waaka and Josh Hough share the second part of their blog on Aotearoa e tōnui nei | Thriving Aotearoa, the theme of uLearn21. Part 2 discusses Ngā ahurea e tōnui nei | Thriving cultures and Te tōnuitanga o te āpōpō | Thriving futures. See Part 1 here.

Ngā ahurea e tōnui nei | Thriving cultures

Janelle: I spoke earlier about the Māori culture on a journey from survival to thriving and what this might look like. Just this week we have had a debate play out in mainstream media about mātauranga Maori where many varied opinions about its relationship to science have been aired. To be honest, I don’t have sufficient expertise in either mātauranga Maori or Western science to weigh in on this debate in a deeply informed way. However, I will say that what led me to consider was whether two worldviews (that may be conflicting from time to time), can live in harmony next to each other, each with their own mana intact.

During the colonisation of Aotearoa, many Māori converted from our initial beliefs and spirituality to a Christian faith. Christianity continues to be very prevalent in the lives of many whānau Māori to this day. More recently some Māori have found that in fact Māori forms of spirituality can sit alongside a Christian faith in harmony, neither needing to dominate the other. Our right to choose the belief system and spirituality that best talks to our heart is something we should all value. Our ancestors articulated our desire for this in Te Tiriti o Waitangi Article 2 – Rangatiratanga or Māori self-determination. This article expresses our right to determine our own lives and live as Māori.

I don’t believe that it is necessary to belittle or disparage one set of beliefs in order to legitimise another. Wouldn’t it be great if we could simply acknowledge the existence of a multitude of world views and beliefs and simply allow people the right to choose that which aligns best with their own cultural values.ulearn21-speaker-images-300px-updated-karlo

“Not all indigenous knowledge is science – because it is the broad spectrum of art, religion, music, philosophy – the entire gamut of knowing! But not all indigenous knowledge isn’t science – it includes scientific knowing in multitudes of ways.” Dr Karlo Mila (uLearn21 keynote speaker)

In a thriving community I believe that’s what we would see. A diverse group of cultures living together and in relative harmony, each acknowledging and respecting the others’ worldviews, beliefs, languages, and cultural practices. In essence, a melting pot of awesomeness! Indigenous knowledge should not have to prove its legitimacy to the Western world. This was the very same mind set that was in play when many indigenous peoples around the world were colonised and assimilated. We know better now and should do better now.

Thriving cultures in Aotearoa are when cultural beliefs, languages and identities are alive and practiced by members of those communities. For me as Māori, this is the ability to connect to my whakapapa, speak my ancestors reo, and live as Māori. Decolonisation is when indigenous people reclaim their identity and breathe life into it so it can be treasured and passed down to our tamariki.

Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.
Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.

Josh: In writing this blog, I have to admit that coming to this part, I was challenged. Some questions began to come up for me as I considered what to write – “as a white heterosexual male, what even is my culture?”. “As someone not from Aotearoa but having lived here for 19 years, where do I belong culturally?”. “If I’m 15,000 miles away from where I was born, am I even connected to ‘my’ culture anymore?”

In an excellent conversation with Janelle, we unpacked the word “culture” together. Through it, I landed on the notion of culture as a ‘way of life’ – those behaviours, beliefs, and values we hold, often without realising it, that in part define who we are. They could be the fact that we have developed ‘cultural’ practices like starting everyday with a cup of tea, keeping our jam in the fridge, maintaining an even keel of emotion at all times, or that we incessantly feel the need to get out into rugged countryside every time things are getting stressful. The links to culture can be identified by those warm feelings we get when we think about a certain familiar routine that we adopt, a group we gravitate to, or an activity we regularly seek out. These behaviours can be learned, instilled, or simply a part of who we are, and are often most easily identifiable by the fact that others share them. To me, in a sense, knowing who you are is defining your culture.

Suffice it to say, culture is complex and diverse. It can include religion, ritual, what we eat, how we talk and act, how we celebrate, how we greet visitors, how we behave, and a thousand other things.

Cultures thriving in Aotearoa means tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti are able to authentically live into their values, customs, goals, morals, outlooks, languages, attitudes and more in harmony. As we celebrate the richness of cultures in Aotearoa, thriving means that we don’t try to shrug off our own culture or co-opt that of others – instead, we live into our own ways of being and doing while acknowledging, valuing and learning from the rich tapestry of other ways of doing the same.

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Te tōnuitanga o te āpōpō | Thriving futures

Josh: As a futurist (i.e. someone who practices strategic foresight), I embrace the notion that the future is not predetermined. Nor indeed is there any singular, correct future. There are a number of futures (plural intended) that are possible, probable, and preferred, and they can be shaped by decisions that are made today.

