First World War curriculum resources in development

Developed by Cognition Education (English-medium) and Core Education (Māori-medium), with teacher input, these resources will help teachers of Years 1 to 13 develop engaging and relevant learning programmes during the centenary of one of the most significant events of the 20th century.

They will provide students with an opportunity to explore how the events and experiences of the First World War are relevant to today and the future and support them to meet several New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga o Aotearoa learning area achievement objectives.

There’s a large amount of information on the First World War that will be brought together so teachers can quickly and easily develop learning programmes. To do this, the Ministry of Education, Cognition Education, and Core Education are working with the National Library of New Zealand Services to Schools and the WW100 Programme Office.

Teachers will be able to use the inquiry guides and resource packs to help students develop their own inquiries and relate them to their everyday lives, communities, and aspirations.

The inquiry guides and resource packs will focus learning around the themes:

• Heritage and Identity
• Making Connections
• Citizen Perspectives
• New Zealand in the Pacific
• Peace and Reconciliation.

The inquiry guides and resource packs will be supplemented by teacher-support guides and notes, examples of school activities using the teaching and learning materials, and engaging visual resources. These will be made available on Te Kete Ipurangi (TKI) and/or a link to schools’ own blogs or websites.

The first of the inquiry guides and resource packs will be available on TKI by November 2014, with more released progressively through to September 2015. Teachers and librarians will be informed via TKI, the Ministry Bulletin for School Leaders, Education Gazette, and the National Library Services to Schools website, newsletter and the Schoollib list when they are available.

Shared histories

Shared Histories is a joint initiative between the Ministries of Education in New Zealand and France. Led by the French Embassy, through the New Zealand Association of French Teachers, Shared Histories commenced in late 2013 and involves New Zealand and French secondary schools collaboratively developing and working on projects on the First World War. The initiative has recently been extended to include schools in Australia.

As the Shared Histories initiative calls for new projects from August 2014, participating New Zealand schools will be able to use the First World War inquiry guides and resource packs to support their shared projects.

Check out Shared Histories(external link) for more information.

WW100 education expo

To commemorate World War I, a free education expo is being hosted by Te Papa on 6 September.

The expo will profile a vast range of WWI education resources and learning programmes from museums and libraries that include Te Papa, Government House, New Zealand Cricket Museum, National Army Museum, The National Library of New Zealand, Archives New Zealand, UN Youth, Heritage New Zealand, Ngā Taonga Sound & Vision, and Capital E Digital.

Topics covered in the workshops and presentations:

• An introduction to WWI with the First World War Centenary Programme Office
• Researching WWI with the National Library and Archives New Zealand
• Modelling the UN in your classroom, led by UN Youth
• The role of Matiu / Somes Island in WWI with DOC
• 'Footsteps from Trentham’ with the National Army Museum
• ‘Search, Curate, and Remix WWI content’ with Digital New Zealand
• The social dimensions to WWI using museum collections
• The Berry Boys soldier portraits.