Celebrating Being Us

Heart warming to see our young people responding to the theme for #PinkShirtDayNZ on Friday... "Celebrating Being Us". Lots of awesome connections with our Manaiaklani Cybersmart kaupapa.  All about elevating the positive and empowering our learners to connect with what they can do to share aroha, kindness and kaitiakitanga... The Love You Give.

Ruma Kea @ Kokatahi School using cybersmart language positive, thoughtful and helpful to design their own pink shirts. Ngā Whai @ Taipa Area School created kindness chains for their classmates and student leaders at Pt England "Love the Difference", celebrating our uniqueness.

He aha te mea nui o te ao. He tāngata, he tāngata, he tāngata

Empower your chrome-bookers, to amplify and turbo charge their learning.

Screencastify for Chromebooks
Lots of options for learners to record sound and action when creating and sharing Digital Learning Objects + a versatile tool for peer and self reflection.

If you are new to using Screencastify see the Cybersmart site for setup plus recommendations and support for the following...

• Scaffold learners to be confident with workflow and plan for opportunities to Create to Learn
• Screencastify 2D Digital Learning Objects e.g. Creating Learning Stories
• Practise and self assess reading and oral language e.g. Build Reading Mileage 
• Share screencasts on blogs + peer feedback via blog commenting
• Record demonstrations and explanations, with narration e.g. Create a screencast
• Collaborate to create e.g. record a conversation, interview

For more blogging tips: Tuhi Mai Tui Atu

"Give them something to do..."

From Rockets to Rock Stars ... 170+ Manaiakalani Teachers Create to Learn 

This quote from John Dewey incapsulates the theme of our Manaiakalani Kāhui Ako, Create to Learn Staff meeting this week. Our goal was to focus our thinking on what we can learn by having an opportunity to create.

Through creating we want to remind ourselves of the origins of Learn Create Share and Creativity Empowering Learning. Opportunities to create, hook our young people into learning.... to create engagement and awaken curiosity, excitement and passion (Create to Learn Dorothy Burt).

When we approach Learn Create Share in a linear fashion, the opportunity to Create is often the culmination of extensive learning and teaching e.g. Our Manaiakalani Film Festival, Annual Fia Fia, and Art Fair.

Lots of awesome learning opportunities here! However, if we recognise the cognitive engagement that ensues when young people are creating to learn, this staff meeting's focus was advocating for increased opportunities to Create to Learn.

Ideally when we identify and plan for opportunities to Create to Learn, creating does not need to be a Peter Jackson production.

It can be quick and scheduled at a stage of the learning where it will have the most impact.


"Creating provides students with an opportunity to reflect on, synthesize, and come to a deeper understanding of what they read and know – or think they know" (Dr Rebecca Jessen)

The Love You Give ♥️

Message for our Manaiakalani Schools
This week, 13 May - 17 May, sees a nationwide event that at its heart aims to celebrate who we are and spread aroha, kindness and kaitiakitanga.

Our young people will be seeing and hearing messages in support of these events via the media and online and you also may be considering supporting Pink Shirt Day on Friday 17th in your school.

Please take some time to consider the principles of the Manaiakalani Programme's Being Cybersmart, when engaging our young people with these themes.

Especially if your learners are creating and sharing content online, in response to next week’s events.

Words, images and actions have power. The more we hear them, see them and use them the more we elevate them. This includes on our screens.

If we are “speaking up and standing together”, what will we see and hear people doing? What will we be doing to celebrate being us?  Whakanuia Tōu Āhua Ake! 

Focus on those actions and imagery that empower our young people to elevate the positive:

• Often learners will respond to the the negative with a negative. In conversations, acknowledge their contribution, then immediately follow up by encouraging them to connect with and describe or model actions they will see and hear if your school is spreading aroha, kindness and kaitiakitanga.

• If learners are creating and sharing, both offline and online, do their words, images and actions elevate the positive? Empower learners to create DLOs that represent themselves and their actions as positive, thoughtful and helpful. This is particularly powerful when creating a positive digital footprint and developing smart relationships online. (Being Cybersmart)

For Example: Do actions, words and imagery empower learners to connect with positive, thoughtful, helpful?

The walls of your schools and kura….

What and how we share online and kanohi ki te kanohi...

Our young people on the big screen... confident, connected, life long learners. 

Note the themes and imagery in these films. 

A final word resonates because of its strong connection with the principles of Being Cybersmart...

"But with that memory comes a responsibility. A responsibility to be the place that we wish to be. A place that is diverse, that is welcoming, that is kind and compassionate. Those values represent the very best of us… 

...We each hold the power, in our words and in our actions, in our daily acts of kindness. Let that be the legacy of the 15th of March. To be the nation we believe ourselves to be"

(Jacinda Ardern, Christchurch memorial)

Image Source

Manaiakalani May Toolkits: Harnessing video to tell and share stories

Participating and contributing to the annual Manaiakalani Film Festival is a highlight of our year. Films are premiered at Hoyts Sylvia Park in November and need to be submitted by the end of Term 3.  To prepare your learners to participate and contribute in the Manaiakalani Film Festival it is essential to identify opportunities to Learn, Create, Share  throughout the year. From planning and presenting to storyboarding, editing and filming, identify opportunities for your learners to harness video to tell and share their stories as soon as you can. Increased opportunities to take ownership of the process early in the year will empower our young people and build their confidence to participate and contribute to the film festival.