To pursue thriving futures in Aotearoa, it’s important to analyse the historical and present contexts in Aotearoa. And this means the whole picture, not just the parts that are good, attractive or easy to digest. As tangata Tiriti, this means owning our politics and our intentions and it involves actively seeking out partnership with tangata whenua. We don’t go into this work focused on our own individual wants and egos – instead, we approach it as an expression of shared aspirations that are about creating a better Aotearoa for our descendants to come.

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Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.

In the education bubble, it’s easy to assume the equity pendulum has swung the right way. There’s no doubt that there have been some improvements in system level responses that are beginning to result in improved educational experiences for rangatahi. Awareness is on the increase, there are great examples of equitable partnership popping up throughout the country, and critical conversations are beginning to be had. But if we think that we’re there yet and the ideal future is now, then we’ve definitely drunk the Kool-Aid as there’s still a long way to go!

The invite then is to lean into working together in equitable partnership as we begin to co-design our preferred futures.

Janelle: I’m excited about the future of Aotearoa. I’m equally excited about our current place in the journey and the fact that I’m here now to bear witness to it and get involved.

I’m particularly looking forward to the inclusion of Aotearoa New Zealand Histories in our curricula and the positive impact this will have on our Treaty relationships. Sadly much of our history has not been taught in schools and some parts have even been swept beneath the rug. Teaching our history will not be about airing the dirty laundry though, it will be about empowering our tamariki with the wisdom we may have gleaned from the past, in order to inform a more positive future for all. By omitting parts of our history and ensuring they have not been learned or discussed, we have dismissed the intergenerational trauma that exists for Māori in Aotearoa. For Māori, acknowledgment of our history will go some way to perhaps heal some of that trauma.ulearn21-speaker-images-300px-updated-eruera

“As frustrating as the fight to end racism is, the recent commitments to teaching the history of Aotearoa gives us the opportunity to educate the next generation about the injustices of the past and give them the tools to move into the future.” Dr Eruera Tarena (uLearn21 keynote speaker)

Our many and diverse communities need allies. People sitting next to them in the waka as we traverse the many awa of Aotearoa. For NZ Pākehā to engage in allyship with Māori, it will undoubtedly involve some unlearning and relearning. In a recent article I read (What does it mean to act as an ally), one of the descriptors of being an effective ally is to know when to ‘yield the floor.’ This really resonated with me and I began to think about the intent of Te Tiriti o Waitangi and what it means to be an effective Treaty partner with Māori.

I think effective allyship may at times involve sitting in the passenger seat and simply admiring the view as you accompany Māori on their journey towards their desired destination. Ready and willing of course to jump out and muck in should you hit a pothole and get a flat tire! Other times it might look like co-navigating the journey together and reaching agreement about the desired destination. And other times, both Treaty partners may be in separate vehicles making their own way to their own destinations. Effective allies will need to learn how to discern which is the appropriate way of travelling on a case by case basis. The good news is, learning is about listening, asking questions and being prepared to fail in humble and respectful ways. A journey towards a thriving future is certainly a journey worth taking.

If you missed it, the first blog in this two-part series is available here.

Bring your team together and make the most of uLearn21 group pricing, learn more >

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Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.

uLearn21 – Thriving individuals and communities

Posted on August 26, 2021 by Janelle Riki-Waaka & Josh Hough

Across two blogs, Janelle Riki-Waaka and Josh Hough share their perspectives on Aotearoa e tōnui nei | Thriving Aotearoa, the theme of uLearn21. In the first blog they discuss Te tangata takitahi e tōnui nei | Thriving individuals and Ngā hapori e tōnui nei | Thriving communities.

This year’s uLearn21 kaupapa has got us talking! As representatives of both tangata whenua and tangata Tiriti, we were interested in understanding where our perspectives and opinions aligned, and where they parted ways. A summary of our kōrero is shared with you all in this blog. We are both really excited about continuing this kōrero at uLearn21 and we look forward to seeing you all there!

Te tangata takitahi e tōnui nei | Thriving individuals

Janelle: When I think about people thriving as individuals, in the simplest sense, I think about people being happy in their own skin and enjoying a comfortable and fulfilled life. In essence, living happily as who they are, surrounded by people they love and having access to all that they need to thrive. For Māori, this might look like being deeply connected to their language identity and culture, having relationships that fill up their wairua (soul/spirit) and having access to the resources they need to nourish themselves and their whānau.

Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.
Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.

For many Māori it may be challenging to think of themselves in the ‘individual’ sense. Our concept of happiness and wellness is often associated with the happiness and wellness of those we love most. We are descended from tribal people and we tend to think about ourselves as but one part of the greater whole – one drop in the awa (river) that is our hapū. Our social structures and concept of whānau are often roles and responsibilities based. For example, we each have a role to play and associated responsibilities that contribute to the wellbeing of our whānau, hapū and wider community. What we know though is that in order to contribute to the happiness and wellness of our whānau, we need to be connected, fulfilled and healthy. For Māori, the health and wellness of our taiao (environment) also contributes to the happiness and wellness of our people.

