Intro / Project description
This project seeks to explore and strengthen how inclusive early learning is enacted, understood, and experienced within Puna Reo. The Puna Reo involved in this project are Ngā Puna Whakatupu, operating under the auspices of Te Wānanga o Aotearoa and members of Ngā Puna Reo o Aotearoa, a national collective of kaupapa Māori early childhood centres dedicated to strengthening Māori language, culture, and identity across Aotearoa New Zealand.Embedded Learning Support (Snyder et al., 2013) is a multicomponent approach that ensures mokopuna with additional learning support needs receive consistent, meaningful support within everyday activities, routines, transitions and play. Professional learning and practice‑based coaching is intended to help kaiako implement Embedded Learning Support in their everyday practice. Through ongoing wānanga, reflection, and shared sense‑making, the project will explore how inclusive learning support might be reshaped, transformed or reimagined to align authentically with Puna Reo aspirations and ways of working. He Awa Whiria (Macfarlane et al., 2015), the braiding of knowledge systems will support rich, culturally grounded inquiry. Rather than assuming any particular model, the project creates space for kaiako, leaders, whānau, and researchers to collaboratively reimagine inclusive learning in ways that champion Puna Reo values, culture, language, and pedagogy.
Aims
Key aims are to strengthen inclusive learning through an exploration of teaching practice and Embedded Learning Support. The project seeks to create space for kaiako, leaders, whānau, and researchers to collaboratively reimagine inclusive learning in ways that champion Puna Reo values, culture, language, and pedagogy. There are three research questions:
- What changes do kaiako experience in their teaching practices and professional capacity when Embedded Learning Support is introduced in Puna Reo settings?
- How do mokopuna and whānau experience and respond to Embedded Learning Support within their Puna Reo setting?
- How might inclusive learning support be reimagined to reflect and reinforce the unique cultural and pedagogical foundations of Puna Reo?
Why is this research important?
Equitable, culturally grounded inclusive learning is essential for positive outcomes for mokopuna with additional learning support needs. Research highlights that many kaiako seek greater confidence, support, and culturally relevant tools for inclusion and to support the learning of all mokopuna. Puna Reo have distinct cultural and pedagogical identities. Puna communities themselves hold rich, place-based knowledge, but there remains a gap in research that centres and champions Puna-led understandings of what culturally anchored inclusive learning looks like from within these settings. This project addresses that gap by supporting Puna Reo partners to reimagine inclusive learning in ways that reflect and reinforce their unique cultural and pedagogical foundations. The work will contribute directly to equity, identity, belonging, and Māori educational aspirations.
What we plan to do
Exploratory, partnership‑based inquiry: The project unfolds over three phases, each designed to create space for reflection, dialogue, cultural grounding, and collaborative sense‑making around inclusive learning.
Phase 1: Foundations: Researchers and Puna Reo partners will build shared understandings through wānanga and hui, learn about existing inclusive practices, and gather early evidence (questionnaires, artefacts, whānau voice). This phase establishes the foundation for reimagining inclusive learning, grounded in current strengths and aspirations.
Phase 2: Collaborative inquiry through coaching and wānanga: Kaiako will participate in workshops, access online resources, and engage in a series of practice‑based coaching cycles designed to support the implementation of Embedded Learning Support in their everyday practice. Through coaching, kaiako will be supported to try out Embedded Learning Support strategies, reflect on their experiences, and consider how these strategies align with their aspirations for inclusive learning within Puna Reo.
Embedded Learning Support is introduced as a model, but not as a predetermined solution. Instead, it forms one knowledge stream within He Awa Whiria. As kaiako trial Embedded Learning Support, ongoing wānanga provide culturally grounded spaces for collective reflection, sense‑making, and discussion of what is working well, what needs adjustment, and what might be reimagined.
Through this process, inclusive learning support may be adapted, reshaped, or transformed to authentically reflect Puna Reo values, culture, and practices, with the aim of strengthening participation, belonging, and learning for all mokopuna.
Phase 3: Sustainability, reflection, and future directions: A final wānanga will synthesise learning, highlighting what inclusive learning in Puna Reo might look like moving forward. Insights drawn from questionnaires, artefacts, observations, and whānau perspectives will help the partnership reflect on what has been learned, what has shifted, and what possibilities emerge for reimagining and continuing to strengthen culturally grounded inclusive learning within each Puna Reo.
Data and Analysis
Data will include wānanga documentation, reflections, whānau perspectives, and artefacts. Thematic and descriptive analysis will focus on:
- shifts in kaiako thinking and practice
- mokopuna and whānau experiences
- culturally grounded insights into reimagined inclusive learning in Puna Reo
References
Macfarlane, S., Macfarlane, A., & Gillon, G. (2015). Sharing the food baskets of knowledge: Creating space for a blending of streams. In A. Macfarlane, S. Macfarlane, & M. Webber (Eds.), Sociocultural realities: Exploring new horizons (pp. 52-67). Canterbury University Press.
Snyder, P. A., Hemmeter, M. L., McLean, M. E., Sandall, S. R., & McLaughlin, T. W. (2013). Embedded instruction to support early learning in response to intervention frameworks. In V. Buysse & E. Peisner-Feinberg (Eds.), Handbook of response-to-intervention in early childhood (pp. 283-300). Brookes.
