This article discusses the need for the right person to ask the right questions of the right people in the right place and time to evaluate special education services for ethnically diverse groups. These requirements are discussed in the context of research evaluating services for Maori children in New Zealand. (Contains references.) (Author/CR)

This article presents an outline history of early childhood programs for indigenous children through a comparative study of initiatives in three countries--Canada, Australia and New Zealand--with the aim being to identify common and distinct developments in the three nations. Formal early childhood education programs for indigenous children based…

Sixty-nine School Journals, magazines for New Zealand students from 7 to 13 years old, were surveyed to examine the representation of ethnic groups and cultures. The magazine issues from 1979 and 1987-1990 featured 760 items (e.g., stories, articles, poems, songs, and plays) were analyzed for the activities, languages, roles, age, and gender of…

The process of agricultural restructuring embarked upon by the New Zealand government in the mid-1980s precipitated a period of financial hardship for many of the nation's farmers. It was not uncommon for families to adapt major adjustment strategies in order to maintain the viability of their enterprise at this time. Drawing upon a detailed case…

In this study on schema theory, interviews were conducted with three adults to identify the schema for particular words or phrases (pencil, making a hot drink, talking), which required identifying all those dimensions of meaning involved implicitly and explicitly in how the word/phrase is used. Results revealed that subjects described their ideas…

Although many nations are struggling with social studies, especially when addressing basic goals, ideas of citizenship, and developing and understanding global perspectives, it is New Zealand that provides an interesting case regarding social studies for social efficacy and global understanding. In this article, the author investigates the…

Examines the notion of cultural safety in relation to the duty of care mandate assigned to child welfare workers when the state intervenes in family life, focusing on the vulnerabilities of rural and indigenous youth in New Zealand to cultural racism. Asserts that child welfare professionals have a professional obligation to enhance their cultural…

Investigates the concepts that could be used to develop geography lessons based on the ideology of indigenous people. Uses the Maori of New Zealand as an example and discusses how such concepts as "Maori Mind,""Maori Land,""Founding Ideologies," and "Cultural Artifacts" could be incorporated into an…

The spiritual aspect of early childhood education is supported by the early childhood curriculum in Aotearoa New Zealand, "Te Whariki". Research in three different early childhood settings presents new perspectives on the everyday experiences of children in terms of spirituality. Each setting formed a case study that included the voices…

The nearly 40 research studies carried out in New Zealand during the last decade have resulted in some very important ideas. In the area of children and texts, research focused on how children learn from texts, and the resulting data suggest that children can and do teach themselves to read, learning from their mistakes. The complexity of the…

Reviews recent research on sociocultural approaches to historical understanding and concludes that students' judgment of historical significance is substantially shaped by the social and cultural characteristics of the learner. Recounts several episodes revealing how minority and mainstream students differ in their trust of the authority of the…

In Aotearoa New Zealand journeys of discovery and colonization were also scientific journeys that brought "Maori woman" under the intellectual control of the emerging "scientific" academy. This paper argues that the historical construction of "Maori woman" through the discourses of Enlightenment science continues to…

Although schools contain many material artifacts, studies in classrooms have tended to focus on discourse and quality of social interaction even when artifacts are being used. Responding to Engstrom's (1999) invitation to take artifacts seriously, three studies are described in which a material object was essential to a classroom activity. The…

This paper examines the education of New Zealand's Maori people, noting historical achievement and enrollment gaps between Maori and non-Maori students. This gap is due to family economics, educational resources, cultural and racial barriers at school, negative school attitudes among older Maori students, and the student achievement testing…

The concept of self-efficacy is based on the triadic reciprocality model symbolising a relationship between: (a) personal factors i.e. cognition, emotion, and biological events (b) behaviour, and (c) environmental factors (Maddux, 1995). Cognition, emotion and behaviour are the domains of personality which form the basis of research in…