Kei te ora te wai, kei te ora te whenua, kei te ora te tangata.
If the water is healthy and the whenua flourishes, so too are the people well. (Nō te awa Manawatū)

A thriving individual is one that can contribute to the communities they serve, supporting them to thrive whilst enjoying happiness and wellness for themselves as individuals. It’s a little like every aspect of a hangi contributing to the overall sweetness of the kai! The sweetness of the kumara is most definitely accentuated by being cooked alongside the chicken and pork, trust me!

Our Māori pūrākau (myths, stories or legends) often contain lessons and guidance from our ancestors on living our best lives so that we may thrive both as individuals and as a whānau. Supporting our tamariki and rangatahi to strengthen their connection to their Māoritanga is a vital part of the hauora of our people and our country.
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“Our Māori narratives and pūrakau have some beautiful themes. Themes of love, themes of respect of whakapapa so you know where you come from. The story of Matariki for example, where we teach about the nine stars of Matariki coming down to take care of Papatūānuku or Mother Earth. Who can’t resonate with a story or the theme of taking better care of Mother Earth and for that matter everyone else.” Jase Te Patu (uLearn21 keynote speaker)

Josh: The Merriam-Webster definition of the word “thrive” is “to grow vigorously”, and the word is often used synonymously with other positive terms like “blossom”, “flourish”, or “succeed”. So what then does it mean to “grow vigorously” in Aotearoa?

As an able-bodied man learning from an unwell disabled partner, my notions of what it means to thrive as an individual have been challenged. The Western paradigm and social media tells us that thriving individually is all about having new experiences, buying flash toys, travelling to destinations, and smashing our goals. But when someone is chronically unwell and they simply cannot do any or many of these things, what then does thriving as an individual look like? For Pākehā in Aotearoa, my answer to this lies in two words; purpose and responsibility.

Living a life of purpose involves living into our identities; being fully who we are and leaning into this to live a life on purpose. A thriving individual is someone who lives by their beliefs and values, yet does the work to continually challenge and grow these beliefs and values. They follow their passions in the ways that they are able, they prioritise balance, and they make a difference – sometimes in small ways, sometimes in grand ways, but consistently with an eye towards their fellow individuals. They rise above the mantras of “survival of the fittest” and “getting after it” and the idea of the constant hustle, and instead see themselves as interconnected – individuals who are meaningful parts of a whole. They are able to accept others as they are, practice gratitude, and be generous in their kindness.

As for responsibility, systems that have led to inequities in this nation were created and sustained by Pākehā, and so it goes to follow that the responsibility to reckon with the injustices caused by them, and the requirement to respond to them with action, falls to us. This is a collective responsibility, and while it can make some uncomfortable, it’s our duty as Treaty partners to learn about our Tiriti responsibilities and uphold them. Being aware of our position, responding to the legacy of colonisation, and doing “the work” is the requirement of Pākehā – both individually and collectively.

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Ngā hapori e tōnui nei | Thriving communities

Josh: To thrive in community requires knowing the communities you connect with and your part in them. Investing time to get to know communities and the people in them means you get to celebrate their expertise, learn from their stories, and work together with purpose. To achieve this, we need to press into and be guided by the shared values of the community – which is hard to do if we don’t have any community relationships!

Applying an equity lens, thriving communities are the drivers of meaningful and lasting change. Root causes of inequity are impacted by system-level changes, not by individual efforts. Narrow-focused programmes and initiatives that benefit individuals rather than the collective have limited success and can actually perpetuate inequity. No one school, early learning service, business, department, organisation or individual, no matter how well respected, funded, located, or resourced, can achieve system-level change alone. In essence, there is strength in numbers.

Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.
Image by CORE Education, all rights reserved.

Recently, I had the privilege of engaging in some research with a valued colleague, Lex Davis, who belongs to some communities that I don’t, one of which is the takatāpui community. I’m not Māori or queer, but this does not prevent me from actively partnering with rangatahi takatāpui to work towards the collective goal of equity for young LGBTQIA+ Māori in Aotearoa. I do this through building trusting relationships with takatāpui, and leveraging my position of Pākehā power and privilege to help the voices of takatāpui be heard and learned from. I can’t do this work in isolation – alone, I have no knowledge, no standing, and no right – but together, I can help amplify the call to action in the spaces in which I move. Our work together has resulted in a kaupapa, Ko tātou tēnei, which invites those in other spaces to move their relationships with takatāpui from sympathetic to transformative.

While I’m writing about community here, not myself as an individual, it would be an oversight not to mention the gift this work has been to me personally. I’ve come to know young people whose wisdom, love, and knowledge have taught me much and moved my heart. This is the power of communities thriving – meaningful change for the individuals in them as they partner to enact system-level change

Mā te te tokomaha, ka kā te ahi.
By the many will the fires be kept burning.

