Whānau are part of the team

By Shannon Swainston, Year 0-1 Kaiako

One of our kaupapa at Sylvia Park School is to create learning focussed relationships with whānau. Evidence shows that student achievement increases when whānau play an active role in their child’s learning, which can be best done by ensuring whānau have a deep understanding of what happens at kura. Pakirehua is another opportunity for kaiako to create these connections. As pakirehua covers all areas of the curriculum, from social sciences to maths to physical education, we kaiako often reach into our communities to find experts that can come into our classes and share their knowledge. No kaiako is an expert in everything, so we look outwards to whānau. We seek their knowledge, their stories. We ask for their guidance. We get them involved in learning inside (and sometimes outside) the class. In some cases, it helps lay the groundwork for learning focussed connections. In others, it’s an extension of an existing relationship that has benefits for whānau, students and teachers.

Whānau involvement is important during the phases of Inquiry, but perhaps most notably we have an Inquiry Outcome Day at the end of every term to celebrate and share our mahi from the last 10 weeks. These Outcome Days are a chance to see what paths other classes in our kura have been travelling. They’re a chance to build on relationships across different year levels. And of course, they’re a chance for us to open our doors and let whānau see what learning has been covered for the term. As a year 1 kaiako I see many benefits to whānau involvement through Inquiry Outcomes Days - tamariki get to ‘show off’ their mahi from the term, they get to explain concepts to their whānau, and they often teach them new things. Whānau are able to see what an amazing place school can be, and hopefully feel that they belong here as much as the children do.

Learning is not secret at Sylvia Park School. We have been sharing assessment data with whānau for years. Pakirehua is a chance for whānau to see how their child’s successes in reading, writing and maths can be applied in the world; how with these foundations of literacy and numeracy, tamariki are able to move into higher level, critical, and word-changing thinking.