Leadership insights on play: Connecting Indigenous ways of knowing with primary education practice

Euro-Western schooling systems often sideline play, or when learning through play is valued, it is rarely recognised as a Maaori way of knowing. In te ao Maaori, however, play is woven through identity, wairua, and whakapapa. Drawing on my puuraakau and the koorero of my tumuaki, Te Haumoana Biddle, this article re-centres play as a mana-enhancing, culturally sustaining practice for primary classrooms. By weaving lived experiences with te ao Maaori and play, it argues that play must be reclaimed from colonial framings and relaunched as relational, land-based, and whaanau-centred pedagogy. Practical examples show how kaiako and leaders can restore the mauri of play so tamariki stand strong in both worlds.