Samoan Bilingual Unit

MUA I MALAE’S PROGRAMME

Bilingual Education is about using Samoan and English to teach all subjects in the curriculum. The methodology that we use is ‘Dual Medium’, separating the two languages by time/day. Samoan is used for four days - with Juniors.  With Seniors - 3 days.

We use Samoan Language to reinforce understanding of different curriculum areas. The Samoan language is also used for motivation and general discussions.  It is not taught as a separate subject but it is integrated into everyday Speaking, Reading, Writing and topic programme.  

Ruma 7’s English language is Wednesday with Ramona.   Ruma 6 is on Thursday with Sarah Phillips because of teacher release day.  Ruma 5 is on Monday and Tuesday.  This means Reading, Language, Mathematics, Topic studies are taught in both Samoan and English.

This model is called 80% -20% bilingual education and is internationally successful for both language learning and success at school.  This approach started formally in term 1 2006.  Prior to this, we were trialling the approach.

Lilly Tali is our teacher aide who will be working with students and teachers of Mua I Malae till the end of her contract in Term 2, 2009.  Her time will be focussed on working with small groups of children for an hour during literacy programme. This is to assist learners with one to one oral language experience in the Samoan language.

We also have a few parents who come in and help with reading with our children in Samoan, which is greatly appreciated, and we are always looking for more volunteers.  Some parents are able to help translating material and this is wonderful.

DESCRIPTION: Mua I Malae-Ropu 3

Ropu 3 consists of 63 children, 26 girls and 37 boys, and they all come from different backgrounds.  The majority of our children were born in New Zealand and their first language is English.  

Samoan is their heritage language. A large number of children come onto us from Aoga Faa-Samoa Early Childhood programme.  This programme does a wonderful job of introducing the children to the world of learning in Samoan.   This is the only Samoan bilingual in New Zealand where most of the children come from English speaking backgrounds.  

Matua Atinae has worked hard to support and develop the school programme for our children.

We have 3 classes.  They range from Year 0-Year 6, the juniors, middle and senior levels.  The Year 0-2 levels are with Miss Ramona Tuai with help from our teacher-aide Lilly Tali.  The Y2-Y4 levels are with Ms Suzie-Jo Rasmussen (our lead teacher) and Year 5 - Y6 with Miss Nera Leaali’ifano (senior teacher).

Everyday, our Ropu get together to share and learn songs, poems, cultural activities and stories.  Anyone who has a knowledge and interest in the Samoan culture is welcome to join and share their expertise.

The school has an Art Rotation /House programme that is run on every second Friday.  This is time spent in gaining other learning experiences such as dancing, drama and music which are all led by different teachers within the school.

We believe in making learning enjoyable because not only will the children acquire and learn the skills they need more quickly, but it also fosters an environment that holds true to one that we are most comfortable in - that is the concept of ‘aiga’.

We have an ‘open door’ policy, where our parents are most welcome any time, any ‘channel’, to come into our classrooms, be it for an update of their child’s progress, concerns, or just a friendly chat.

Our environment is one of respect, co-operation, care, friendliness and acceptance of each other, not only as members of the unit, but for whom and what we are.

Music is a universal language, and one, which we as people, are surrounded by.  We live in it every day of our lives.  Pese for lotu, mo fiafiaga, to soothe the soul, to calm an agitated child, to enjoy.  We have ‘community singing’, where we not only sing ‘our’ songs, but we are able to experience that of our other sister cultures within the school-(one other avenue to explore languages).

We start every morning with lotu, roll call and fitness.  We begin with a pese amata, and then the children join in with “Lo matou Tama e…”

Professional Development

Professional development is essential and encouraged to help teacher become more knowledgeable about delivering the curriculum through both languages.

Our participation in the TLRI/MEI and LPDP research is empowering us.  It has strengthened our team, promoted more professional sharing within the school and challenged our beliefs about learning and teaching practice.

Planning

Planning is done co-operatively. We have a school wide overview and we plan integrated units across all curriculum areas according to the needs of our unit.

We have to keep in mind that we are using Samoan language to teach the curriculum, as well as learning the language.

