Tēnā koutou, ngā mihi nui ki a koutou katoa.

I’m sorry that I can’t be there in person to participate in the formal launch, the acknowledgement of the update of the Te Whāriki Curriculum but I did want to take a minute to make sure that you understood how much I appreciate all the work that so many of you have done to ensure that our world leading curriculum is updated, is refreshed, is future-focused to make sure that our tamariki mokopuna, our youngest and earliest learners are getting the opportunities that this curriculum outlines for them. And it is world leading. Not only in its evidence-based approach to early learning, but actually in what is a very distinctive feature of our New Zealand education system, the bicultural platform, the bilingual framing, and the anticipation that this will form the whāriki for our increasingly multicultural and shared future.

So I am just so delighted today that we have this document and of course that it incorporates, in a really physical way, the bicultural approach that we are taking to Te Whāriki. It reflects the fact that this curriculum is built off tikanga, is built off the rich, deep well of Māori and iwi cultural experience, and incorporates all those features of who we are in our multiple diversity in the ancestries that we enjoy, and how we bring those forward into our present and provide for our future. I know that very technical things such as the reduction in the number of outcomes to be far more crisp and what it is we are expecting. I know that we are still providing for the social and cultural identity of our young people, but also looking at stronger links with The New Zealand Curriculum and Te Marautanga and how the cognitive development of the child continues in that totally integrated way.

I’m very aware that there are diverse choices that parents, family, and whānau make about what they want for their children and that Te Whāriki anticipates, reflects, and supports that diversity. So thank you all very much from the original conceivers, writers, those who have gone on to develop and implement it. The practitioners who have given their feedback about how this can be improved. Those who know what the link is with those curriculum as our kids go on into the more formal education setting. I have been the beneficiary of a mother committed to all the best qualities of early learning and a mother who was an early adopter of child-centred early learning, play-based approaches to development, and of course when kōhanga reo was first conceived of and introduced into our dialect, really, of what is available.

So, I very much want to acknowledge the National Trust of the Kōhanga Reo specifically, as well as all those others who have contributed. I look forward to seeing this have greater effect on our youngest learners and how this connects to our Communities of Learning, our Kāhui Ako, our new operationally based approach to ensuring that every child is the centre of their own pathway and have the opportunity to be supported in the practice of their personal rangatiratanga.

Nō reira e hika mā, tēnei te mihi ki a koutou katoa e waha nei, e hanga nei tēnei kaupapa ātaahu.

Ngā mihi

The metaphor of the whāriki, with its principles | kaupapa whakahaere and strands | whakahirahira was provided by Tamati and Tilly Reedy, who drew upon traditional Māori concepts that had shaped the kaupapa of ngā kōhanga reo.

Helen and Margaret worked across the diverse early childhood education sector to achieve broad commitment to this framing and philosophy. They developed guidelines for practice that was empowering and inclusive.

Te Whāriki was published in draft in 1993 and was regarded as innovative and world leading. The Ministry of Education subsequently adapted this draft and published a final version in 1996. This version has shaped early childhood education practice in Aotearoa for over 20 years.

Watch Lady Tilly Te Koingo Reedy give a short speech about the foundations of the original Te Whāriki document. She talks about positioning the child at the centre of the curriculum within a cultural and social context.