A Māori Modern Learning Environment: Ko te akā pūkaea kia ita, ko te akā pūkaea kia eke!

Abstract

This Kaupapa Māori research project investigates the ways that two Māori-medium pathways (bilingual and immersion) work together in a newly built Flexible Learning Space (FLS) to progress te reo Māori and the aspirations of whānau. This paper introduces the project that proposes the notion of the Māori Modern Learning Environment (MMLE). Funded by Teaching Learning Research Initiative (TLRI), this twoyear project is still in progress with the project only being at an early stage. The researchers are currently exploring how ‘space’ is understood and utilised by Māori teachers, students and whānau of two Māorimedium pathways, within the wider English-medium primary-school context. This pūrākau (case-study) project takes a strengths-based approach, and is based on the experiences, pedagogies and potential of Te Akā Pūkaea, at Newton Central School. The two whānau groups and Māori-medium pathways at the centre of the study are: Te Uru Karaka (immersion) and Te Awahou (bilingual). This research is intended to respond to the call from Stewart and Benade (2020) to ‘spatial biculturalism’ as we theorise ‘space’ from a Kaupapa Māori lens. Hence, the project is titled “A Māori Modern Learning Environment: Ko te Akā Pūkaea Kia Ita, Ko te Akā Pūkaea Kia Eke!”.