E-learning and social media: Using Facebook to create an online community among applied social practice postgraduate students during a COVID-19 lockdown

This paper will discuss the use of Facebook as a means for creating an online community to support e-learning among applied social practice postgraduate students in the School of Healthcare and Social Practice at Unitec Institute of Technology during a lockdown in Auckland which began on 17 August 2021 and ended on 3 December 2021 (with the implementation of the COVID-19 Protection Framework see: https://covid19.govt.nz/traffic-lights/covid-19-protection-framework/).

Tutuku: Telling the stories of the Māori Showband world through digital innovation

In this article I will discuss the development and creation of the Tutuku digital archive. Tutuku is the name of the digital archive I have created as my nominated creative component for my PhD. Tutuku is coupled with my thesis “He Kohinga Kōrero: A selected group of Māori musicians and performers’ experiences of the 1960s through the Māori Showband movement”. Tutuku contains people’s narratives and experiences, which in turn each have their own mauri or life principle (objectspace, 2020). The narratives could also be described as mana taonga. Mana taonga is a specific Māori curatorial concept that taonga have their own status and power which must be managed and cared for in a culturally appropriate way (Mccarthy, Dorfman, Hakiwai, and Āwhina, 2013, 7). The concept of mana taonga creates the space for indigenous voices to be self-determining in history retelling. Tutuku creates pathways for expanding knowledge on many other subjects. Tutuku is available as an IOS App and web application located at Www.tutuku.co.nz. The second version will be available exclusively for Android devices in the Future. Tutuku will continue on into the future, to be a safe digital space for the sharing of indigenous experiences, culture and histories.

The Jesus of K Road: Theological reflections on Māori and homelessness

This paper reflects on my observations of, and casual discussions with, Māori experiencing homelessness, specifically, during the current lockdown in Auckland which began on 17 August 2021. It is important for those who experience homelessness to have their voices heard (Beaton et al., 2015). Amplifying these voices could increase understanding of the very complex issues that are faced (Beaton et al., 2015).

Green, Green Grass of Home

Our old grey Subaru crept slowly up the dusty gravel road. It was a muggy evening, but you couldn’t turn the air con on or open any windows unless you wanted a car full of dust. I got to sit in the front for this last stretch to Nanny’s, so I oversaw switching out Dad's Prince Tui Teka CDs. Dad went extra slow so as not to scratch the discs, but that was hard on a gravelly road full of potholes.

Mauri Ora: Creating a model of practice using Indigenous Tikanga.

As an Adult Educator, combined creative thinking and critical thinking can often provide learners with the tools to be innovative through their practices. He Pūawai is an Adult Tertiary Teaching L5 program at Te Wānanga o Aotearoa. The course is a 20-week program comprised of four learning modules providing skills and learning tools for facilitators, tutors or trainers teaching Adults. I have collaborated with a tauira to extend a Kaiako perspective and tauira vision that created a model of practice and framework. The tauira were the Semester A He Pūawai program. This framework applies Ngā Takepū, Ahurutanga, Kaitiakitanga, Koha and Mauri Ora, and these principles are embedded in Adult Teaching through the delivery and learning practices at Te Wānanga o Aotearoa. Takepū is about caring for people, relationships and cultures through a holistic approach in an educational context for all learners (Pohatu & Timata, 2008). I will discuss how ‘Mauri’ informed and balanced innovation and creative skills that enhance relationship building. Pohatu & Pohatu (2011) refer to ‘Mauri’ as the formation of human relationships. Mauri emphasises the “how and why” we shape how we learn, teach and behave (p. 1).

Caged

There I stood, in the middle of a moment that uttered assumptions of me, of my people. It was so subtle but hardly dismissible. It turned my insides and left a heavy weight in my chest. I felt like I couldn’t speak, like a puppet controlled by my environment, ruled by what others had been brainwashed to believe, what I had believed, dominated and bound to this cage.