Assessment

We are working on developing assessment and evaluation measures for both languages (L1/L2).  This is an ongoing process and is done both formally and informally, making use of school wide testing, assessment tasks, self-evaluation and teacher observations, to ensure the needs of our children are being met.  Data is collected to make informed decisions for future choices of methodologies, planning and style of teaching.  We are in the process of moderating the new levelled testing kit in Samoan.  The MEI Bilingual teachers cluster translated the kit in Samoan and it is now (PM Readers) trialled by other bilingual schools in Auckland.

From last term’s assessment, we grouped the children according to their needs in Language, Reading and Maths. Due to the varying level of abilities in Samoan language within the unit, it is essential that assessment be done to ensure that each child is placed within a group that is appropriate to his/her capability.  This allows the teacher to create a thorough description of the class, and create target groups to focus on each child’s ability.

Research in Aotearoa/NZ and overseas indicates that it takes bilingual learners 6-8 years to reach similar competency to their native speaking peers in literacy (CALP- Cognitive Academic Language Proficiency) in both languages. 

Our children who started in the full programme at Y1 learning and using Samoan across the curriculum can be expected to develop literacy and Oracy in Samoan by Y4 and Native Speaker levels in literacy in English by Year 6-8.  What this means is that there will always be a delay in children’s ability to read and write in English to grade age norms until Year 6-8.  This is normal and natural for all learners in bilingual programmes. Excellence in English cannot be achieved in the first few years  while children and learning to read and write also in Samoan. Learning to speak read and write in two languages is not the same as learning one language. We plan to  will track and monitor childrens’ development in both languages and literacies and report on them  Different children will make different progress depending on the amount of exposure to Samoan outside the school.There is no escape from this situation. It is perfectly normal for all bilingual programmes all around the world.  The few children who do not make adequate progress in literacy will be identified early on  and assistance sought for them. Withdrawing children from Mua I Malae to learn in English only, will not assist them to become bilingual.

Resources

We have a wide variety of Samoan books stored in our unit.  These resources are supplied by the Learning Media free of charge.  Other resources such as charts and large pictures are stored in the Ropu and staff resource room, and are always readily available.  Other resources have been painstakingly translated to support our programmes.

Realistically, there are important issues that need to be addressed, such as the need for more picture books for preschool readers to bring information to text.  There is need for current Samoan texts to be identified in levels such as emergent, early and fluent readers

The Tupu series, which is provided by the Ministry of Education, are excellent texts for proficient readers.  However, these published texts are not suitable for emergent readers because the sentences structures are too difficult and too numerous. 

There is a serious need for materials with a repetitious use of words in simple sentences in  Samoan so that the learners can revisit and practice prior learning and extend themselves without it becoming ‘boring’.   Such an important part of the emergent reading process is missing and no wonder why children are not responding to the Samoan language effectively in a range of contexts.

Early Literacy Readers

Matua Atinae (parents) funded a series of PM and PM+ readers, Nelson and Learning Media texts for the unit.  The teachers translated and sorted the books into sets of 8 books for guided reading groups.

We also have translated 3 picture dictionaries and made copies for each classrooms. Individual teachers make their own resources when the need arises, such as vocabulary lists, matching activities, describing and arranging pictures and sentences, cloze verb tasks, meaning-focused activities, picture big books, poems and song charts…

More resources are needed to aid with our teaching, such as ready made tasks for each translated book, charts, tape cassettes and songs.

We would also like to see more of our people come and share their wealth of knowledge so we can tap into the many hidden treasures that often pass us by so as to broaden the learning of our children, who are our future.

The purpose of developing Samoan materials and resources is to ensure that they are labelled and organized well enough so that teacher can use them with no confusion and with minimum time.

It is our parents (Matua Atina’e) wishes to extend the children’s learning by having the opportunity to experience the faa-Samoa first hand.

Wishes

Our Ropu wishes for the rest of this year is for more Samoan speakers to read individually with our children so that they can continue learning Samoan at our new Bilingual Unit at Kowhai Intermediate. We’re all looking forward to grow the unit at Kowhai so that our languaguage cannot be lost  and we need everyone to do their part.

Suzie-Jo Rasmusssen

Mua I Malae, Ropu Leader 2009