Our biggest hui yet was held in Rotorua and Auckland, and online. Read about the day and view the keynote presentation in this article.

You will remember the last two years of Nex Kōtuitui meetups: from fully online, to hybrid online and in Tāmaki Makaurau.

This year we met in a more regional sense with the aim to get the north, east, west and south into localised areas.

It was great to see people hopping on flights, or roadtripping to a location to meet up with other kaiako face-to-face. It was also great to see a balance of ePrincipals, eDeans and support staff attending alongside eTeachers.

As ever, there was the online option, well-supported and deftly helmed by Jan Bolton. The participation and engagement in that space was greatly appreciated as the conversations on the back-channel reflected those in the face-to-face space. 

Theme

This year the hui theme was borne out of feedback from across KotuiAko VLN Professional Growth Cycle conversations in the monthly staff meetings: how do we foster learners' active participation and contribution in our designed and taught online lessons? Furthermore, how do we encourage independent learning after the lesson has finished? Lucie Lindsay was pivotal in pulling this theme together and providing interactive resources. 

Keynote

We were extremely fortunate to have Dr. Dianne Forbes as our keynote speaker to kick off these conversations. Dianne has mentored members of the KotuiAko team and besides being a digital learning specialist for 21 years, she is an engaging speaker with a tonne of both anedoctal and peer-reviewed research on how to make the online learning experience relatable but practical.

Dianne's background and expertise for this session garnered much enthusiasm as she described how students were able to engage in real-world projects (creating a classroom economy!) and demonstrate their agency in this designed learning. With so much of learning being outcome-driven, this pedagogy sits in the space of learner-centered outcomes.

The teacher conversations after morning tea focussed on collective challenges in the online teaching environment. For context, the collaborative documents are here and you are encouraged to review the contributions by hui participants. 

At the post-lunch wānanga, professional conversations around coaching, mentoring and teacher voice provided invaluable information for the Nex Kōtuitui Ministry of Education milestone, but also generated further commonalities. 

We farewelled staff who were moving to new opportunities and heard from Rachel Whalley and Amanda King about continuity for Kotuitui while participants could signal what PLD sessions they found useful over the past year.

Moving forward

While scheduled for the end of the year when we are mentally winding down, the hui also provides a way of bridging the school year to 2024, with lots of ideas for future PLD sessions, and it enables our organisation to move forward using the knowledge shared at the sessions. 

These professional conversations continue to fulfill the requirements of what it means to be an effective eTeacher, but also to open up korero about possible research projects and case studies. 

Please do engage with the Hui Hub which contains links to resources, and the keynote recording.