You can contact LEARNZ, part of CORE Education, at:
Postal Address:
PO Box 13 678,
Christchurch 8141,
New Zealand

LEARNZ is a great way to study a topic using a medium that is accessible to all, even my low vision student and those with poor reading skills. The Antarctica field trip supported the science and social studies areas of the curriculum and much more, such as the key competencies.
It takes us to a place we have never been and experienced before and it gives us more insights of what's happening there. It's incredibly interesting.
It has been one of the best units I have taught in my 16 years of teaching - I would recommend it to anyone. I do think that it has been particularly successful in my classroom because we signed up for the extras such as the ambassador and the audio conferencing - that's what really made it come alive for me and the children in my class.
Students became very curious with lots of wonderings about Antarctica and they decided that science is really cool. The field trip made for fun learning and helped us use the i-pads and laptops more effectively for independent research.
It was in line with our learning focus for this year of being a fully digital classroom. Online help was all good.
This field trip supported our science and geography topics. We found the videos very informative. It was great to listen to scientists and the artist giving us a glimpse of what living and working in Antarctica is really like.
Excellent source of information for the students, aimed at their level, well presented and easy for the students to access and work with. Students found it extremely interesting and they learnt plenty of new things about Antarctica.
My curriculum focus was supported fully by the LEARNZ Antarctica programme and two NIWA scientists visiting the class in person helped no end to endorse what we had learned. Some students were able to really drive their own learning, while having the two levels for reading enabled some of my less able readers to participate more fully.
Catered to the needs of all students. Tasks were easily differentiated for all curriculum levels. Great opportunity for students to make connections with the wider community.
This LEARNZ Antarctica field trip has given me the confidence to continue to integrate digital technology into my programmes. My class were very engaged in their learning and it was well integrated through Literacy, Science and Mathematics.
It was great to have people there in real time - it connected the students to the context. It was fantastic where they could type questions to the experts even though they didn't have a speaking role.
Children loved every part of the experience- thoroughly engaging. Really cool for the students to be able to participate with a group outside of their immediate context!
I thought LEARNZ did a great job of mixing up content that covered multiple curriculum areas in a logical and accessible way. Most of the time my Year 8-9 class were engaged and absorbed by what was happening. Well done.
I really enjoy the learnz trips. My class loved learning about preservation and discovery in Antarctica. It delved into the deeper questions.
This is an effective and engaging part of my literacy programme. My Pasifika students, in particular, are much more engaged with a Learnz field trip than other academic activities. Especially relevant in meeting the vision of the NZ Curriculum.
The students became very curious about Antarctica. They couldn’t wait to find out what would happen next and were so upset if we didn’t watch everything first thing in the morning.
Great for Nature of Science. Also enviroscience topics. The kids were really interested - we found all the science fascinating and it was delivered in a way that made it understandable for the class. Also just the glimpse into life in the Antarctic.
This unit linked with our topic of sustainability and enabled cross curricular learning in a digital context. This type of learning resource helps students to work at their level, irrespective of where they start and their reading ability.
Having all of the Antarctica resources together makes it very easy for students to self-explore the parts of the topic they are especially interested in. The real benefit for us has been having all of the audio with the readings for my lower readers; they prefer to listen and the NZ accent of the reader is a bonus.
Great resource with a variety of media. Very comprehensive, providing students with another layer of learning material connected to real world around them.
The idea of virtually going to Antarctic created such a buzz and a HUGE level of engagement. It's great the way LEARNZ leaders connect with students - they present everything in such an accessible way but have high expectations that students can and will be able to understand fairly sophisticated concepts.
The students particularly enjoyed the videos and the quizzes. They also commented on how much they liked how the diaries were written as if they were there. This LEARNZ Antarctica trip fitted in well with the Nature of Science aspects of questioning and using vocabulary that we were focussing on.
My Year 7-10 students can access the field trip whenever needed, not necessarily during the trip. Relevant topic. Students keen to learn more about Antarctica.
My Year 3-4 students found the field trip extremely interesting, particularly as we had an ambassador join Shelley on the trip, too. We used the background pages for our reading programme and used the videos. There was a high degree of curiosity from the students, and their questions were answered at their level.
Real life engagement with scientists on ice was interesting - great for students to see what we had been studying in real life.