Ko te Kaupapa o te Kura- My Professional Context, Mind Lab Activity 2

He aha te mea nui o te Ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.

What is the most important thing in the world? It is people, it is people, it is people.

Whaiwhetū marae- Lower Hutt

I see a school community as a Marae. It is a place that directly and indirectly helps to weave the fabric of a community (Stoll 1998). The socioeconomic status of my kura can be broken down into the following figures (courtesy of the latest ERO report):





The figures explain the gate to the Marae. They are an entry point into what can be outwardly seen about our kura. So this gate shows that our kura is predominantly pākeha in a suburb that is fast becoming a real estate gold mine. The majority of our families are financially secure. Families go skiing in winter and holiday abroad in summer, often to visit relatives. Parents are involved in their children's learning and volunteer to help in programmes or organise extra-curricular activities such as a chess club. Most children attend kindergarten and pre-school and come ready for school with good basic knowledge of sounds as well as high oral literacy. It is a comfortable place from which to engage in learning.

The culture that the school community strives for is the marae atea: the ground that leads us into what happens inside the whare. They are the hopes and the aspirations that help shape our school vision and values. In our case, it is one of high achievement (the wero) coupled with innovation. It is also a culture that prides itself on being inclusive (manaakitanga) and artistic.

The sides of the whare nui are the strengths of our kura. The arts are highly valued, so much so that we a have a permanent staff member (herself an artist) who teaches visual arts during our non-contact days. We have staff able to support extension options such as choir, orchestra and dance. Although there is a small percentage of Māori children in our kura, there is a kapa haka group that is joined by one-fifth of the students and we are also lucky to have two staff members with the knowledge to lead kapa haka and a Te Reo language extension programme.

Another positive aspect of our school culture is that we have worked with learning experts over several years, who have provided ongoing professional development support. Our school has, for many years, adopted an inquiry learning approach and worked closely with Kath Murdoch to push our professional practice in this area. This has helped to grow our collegiality (Stoll,1998) and we often work collaboratively is different projects such as planning or teaching as inquiry. The certainty and cohesiveness of having a focused approach to learning help to strengthen our collegiality (Hongboontri, C. & Keawkhong, N., 2014),

Our school has also become highly digitised in the last couple of years as a means to engage early with the external social context (Stoll,1998) of this current trend in education. The senior years are using 1:1 devices through a BYOD (Bring Your Own Device) initiative. This, coupled with the development of ILE and team teaching in those levels, has created a need to embrace digital learning in all areas of the school to help develop teaching and learning programmes that make the most of the digital tools available.

Being a suburban school, we have strong links within our community, although this requires ongoing work. This is possibly one of the minor challenges that we have: to stay involved with our community and our local environment. In the past, we have used our local landscape, the coast, as ways for children to study environmental pressures, or involved neighbouring schools in kapa haka exchanges, or buddied up our students with our local kindy as part of reading programmes. These actions help our students to see themselves as effective members within a wider sphere of influence.

These very localised interactions, however, can't escape the fact that the school is in a very privileged position socially and economically. The challenge then becomes how to extend our student's understanding of their world further afield and investigate challenges or social issues outside their comfort zone. This year, one syndicate investigated the topic of home and of refugees, speaking to those who had direct experiences of being a refugee. They partnered up with the Make Foundation to create an opportunity to meaningfully contribute and engage in a context outside their known world. By becoming more involved in more challenging aspects of the world they were able to grow their empathy and understanding of their place within it.

Another issue, one that impacts my practice as co-leader of Te Reo me ona Tikanga Māori, is to foster and uphold the bicultural nature of New Zealand in our learning environment (as per Registered Teaching Criteria 3, 7 and 10) within a community of predominantly pākeha staff and students. I see these as the pou that uphold the bicultural practices that we are trying to develop in Aotearoa. It is fortunate that we have a strong leadership team who are committed to the upskilling of teacher competency and who are supportive of programmes and activities that help Te Reo me ona Tikanga Māori become part of the school culture. The drive to integrate Māori kaupapa in the school has also come from a small but very active group of Māori whānau.

Slowly but surely, over the last eight years, I've seen Māori kaupapa become part of our school culture. Our pōwhiri every term are now part of what we do as a school, and our poroporoaki to farewell our year 6's and staff is an important milestone in our year. We also celebrate Matariki with a dawn karakia and talk, followed by a community breakfast of over 250 people. Our recent noho marae ( to our local urban marae) attracted 80 members of the school community as well as encouraging staff to join us for the experience. Through the ongoing dedication of the curriculum and school leadership teams, there is tangible growth in staff confidence and commitment in developing their practice in this area.

Where to next? Although our school has a huge variety of ways to grow a positive and nurturing community, such as teachers collaborating together (Hongboontri, C. & Keawkhong, N., 2014), and students being encouraged to be critical thinkers and responsive to each other, the challenge is to continue to disrupt our comfort zones to engage further afield in ways that have real impact and help our school community to see its place within bigger contexts and in ways that have real impact in the world.

For me professionally, given the opportunities that eLearning offers, is where I'd like to move to next: connect, communicate and create, through meaningful contexts, and be more active participants in the wider world.


References:

Hongboontri, C., & Keawkhong, N. (2014). School Culture: Teachers' Beliefs, Behaviors, and Instructional Practices. Australian Journal of Teacher Education, 39(5), 66-88. Retrieved from http://ro.ecu.edu.au/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=2332&context=ajte


Stoll. (1998). School Culture. School Improvement Network’s Bulletin 9. Institute of Education, University of London. Retrieved from http://www.educationalleaders.govt.nz/Culture/Understanding-school-cultures/School-Culture