Janelle: As I noted earlier in this blog, thriving communities rely on thriving individuals. For many years in Aotearoa’s history, tangata whenua have largely been in survival mode. We are still experiencing daily the aftermath of colonisation and the intergenerational trauma left in its wake.

Many of us are dreaming of the day our journey leads us as a people from ‘surviving’ to ‘thriving’. When our marae are warm and bustling with the mauri (life force/essence) of our people. When our language can be heard in everyday conversations at the corner dairy. When tangata Tiriti and tangata whenua are genuinely engaged in equitable partnerships, co-design, co-governance and shared decision making. We have made many inroads on our journey but sadly we are still encountering ignorance at every turn.

Many of you may have read in The Listener about the recent conflicting opinions about Western science and mātauranga Māori. Or have seen appalling comments from some members of our community following the Government’s formal apology to Pacific peoples of Aotearoa for the Dawn Raids. These bumps in the journey are often exhausting for the navigators and the passengers, however they are important reminders for us all of how far we still have to travel. They keep us alert on the journey and often further prepare us for the oncoming potholes!

In giving thought to what a thriving Aotearoa might look like, I consider the growing identity of Aotearoa and our cultural practices as a people. Our Aotearoatanga if you like! NZ Pākehā as a culture has been heavily influenced by the tikanga and kawa (marae protocol) of tangata whenua. Our everyday language use now incorporates many Māori words that have seamlessly integrated into our norm. E.g. whānau, mahi, kai, puku, kia ora, aroha, ka kite.

Our tikanga of manaakitanga and koha are largely practiced in homes and workplaces throughout the motu. I mean who would show up for dinner at someone’s house without taking something! If we traced back the origins of some of our everyday Kiwi-isms, we would see that many have been born and adapted from the tikanga and kawa of Ngāi Māori.

With that in mind, perhaps a thriving community is one that reflects the identity and values of those that inhibit it. In the case of our young and beautiful country, founded by tangata whenua and shared with tangata Tiriti, perhaps we are still defining our Aotearoatanga and in fact the best is yet to come.

Aotearoa is about to re-introduce an indigenous celebration to our calendar of public holidays – Matariki. Our country is at a point in our history where we will all collectively honour and celebrate an aspect of Māori tikanga together as a nation. What an amazing part of our journey to celebrate.

ulearn21-speaker-images-300px-updated-rangi“For me, Matariki is part of the decolonising of our division of time. It’s reclaiming our traditional, environmentally driven, timekeeping systems that allow us to interact with our environment and acknowledge the changing of the year. Matariki is for all New Zealanders. It’s not a Māori celebration any more in my mind. It’s become a national celebration and that’s its future for me and I think that’s a wonderful part about Matariki. It is about the best things of humanity such as being kind to each other, aroha, those are the basic principles. It’s about charity, hope. It’s about promise.” Dr Rangi Matamua (uLearn21 keynote speaker)

To learn more about Matariki visit the Living by the Stars website.

Part 2 of this blog, sees Janelle and Josh discuss Ngā ahurea e tōnui nei | Thriving cultures and Te tōnuitanga o te āpōpō | Thriving futures. Read Part 2.

uLearn21 is online 13-14 October, with all conference content available until 31 January 2022. Learn more and register now >

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Equity, te reo, and doing the right thing

Posted on August 4, 2021 by Dr Hana O'Regan

In her follow-up blog to Raising the equity flag – why I’m passionate about fighting inequity in Aotearoa, Dr Hana O’Regan writes about the historical marginalisation of te reo Maori, and the importance of picking your equity battles.

When I was in the 6th Form – the equivalent of Year 12 now – I remember having a debate (actually an argument!) with some of my teachers around the way that marks were allocated to schools for Sixth Form Certificate.

The number of points a school received was based on the School Certificate marks received from the year before, across all subjects. These points were then allocated to different subjects based on a curriculum hierarchy. I learnt that any points received because of the high marks in School Certificate Māori, may be allocated to the ‘academic subjects’, which didn’t include te reo.

Te reo Māori was the only language on the New Zealand curriculum not considered an academic subject. It was aligned with home economics, and woodwork.

I challenged my teachers – how could one language be separated out from all the others? I was told that it was because Māori didn’t have a literary heritage – the “standard” for a language to be considered academic.

I was angry!

This felt unjust and unfair, but I didn’t have a good counter-argument other than saying it was a stupid rule. When I was 16 I didn’t know the history around the treatment of Māori as a language, or the way that it had been deliberately marginalised. I didn’t know about the laws and policies that were imposed to silence it and those who spoke it. All I knew was that it seemed unfair, and unjust.