Our May Toolkits included strategies and recommendations for teachers and opportunities to learn the skills our young people will utilise when creating their film for the festival including Creating a Learning Story, Creating a Short Film and Create a One Shot Film

Manaiakalani Being Cybersmart - Smart Footprint

We are currently updating and transferring Cybersmart Learning content to new Google Sites. The content on the classic site will remain available, however will not be updated. Any new content can be accessed from our new Cybersmart site.


We begin Term 2 with a focus on our Cybersmart Learning: Smart Footprint. Central to this is empowering our learners to understand the difference between private and public information and creating a positive digital footprint.

Whenever and wherever we share online it's personal, visible and amplified. It is personal because we are sharing information about ourselves.  Creating a positive digital footprint means learning to make smart decisions about what personal information we share and what personal information we keep private.

Blogging enables our young people to connect with an authentic audience and provides a rich and engaging platform for learning to create a positive digital footprint.  Making connections and sharing via the class blog, school blogs and blogs across our clusters enables learners to begin engaging with creating a Smart Footprint whether they are blogging individually or currently sharing via their class blog.

Teachers who are receiving in class support from Manaiakalani facilitators  are also participating in Tuhi Mai, Tuhi Atu which is enabling us to harness blogging for Cybersmart Learning.

Recommendations and resources have been shared to support teachers to identify and design cybersmart learning in response to the strengths and interests of their learners.

Monitoring Blog Comments

All blogs in Manaiakalani are set to anyone can comment.
As the administrator teachers are sent an email notification when a learner posts or a comment is left on their blog. The easiest way to monitor interactions on learners’ blogs is through the Teacher Dashboard. As blog admin our teachers are responsible for moderating comments and spam.

How to delete comments
Log into your blogger dashboard and select the blog you want to monitor comments for.
Click comments then delete comments or mark as spam if the comment looks like spam.
This will delete the comment and also, over time, blogger will recognise spam comments and automatically move them to spam.

For more blogging tips: Tuhi Mai Tui Atu

Manaiakalani Cybersmart

Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu

We are very excited to begin this year with over 50 class blogs registered for Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu our Manaiakalani Outreach Blogging programme. Literally translated, Write to me, write to others, we are using our class blogging platform to build powerful connections across our clusters. 

Similar to Quadblogging Aotearoa, but with our own Manaiakalani kaupapa and pedagogy Learn Create Share, Tui Mai Tuhi Atu empowers our young people to learn to be Cybersmart through leaving quality blog comments and engaging in online behaviour and thinking that elevates positive actions.

Teachers new to Manaiakalani will also be receiving support from their facilitator for Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu as they build confidence with blogging and Learn Create Share.




Each week we will share blogging tips to support both blog administration and Learn Create Share.
Find our more about Tuhi Mai Tuhi Atu, connect with blogging teams and explore tips on the website.

Manaiakalani Being Cybersmart - Smart Learners

We are currently updating and transferring Cybersmart Learning content to new Google Sites. The content on the classic site will remain available, however will not be updated. Any new content can be accessed from our new Cybersmart site.

"Smart learners are at home in a digital world"
Smart Learners focuses on connecting our young people with elements of our Kawa of Care and responsible use agreement. 

The Manaiakalani  Kawa of Care was co-constructed between schools and whānau. This agreement covers the responsibilities of learners, parents and schools. 

It ensures that learners will get the best use of their device, and that schools and families understand how they can best care for the devices.  

To make the most of their device, Smart Learners follow the Kawa of Care and learn to use their device confidently and in clever ways to Learn Create Share.  

To empower learners it is critical that learning sites are visible and accessible and that learners are able to confidently navigate the site to access learning.

Recommendations and resources have been shared to support teachers to identify and design cybersmart learning in response to the strengths and interests of their learners.

Cybersmart Learning: Smart Learners

Manaiakalani Blogger App Pilot

Great excitement today as Clarelle and her learners at Pt England School are trying out the Manaiakalani Blogger App for the first time... on their iPads!

Over the next couple of months we know they will be able to provide us with some valuable feedback on how the App performs and also suggest improvements. These young people are already confident bloggers and watching them access the App for the first first time was encouraging. I noticed they were navigating the App confidently and also persevered and problem solved when needed. I am hoping that the attention we gave to the design of the icons and layout of the App contributed to this. We thought a lot about the work flow they were already familiar with and also the other Apps they have been using i.e. Google Drive and Explain Everything.

Visit Clarelle's Blog and you will find a feed gadget in the right navigation bar to all learners' blogs... they appreciate comments.

We have created this Slide Deck highlighting development priorities and to record action in response to feedback from the pilot. It will be updated as changes are made.