This qualitative study examined distributed leadership enactment within Whānau Manaaki Kindergartens in Aotearoa New Zealand, exploring effective practices, systems, and processes. Drawing on perspectives from teachers, positional leaders, and chief executives, findings revealed that intentional, values-based, supportive structures alongside clearly communicated leadership expectations enable effective distributed leadership. The article offers ...

The notion of children's working theories is an overarching outcome of Te Whāriki, Aotearoa New Zealand's early childhood curriculum. Growing research examines children’s working theories and teacher support strategies. This article draws on doctoral research to present the spiral of working theory development model, providing a framework for understanding working ...

Dame Iritana Tāwhiwhirangi (Ngāti Porou, Ngāti Kahungunu, Ngāpuhi) was born on 21 March 1929 in Wharekahika, East Coast, the daughter of Matenga Matuakore Thatcher and Winirangi Albert (nee Chelsey), and recently passed on 1 February 2025. This article chronicles four decades of dedicated struggle and visionary leadership in Dame ...

This article examines how government policies have undermined equity and access in early childhood care and education in Aotearoa. While flaxroots initiatives have historically fostered inclusive, community-centred, low- or no-cost early childhood models, recent policies favouring commercial providers have intensified disparities, particularly for Māori and Pacific communities. The analysis situates ...

Regulatory reform, recolonisation, and the fight for te reo Māori: This interview continues a vital thread from our previous issue’s coverage of Kōhanga Reo by situating the movement—and the political and pedagogical leadership of Associate Professor Mere Skerrett—within the increasingly fraught context of regulatory reform in Aotearoa.

Teachers have responsibility and can assume agency for enhancing the education of Pacific students in Aotearoa New Zealand. Pacific education is an area which needs improvement and, consequently, Pacific communities seek actions - deliberate strategies - to enhance educational provision. Among the strategies available is the engagement of role models ...

There is a significant lack of te reo Māori resources, especially digital materials, for learning pāngarau/mathematics. Few studies have investigated how well digital resources for pāngarau align with kaupapa Māori principles. In this article, we examine a digital resource, Matific, from a kaupapa Māori perspective. We find the te reo ...

This qualitative study explored children’s opportunities to actively solve problems as they talked, wrote and read during their first few months at school. Participants were two teachers from two schools in Tāmaki Makaurau, Auckland and eight children, newcomers to their classes. The children’s writing records and actions during guided writing ...

Data literacy enables teachers to use information collected about students and their learning to take data-informed instructional action.  This article outlines two approaches developed by teachers to provide teaching targeted to the immediate needs of specific students that moved beyond “gap-filling”. The pre-teaching and “fresh choice” approaches led to increased ...