That frustration increased when I was 20 years old and working in the Alexander Turnbull Library in Wellington. I started going through Māori language newspapers written in the 1800s and early 1900s… I saw thousands upon thousands of examples of a literary heritage, and I was blown away with the depth and breadth of what I found. Māori were active seekers of knowledge. Newspaper stories with current affairs of the time – international, national and local – history, politics, poems, editorials all in te reo Māori! In fact, I now know that people were more likely to be literate at the turn of the last century if they were Māori, than if they were non-Māori.

I was angry that my 16-year-old self hadn’t known this to help me argue the case for te reo with my teachers.

While I now had more information to argue my case for the equitable treatment of my language, I was yet to properly understand the legacy of the fight for language revitalisation in New Zealand. I didn’t have an understanding of the breadth of policies and actions that had led to the decline of the language in Māori communities. That learning would develop over the following years. With each new piece of information, a part of the puzzle was solved, and my confidence and ability to articulate and advocate for the language grew.

I learned to pick my fights

But even having that knowledge and preparing the rebuttals was not always enough. I learnt to pick my fights, and decide when I would argue for the correct pronunciation of my name, someone else’s name, a place name and so on. I made decisions around which parts of the equity landscape for te reo I wished to address. I learnt early on that it could be tiring, exhausting, and emotionally draining to feel that you always had to be on the defensive; ready at the drop of a hat to invest your time and energy into helping someone else increase their knowledge and awareness. Calling someone out for their statements, stereotypes or put-downs, certainly has the ability to create an air of tension, even when done with empathy and patience. I also had to be prepared to fail in my goal and understand that I wasn’t always going to achieve a shift in people’s thinking or behaviour.

Some of the barriers, the blocks, and the failure to successfully raise the equity flag for the treatment of te reo and Māori culture and identity have been harder to swallow than others. The hardest for me have been when I haven’t been able to shield my own children from the negative stereotypes and treatment.

Before my children were born in 2003 and 2004, I had done my homework, prepared all the responses I thought I would need, and knew how to help people say their names correctly. I had absolutely committed to doing whatever it took, even if it meant giving personal pronunciation lessons. But I hadn’t counted on the fact that some people would not be prepared to even make the effort, and would go so far as to insist that they mispronounce my children’s names, or that I give them an English option. I wasn’t prepared to respond with one-liner rebuttals when my three-year-old son was verbally abused for speaking Māori to me in the supermarket. I wasn’t prepared for the fact that the abuser thought she had the right to swear at my three-year-old child who was simply speaking to his mother.

I was lost for words.

I also wasn’t prepared, while sitting in a doctor’s surgery, to have another person verbally attack my child at the age of six, when he was again having a personal conversation with me in his native language. I was taken aback by her viciousness, the swear words she used and the fact that she thought it was remotely okay to curse angrily at a young boy in a public space for talking to his mother.

None of the educational training and knowledge I had acquired at that point prepared me for that moment. Again, I was lost for words.

img_3847-smlShifting the equity dial

When I was 21 I was infuriated by the racial and targeted attacks on my father, and our wider Ngāi Tahu tribe, by a group who were protesting that Ngāi Tahu had asked the Crown to buy a number foreign-owned High Country farms that were up for sale. We were asking whether they could be used as part of a Ngāi Tahu Settlement. Ngāi Tahu had declared we would not be seeking any privately owned land as part of that process. This was met with bumper stickers, fliers and rallies saying (Ngāi Tahu) Hands off the Greenstone Valley.

I wanted my father to join with me in my outrage, to stand strong, and to call them out. But he responded calmly and in a matter-of-fact way; “If you only knew what they only know you probably would think the same”. Of course that infuriated me even more because what he said made perfect sense! But it didn’t help me to deal with the level of frustration and anger I felt at the overt racial slurs thrown our way over this issue. What his words did do, however, was to give me a blueprint for resolution, and an idea of where to focus my energies and attention. I needed to do what I could to help others see what I saw, to learn some of what I knew, in the hope that it might help them see a different picture.

Lifting the veil of ignorance on inequity is the first step. Being able to understand, and know, where inequities exist is a fundamental prerequisite to doing something about them. Using an equity lens to assess situations, policies, practices and behaviours, allows us to see the fuller picture – to deeply understand what the challenges are that we’re dealing with.

But it’s not good enough to know and see inequity. Once we are aware of its presence, we need strategies that help us respond to them – to shift the equity dial. This is often where things become unstuck, as the challenges can become almost overwhelming and seem too hard to change. We then run the risk of becoming apathetic, or suffering inertia, which gives them airspace and the room to persist and exist.

So what do we need to do?

We have to dig deep and find the strength to move into the uncomfortable spaces, even when we feel tired and, sometimes, overwhelmed. At those times we need to commit to the change because it is the right thing, and the just thing, to do.

