You can contact LEARNZ, part of CORE Education, at:
Postal Address:
PO Box 13 678,
Christchurch 8141,
New Zealand
At Year 2 level, fire drills, earthquake drills etc need more context, and this field trip provided that. This field trip helped students to become engaged in society by having a better understanding of how good citizens understand and prepare for disasters.
My class enjoyed the little videos and learnt heaps about earthquakes. Linked well to managing self and community. It involves the children with things outside the classroom - connects them to real life NZ.
Activities (interactive) are great. Visiting places and discussing in short (video) clips are useful. Students had information at a variety of levels and had access to an expert, allowing teacher to become facilitator.
A great resource for reading and inquiry. Students really enjoy the reading and activities.
This was effective, interesting and aimed at the students' ability, with interesting quizzes too. Students learned a lot and they enjoyed the videos, which generated a lot of discussion. It was good not to be the one imparting the information, to have experts explain how things happen.
This field trip most definitely supported our students in becoming lifelong learners, who develop skills and strategies for real-life situations. Everything is well-researched and my Year 6-8 students and I particularly enjoy the presentation of the video clips.
This is a fantastic resource for all as there is a lot of information compiled into a number of units. We are ever so grateful for the hard work put into making LEARNZ virtual field trips.
All New Zealanders need to know this info - new immigrants were quite surprised by some of it. Ticks all of the boxes. Allows my diverse learners to engage in their own style with the material, which frees me up to move around and have quality conversations about the topic with each of the students - no crowd control needed! Brilliant!
The field trip really helped the children to think and plan ahead what they would do to keep safe in an emergency. The videos linked to disasters that could happen in our area.
Fantastic resource that our class really enjoyed once again. Thank you. Great planning guide. Easy to use and informative.
The resources were excellent for research and reading tasks, and we learnt the importance of being prepared as we practiced our earthquake drills. Everything supported our unit of inquiry about natural disasters specific to New Zealand and my students valued being able to speak to experts in the field.
The subject was national and we localised it by making a plan for our schools which we shared with the whole community. The key competency of 'managing self' is very relevant here and the activities and videos were great.
Learnz virtual field trips are an integral part of our programme - students look forward to each one. What's the Plan, Stan? led to research around a range of topics - particularly in response to Web Conferences. Special needs students can access ALL aspects of the tour. Maori students are able to add context and their own ideas and understanding, from talks by representatives of local iwi.
The fieldtrip background pages allowed my Year 8 class of very diverse abilities to engage at their various levels - at least a quarter of the class really appreciated the audio text! It was also a great opportunity for my students to integrate inquiry learning into our course.
Explanations were clear and my classroom were buzzing all week about the content. Students were keen to research and find out more information, they also spoke to their families about emergency plans and kits at home. Awesome fit for our school inquiry "Keeping myself Safe and Healthy".
LEARNZ supports all areas of NZC - a wonderful resource!
The students loved Stan the dog and the way he acted out in the video. This held the younger viewers interest, but also reinforced the learning points. It made online learning very purposeful, more than just a research or processing tool. Talking to someone in Auckland from Picton was very powerful and engaging for learners.
Our students are manly visual learners so through watching the videos they were able to sustain attention longer and retain more information. Also every activity in the field trip, I believe, has in some way reflected the Key Competencies and Values in the Curriculum.
It was a good starting unit for our term theme of survival and sustainability. The web site structure allowed them to take ownership of their learning and explore. Overall, it was a good way for students to hear from an expert and gain knowledge and insight.
I used it as part of my independent learning and group reading sessions. This field trip showed the children how they can be managing their own safety.
My multi-levelled students thoroughly enjoyed participating in watching the movies and learning through accessing the background pages and quizzes. LEARNZ is a great package of information and up to date footage, that makes usage and planning of the unit very easy for me as a teacher.
Fitted in well with our civil defence week. Engaged the students. Have recommended to colleagues and our whole team will use this next year.
The children were engaged and enjoyed having their questions answered in real time. All the background material with links to NZC was fantastic and we could weave this in to our reading, writing, health and science learning.
Very effective not only because of its relevance to the area we live in but also because it enables students to think critically and develop connections within our community. Using LEARNZ trips encourages me to leverage digitally into other areas of my teaching.
Children engaged with this resource and were excited to learn about disasters in this way. Background pages were a great support to the children's learning as they were easy to use as an independent or group or whole class activity, especially with two reading levels and with the read-aloud option.