A Māori Model of Leadership Practice

He Waka Hiringa (HWH) is a Masters of Applied Indigenous Knowledge offered as a programme of two years’ study by Te Wānanga o Aotearoa. The main pre-requisite for enrolment in to this graduate degree is for the student to be a master of their own practice, whatever that practice may be. In other words, they are already leaders in their own field of practice. My task is to help them clarify how they indigenise their practice; introduce them to academic processes to achieve the rangahau (research) around this and encourage them to create their own Models of Practice (MsOP) to guide them as they work with students or clients. In six years three cohorts of students have succesfully graduated through my encouragement in the development and approval of about 100 different new MsOP, each unique in its own way. These add to the use by graduates of HWH to models such as Whare Tapatoru ( Wi Te Tau Huata Snr. 1967, personal communication), Whare Tapawhā (Durie, M. 1984), Te Wheke (Pere, R. 1997) and Poutama Pōwhiri (Huata, P. 2011) to name a few well known MsOP. In terms of a Leadership MOP I have not seen a better model than that created by Te Wairere Te Pūāwaitanga o te Whakaaro Ngaia (my youngest child and daughter) to fulfil the requirements of her Masters in Management Communications and Te Reo Māori (Māori Language) graduate degree at The University of Waikato. I am going to use her MOP for leadership in competitive Kapa Haka[1] (Māori performing arts) as my model in this delivery with her permission. The title comes from a waiata-ā-ringa (action song) composed by one of her tuākana (older sisters), Te Ingo Karangaroa Ngaia, entitled ‘He Rākau Taumatua!’[2], for their whānau (family) kapa haka, Te Haona Kaha. [1] I use capital letters when talking about the art form and small letters when talking about a group that does the art form. [2] “He rākau taumatua” was first performed as a whakawātea by Te Haona Kaha kapa haka at the Tainui Waka Cultural Trust Regional Kapa Haka competitions in 2016.

Hoani and Hiwa

“Hoani time to get up.” Dang it Mum it’s the weekend. “What did you say boy?” Oh, shit. Did I say that out loud? “Sorry Mum!”Far out. Why are we getting up so early for, it’s legit only 6am.“Ok you three have 10 minutes to pack your bags and get in the car. Kia tere!” The only time we get up this early is when we go home to the Hokianga to see Koro. DANG IT. Why are we going to Koro’s house man, it’s so boring up there.I haven’t been back home to Hokianga since I was 10, I’m 14 now.Turns out we’re going to Koro’s to celebrate Matariki, the Māori New Year.Sounds boring aye. Yeah, thought so hahahaha.

The Tangi

The first day, it was dark, the clouds hung over us, not only the rain clouds but the cloud of sadness that lingered since that last day with him. We stood huddled at the gate, hiding from the rain under umbrellas but also from the eyes of the crowds of people watching us in our grief. The kaumatua of the marae signaled it was time, time for us to take him inside the Marae where he would lay, where we would share him with all the others who had come to be with him.

Maramara me te Iwi Taketake: Data and the Indigenous Group

This paper considers Indigenous groups and data. The paper begins with fifteen assorted questions which are addressed in various ways in the next two sections. The second section is a review of ‘Indigenous Data Sovereignty’ a collection by Kukutai and Taylor of 2016. This collection is seen as an excellent statement of the position of the Indigenous group regarding data and each chapter is reviewed in several paragraphs. Beginning with Kukutai and Taylor, the third and final section is a commentary on recent literature on data with reference to the Nation-state, Big Tech and Indigenous groups. This section considers a shifting situation involving machine learning and the hunting, gathering and farming of data. A reappraisal of the way data is used in the context of the Indigenous group, the Nation state and Big Tech is proposed. That reappraisal involves new considerations of identity in forms of ethnicity, nationalism and tribalism as well as the way Indigenous groups are defined by others and the ways in which they define themselves.