I will finish this blog by using a quote from one of our tīpuna from Moeraki, Matiaha Tiramōrehu, who petitioned The Queen on the 22 October 1849, which was the first formal statement of Ngāi Tahu grievances against the Crown regarding the South Island land purchases. Matiaha asked:

 “That the law be made one, that the commandments be made one, that the nation be made one, that the white skin be made just as equal with the dark skin…”.

Now I know that the issue of equity goes well beyond skin colour, ethnicity and race, but the foundational sentiment and intent is an enduring one that lasts through the generations. We still have a way to go – but how exciting it is to be journeying together!

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Queer, Māori and young: what it means for teaching

Posted on July 22, 2021 by Lex Davis & Josh Hough

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Lex Davis (he/him) (Te Rarawa) and Josh Hough (he/him) are the authors of Ko tātou tēnei | This is us, an action research report, supported by CORE Education, that shares the voices of Māori LGBTQIA+ students.

Lex wished that he had better opportunities to celebrate his queerness and taha Māori at school. Still, he is super happy that he is now in a position where he can make better spaces for others. The work that you are going to hear about is one way in which he can celebrate his work and personal identities.

Josh has worked really hard to explore what it means to be a partner in this work where he doesn’t have a personal connection. To do so, he uses loads of love and empathy and his skills in design, futures and pulling apart identity (and putting it back together!).

We decided that we would create a project to explore what it means to be young, indigenous and queer in our school environments. We worked with, challenged, and celebrated our Māori LGBTQIA+ youth – our rangatahi takatāpui.

The young people are the heart of this project. They are extraordinary, and so too was the space and time we spent together over a specially-designed wānanga at Living Springs. We had many people, ideas and skills in the space which challenged, pulled apart, and grew our understanding of ourselves and each other. We used cool design processes to explore how our schooling spaces could work for their peers. We supercharged this process by delving into mātauranga Māori to celebrate their identity as queer, indigenous heroes!

This blog recognises some of the learning we explored that could help our teachers transform their relationships with our ākonga. It is a story of two beautiful people at our wānanga – Mana, an amazing member of our trans community and Hera, their teacher at school.

The next blog – coming your way soon – will look at using a set of provocations to take stock of where you are at as an individual and school community. Our third blog is an opportunity to hear from the rangatahi takatāpui as we interview them.

Improving our relationships with rangatahi takatāpui

Hera and Mana (not their real names) are kaiako and ākonga at the same school. Though they had an established and trusting student / teacher relationship, the wānanga gave Hera a profound appreciation for the fullness of Mana’s identity.

Mana and Hera’s relationship as student and teacher, but also as takatāpui and cis-het*, illustrates the transforming relationships with takatāpui poutama and how it works at each of the three steps: sympathy, empathy and transformation.

As kaiako, this can be characterised by the nature of the relationships we seek to build with rangatahi takatāpui in our roles as bystanders, allies and partners. We will step you through this process as we saw it relate to the experiences of Hera and Mana.

*“Cis-het” refers to someone who is both cisgender and heterosexual.

Bystander

What does it mean to be a bystander? It means, as kaiako, we implement the professional and ethical obligations explicitly required by our roles. These include our obligations to health and safety, the Teacher’s Code, and human rights laws. In other words, good teachers by the book. By fulfilling our ethical obligations, we take the steps to ensure our classrooms are safe and accessible learning spaces for all students – including rangatahi takatāpui.

One way we fulfill our obligations is to pay attention to the language used in our classrooms.

As a bystander, Hera regularly challenges homophobic and transphobic language in her classroom. Mana and other students who are sexuality and gender diverse report feeling safe when they are with her.

Ignorant slang and harmful language are an unjust reality for Māori and rainbow whānau. As kaiako, we set what is acceptable and normalised within our classrooms and it’s our obligation to step in when we hear casual put-downs and verbal abuse. This may not always feel comfortable, but courage requires vulnerability, and your actions will send a powerful message that the spaces you control are safe for all students.

As teachers, we begin with relationships. Good relationships require trust. To build trust, our classrooms need to be spaces in which students know that they are safe and can be their whole selves.

Ally

Allyship is moving beyond the obligation; acting upon what we know and learn. It requires vulnerability, self reflection, and commitment to learning about one another.

As allies, we become open to discovering more about Māori and rainbow communities and what it means to be indigenous, queer and young in Aotearoa. We learn from the stories of our students; their specific experiences and how they have shaped their identity.

To succeed in allyship, it’s important to begin with a critical awareness of our own identities. This means taking time to recognise things we may often take for granted or gloss over. This often includes examining our own experiences and relationships to uncover how these shape the views that we hold.

At a design workshop at the wānanga, Hera created a simple pipe-cleaner art piece – “I am so sorry”. Hera apologised and took ownership of the responsibility for not always using the correct pronouns – they/them. Though this was simple, it was a highly emotive moment, building trust and respect between her and Mana. Using correct pronouns is critical to Mana’s wellbeing and identity as a non-binary person.

