Culture, Identity, Sense of Self, Connectedness, Relationships & Vā.

Culture, Identity, Sense of Self, Connectedness, Relationships & Vā.

May 2020

During lock-down in NZ I focused my discussions, planning and teaching around the concept of making connections with ākonga and their whānau. I had already noticed that there was an issue of equity as some were struggling with access to resources such as internet, devices, paper based materials and craft supplies.  Each ākonga and their aiga had different ways to connect with me and the learning opportunities I was trying to provide. As well as the using the google classroom I connected ākonga and their whānau to learning sites such as Studyladder, Reading eggs, and Matific. The school was able to provide some resources and I monitored my contact with whānau and ākonga engagement. We were encouraged to reflect on our online teaching and contribute to a kaupapa around cultural identity and bringing home back to school.

The vā that binds a pasifika education (a story during covid-19)

"The vā, as a relational sphere when applied to the teaching and learning environment, becomes a conduit for story creation, storytelling and story reimagining. 

In education, the power of story connects teaching and learning, content to context, being to knowing, genealogy to history, politics to power and the human to non-human life."

June/July 

We returned back to school in week 6 of term 2. This is my planning for those 6 weeks of term 2.