You can contact LEARNZ, part of CORE Education, at:
Postal Address:
PO Box 13 678,
Christchurch 8141,
New Zealand
Totally appropriate as we have spent the term focussing on our origins and how our ancestors reached NZ. For the Māori children, in particular, the story of Kupe was perfect.
This field trip lent itself so naturally to exploring space in a NZ context. Students loved learning about our sky & our history as navigators.This was powerful for my Māori learners as it showed sophistication they were not previously aware of.
Fabulous trip; excellent daily videos that support teaching practice. The Māori aspect was particularly good with the lead up to our Matariki celebrations. Students loved taking part in the web conference, especially having their extra questions also answered.
Our focus this term was "Exploration" and this trip linked beautifully with this. We have many Pacifica students in our class and it enabled them to make connections to their heritage, culture and history.
We were able to relate this field trip to our learning around literacy, science, social science & the arts. The setup of the material encouraged students to work both collaboratively & independently.
Love it! There are connections to all of the Key Competencies and Learning Areas as students become engaged by the 'Real People' behind the information. Also gives students an opportuntity to connect with others in an authentic digital experience.
Fantastic background information for my students; they all really enjoyed it. Great resource that all students and teachers should use.
I could quickly look at background and ideas and use those suitable for my Year 2 class. Great for English (use sources of information e.g. videos, to identify form and express ideas), Science (PEB - Astronomical Systems - Matariki) and Social Studies (How the past is important to people | How places are significant to people).
Engaging, motivating, easy to use, great resources, tailor-made for busy teachers to implement. Resources fully support an integrated approach. Thoughtfully curated. Children loved the digital content and videos. Rankings via quizzes very motivating for my class.
Relevant topic and info that fully engaged my students.
The website fitted perfectly with our current learning about Matariki and the field trip was very engaging. It helped encourage the students to be actively involved in various Matariki events in our area, as they felt confident sharing their newly acquired knowledge as well as asking questions.
This was a wonderful field trip which linked with our classroom learning. The kids particularly enjoyed watching the web conferences.
The class were motivated and excited by the learning, as the field trip gave students the opportunity to strengthen their own identity and cultural connections/ whakapapa. In addition, I tried new ICT aspects linked to the field trip and explored the concepts of 'Cultural Narratives' and 'Social Mapping'.
All aspects outlined in the planning for this field trip were easy to connect to the NZ Curriculum documentation. The newsletters were informative and useful, but I also found what I needed in the online help. My students have already asked when our next LEARNZ trip will be.
Meaningful and relevant content for students, pitched at an appropriate level for our multi-age classroom. Having the opportunity to interact and ask questions in real time was appreciated and is valuable.
We were studying Matariki as a whole school so this field trip was fantastic!
Content was perfect for our topic this term on navigators. The children's sense of belonging and dual heritage was reinforced as we discussed the videos and as our more able readers supported those less able in reading the background pages.
Pitched at a perfect level for my Year 4/5 class and went well for our place-based focus for the term. It supported and excited my students in an inclusive and well-planned way.
It fitted in with our next unit "Living Landscapes" and my students' interets in NZ spiders. It was my first time doing a live web conference and my class and I found it to be enjoyable, especially hearing from the experts, and they learned about the etiquette of that situation.
The learners were excited by the theme of the trip and carried out their own BioBlitz as a result. LEARNZ provides great resources and exciting opportunities for our learners to hear from experts in the field and to see practical applications for their learning.
It was an appropriate level of challenge, and was fun and engaging at the same time. My students are buzzing after this experience. and are excited about the next LEARNZ field trip.
We have been focussing on collaboration so students used this unit to work together to find information and monitor their own learning. It was easy for the children to navigate and use the website independently.
Not only did my students enjoy this BioBlitz field trip, they were able to apply their learning to our local area. Having the ability to listen to the background pages being read to them is empowering for my lower ability readers. It means that they can still get the same information and complete the tasks.
It followed on very well from the inquiry we have been doing into the plants in our local native bush. The most noticeable impact was a increase in our classes' scientific vocab. Great opportunity to communicate and collaborate with others outside of our school.
It linked in to our syndicate camp in the Tangihuas by Whangarei. It backed up our teaching points on why we need to monitor wildlife and trap introduced pets.