In this one moment, Hera’s relationship with Mana transformed from sympathetic to empathetic. They were able to move beyond the surface and develop a shared understanding of Mana’s identity. It was a humbling moment for Hera, who recognised the power dynamic in their relationship and what it meant for a teacher to say sorry.

Mana later told us this made them feel safe and connected at school which made them actually want to go there and learn.

Hera’s pipe cleaner statement to Mana: I am so sorry. A powerful moment in allyship with her student. Credit: Lex Davis
Hera’s pipe cleaner statement to Mana: I am so sorry. A powerful moment in allyship with her student. Credit: Lex Davis

Partnership

The next step in transforming relationships with rangatahi takatāpui requires interrupting the traditional teacher as leader and student as follower power dynamic. It demands growth beyond listening and understanding.

Partnership is an equitable approach where we as kaiako take action to empower rangatahi takatāpui to construct thinking, lead, and teach us as we teach them. We actively create space where rangatahi takatāpui co-construct approaches to leading and learning.

During the wānanga Mana shared their knowledge around indigenous gender and sexuality. Hera was a part of this process, as was Mana’s father. Both of these important adults in Mana’s life were able to celebrate them as tuakana in this learning. Mana expressed their pleasure at holding this space and the mana this gave them. They were also going to use this as an opportunity to take an active role in sharing this with others back at their school. Hera will support this by co-creating space through her roles as social studies teacher and supervisor of the SAGA (sexuality and gender awareness) group.

This example illustrates Mana’s shift from participant to leader – co-constructing their learning and relationships with their teachers.

One of the rangatahi takatāpui hugs kaumatua, Teoti Jardine, at the end of the wānanga. Credit: Lex Davis
One of the rangatahi takatāpui hugs kaumatua, Teoti Jardine, at the end of the wānanga. Credit: Lex Davis

No matter where you sit on the bystander-ally-partner continuum, there will be challenges which require you to lean into vulnerability. You won’t always know what to say or how to say it, and sometimes it won’t go quite right. But, it is the conscious choice and the courage in these choices that demonstrates your commitment to your students.

As you read about and recognise the importance of relationships, what stories from your own life do you have where you have been a bystander, ally or partner to your students?

Share your thoughts with us on Twitter by tagging @coreeducation and using the hashtag #HearTheirVoices

View the research report Ko tātou tēnei | This is us and access free resources to ensure that rangatahi takatāpui feel safe, valued and heard >

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Aroha: breathing life into Tātaiako and Tapasā

Posted on April 20, 2021 by Hamish Barclay
Image copyright CORE Education, all rights reserved.
Image copyright CORE Education, all rights reserved.

Setting the scene

I have a passion for re-imagining what secondary schooling and especially the middle years (Years 7-10) could look like. Starting out in my teaching career, my personal educational philosophy was simple: make this time memorable for students. But what seemed like a simple task was in reality an uphill battle.

In 2009 I started teaching at St Thomas of Canterbury College where the focus was on social justice and equity in education. In 2016 I was able to lead the transition of our junior school from a traditional delivery to a more integrated model in order to support future-focused learning and teaching (Bolstad and Gilbert, 2012). Coinciding with this, our school was granted a Teacher-Led Innovation Fund (TLIF) focused on deconstructing existing systems, structures and routines to create a 21st century curriculum with a specific focus on engagement and student agency.

Throughout the two years of the TLIF project, our evidence showed that we had created positive shifts in the engagement of our students, and we were also able to uncover data that we had not seen previously. For example, even though we had begun to integrate learning areas, for example with STEM, and begun to make projects more engaging by using student voice to inform our planning, our Year 9 Pasifika and Māori learners still showed reluctance to engage.

This perplexed me and forced me to reflect on what we were doing. What assumptions were we making? I wrote myself some key questions:

  • Was the learning in a context that Māori and Pasifika students could relate to?
  • Could involvement of the community, specifically iwi, help engage learners?
  • Were the conversations, or lack of conversations, at home having an impact on student engagement?

The Dr Vince Ham eFellowship 2020 offered by CORE Education was an opportunity to explore these questions in more depth, and so I began a new research journey.

My research

In applying for the Dr Vince Ham Fellowship I looked to the key concepts of Tātaiako (Teaching Council of Aotearoa New Zealand, 2011) to shape my research. These concepts specifically included:

  • Wānanga: participating with learners and communities in robust dialogue for the benefit of Māori learners’ achievement.
  • Whanaungatanga: actively engaging in respectful working relationships with Māori learners, parents and whānau, hapū, iwi and the Māori community.
  • Tangata whenuatanga: affirming Māori learners as Māori. Providing contexts for learning where the language, identity and culture of Māori learners and their whānau is affirmed.

