This paper examines why Maori language needs to be taught accurately at the early stages of initial teacher education programmes and continue for the duration of a teacher education student's degree. If teacher education faculties are permitting their students to mispronounce Maori names or words, they are in fact doing a disservice, not only to…

History has informed the present, as surely as the present will inform the future. As an evolving society, we are continually reflecting on the events and experiences of the past, taking stock of the issues and realities of the present, and then adapting the parameters, definitions and constructs that serve to define acceptability and reason as we…

In schools today inclusion involves a challenge to attitudes and expectations within educational communities. "The New Zealand Disability Strategy" (Minister for Disability Issues, 2001), is a guide for government action to promote a more inclusive society. Out of its 15 Objectives, Objective 1 encourages and educates the community and…

The importance of identifying and nurturing the gifts and talents of young people is now more widely accepted in New Zealand than it has been in the past. In this country the approach to meeting this challenge must reflect an understanding and acknowledgement of Maori conceptions of giftedness and talent. It is proposed here that the…

The issue of physical punishment is a particularly controversial one at the moment as child advocates are engaged in a struggle to persuade the New Zealand government to repeal a defence in law (section 59 of the 1961 "Crimes Act") which justifies parents hitting their children provided the force used is "reasonable in the…