When it came to considering my research design, I posed the following question: “How could students share their learning in STEM with parents in an authentic context?’’ But then the spanner in the works hit: Covid-19! My initial idea of having learning out in the community was derailed and for a while my project floundered until, through conversations with CORE’s research mentors, I soon realised that my question actually suggested the answer: I was focusing on the outcome without going to the source – the parents.

Methodology

Through the research design process, I began to focus on exploring new methods of gathering student voice. As a college we gather student data each term to help us reflect on our practice, but often through a digital form. This method has been successful but had also in some ways reinforced the questions I was asking myself. During the TLIF, our lead researcher posed the provocation: “It’s the voices you don’t hear that matter!” I realised it was often the Māori and Pasifika learners whose voices were needed the most but were often the quietest. How then might educators gather the voice of the voiceless? On reflection, it became clear that digital feedback was not culturally responsive.

With this idea in the back of my mind, it was at our first eFellows hui that the idea of Story Hui was suggested. Liz Stevenson, herself a former eFellow, created Story Hui (Stevenson, 2015) as a story-telling process to capture the voice of students around their capabilities, engagement and well being. Straight away I could see the missing link: I could see the benefits of Story Hui and how it could make learning and achievement visible for the Māori and Pasifika learners at our college.

Talanoa, hui and oral language are so deeply embedded in Polynesian culture it made sense that we gather voice in this way, rather than the written, Eurocentric ways of digital online forms. Stories speak to us at a deeper level; they value and honour diverse ways of knowing, being and learning. Stories put a face to the numbers and help to show what’s working, what’s not and why. It simply aligns better with cultural capabilities and in my view moves documents such as Tātaiako and Tapasā (Ministry of Education, 2018) from being a ‘tick box exercise’ to living, breathing documents. Therefore I wondered about using Story Hui as a methodology to test my idea about what students felt about school and the conversations they have at home with parents, if indeed these conversations happen.

Findings

My initial wonderings had centred around the question of conversations about education at home. Did they happen? The biggest takeaway from my research blew my assumptions. Participants talked about learning almost daily! Moving into the Story Hui I wanted to unpack exactly what students and whānau talked about and their views on education, as my hunch was that this was not aligned.

Covid-19 and the ensuing lockdown had brought learning into the home and for many whānau challenged their world views about education without the barrier of school. Key findings from my research included the following:

Who talks?

The data suggested that families talked far more than I had imagined, in most cases daily. For both parties it was seen as important to discuss learning, and particularly for students to let parents see that they are doing well. These discussions were open and honest and echoed the importance of kōrero and its relationship in improving learning outcomes.

Difference in worldviews

One parent said, “Lockdown was an eye opener on how learning happened, especially group work and use of devices.” Parents, while acknowledging much of the content they learned in school was pointless and the soft skills they use in day-to-day life were more important, often focused only on literacy and numeracy. Parents commented that during lockdown they were surprised with how much collaboration took place, while students saw this as being what they valued most about learning.

Proud to be Māori!

Whānau discussed the importance of culture being represented in learning. Students at our college report that they feel proud to be Māori, and believe culture is represented in their learning. However whānau reported that their own school experiences clearly impacted on their views. Participants spoke of negative experiences and how this had an impact on them as they tried to fit into a Pākehā | Palangi system. For whānau they wanted to ensure the experience of school was mana-enhancing for their tamariki.

Recommendations

My assumption is that as educators we often see cultural competencies and documents such as Tātaiako and Tapasā as merely a paper exercise to comply with Ministry requirements rather than having a living, organic system in place to enhance the voice and learning of our Māori and Pasifika ākonga.
Whanaungatanga and tangata whenuatanga cannot be achieved on paper. Schools need to have systems in place to engage with whānau outside of traditional meetings or surveys. Story Hui or other forms of Talanoa provide this.

My experience of engaging with new systems of gathering voice was that whanaungatanga and tangata whenuatanga were embodied, and enhanced the mana of both students and whānau. Schools need to be critical of whose voice they are gathering and how they are collecting it to ensure that voices are genuinely heard in the planning and implementation of learning.

Find out more about the Dr Vince Ham eFellowship

Further reading

  • Living in a small data world: Play in secondary school, eFellow research report, Bevan Holloway, 2018
  • Story Hui – A design for social good
  • Story Hui Trust
  • Story Hui on Enabling e-Learning

References

Bolstad, R., Gilbert, J., & McDowall, S. (2012). Supporting future-oriented learning & teaching. Ministry of Education.
Ministry of Education. (2018). Tapasā. Ministry of Education.
Stevenson, L. (2015). STORY HUI TRUST. STORY HUI TRUST. Retrieved 26 March 2021, from https://www.storyhui.org/.
Teaching Council of Aotearoa New Zealand. (2011). Tātaiako. Ministry of Education.

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