From the Chair
Kia ora,
Where has this year gone? I hope you aren’t feeling too frazzled and have most of your work and marking under control.
Over the last few months the Council has moved ahead in so many areas, I hope I can capture it all. We have continued our work with external agencies, organisations, industries, companies and those in the education sector. These links have included DDTA, CORE ED, Conferenz, Code Avengers, Interface, Techies in schools, Leatherman, MOTAT, NetSafe, CodeClub, the Primary School Teachers Conference, Te Papa, ‘School Travel’, and obviously teachers and schools. Generally we have initiated contact with these organisations and suggested mutually beneficial ways to work together. I am following up on our work with the other organisations we have established links with, and will work closely with these selected groups to ensure a win-win partnership. Although time-consuming we expect these relationships to pay off for members for example -if you are attending Conferenz don’t forget to ask for your 10% TENZ discount.
As a result of a request from regional chairs, TENZ promotional pens and highlighters have been bought. Look out for these at your next regional and Matanga event.
I am now a member of the organising committee for the Primary Teachers Conference. This conference is a wonderful initiative, designed to be holistic with representatives and speakers from all learning areas. The Conference will be in Wellington on the 15th and 16th of April 2019. Although our TENZ Conference is in 2019 we felt it was important to support this wide ranging primary conference. If you attend – please take photos and write us a report, and/or post something on facebook.
Although it is now rare for the initial teacher education (ITE) providers to meet together, TENZ provides an excellent vehicle which encourages the sharing of resources and knowledge. We hope this will ensure a consistent, unified message across the nation and staff in smaller institutions feel they are not alone in their support for the technology curriculum at the tertiary level. This month digital technologies posters, two kahoot and a game were distributed ITE providers.
I would like to take the opportunity to thank the Council members for all their tireless work behind the scenes.
Like you, we are keen to help technology education flourish in NZ. If you can think of anything we can do to help you, your students or the discipline – please contact us.
Louise Milne (TENZ secretary) has graciously taken over the role of collating all the achievements of TENZ into this newsletter, as I was finding I couldn’t do this fast enough. Please find below an update from the last two months. Thanks Louise – I am grateful and I am sure the members will be too.
Best wishes/ Ngā mihi,
Kerry Lee (Chair of TENZ)
Matanga Project Update
The Matanga project continues to progress. It was advertised in the Education Gazette and the Technology Online newsletter seeking teacher participants. There are currently 83 teachers who have expressed an interest. The final date for this was the 30 September. A meeting has been held with the Academic Dean at the University of Waikato to clarify the opportunity for participants to credit 30 points towards a graduate/postgraduate qualification. This would require enrollment in the appropriate qualification and the submission of an evidence portfolio.
TENZ Conference update
The 2019 Technology Education New Zealand conference will be held from 1 – 3 October. The venue is to be Albany Senior High School, 536 Albany Highway, Albany, Auckland.
The conference theme is TENZ RISE 2019 – Reflect, Innovate, Shine and Educate. The intent is for participant contributions which reflect on current exemplary teacher practice, innovation that is based on current research findings, the opportunity to showcase students’ work and, as an overview, to educate everyone.
We hope to have a call for the submission of workshop outlines and academic papers in early December 2018.
Wendy and Kerry have been loading any useful material they come across onto the facebook page. Feel free to do the same. These links include industry firsts, school projects, interesting innovations and even technology links for Maori language week. The link below is to the Technology Teachers Facebook site and is well worth a look. There is also the opportunity to comment and add to the suggestions and ideas that other members have posted. I hope you all are members but if not, contact the Facebook team and tell them which school you work in. The link is https://www.facebook.com/groups/technoteach
TRCC
Ceri deBoo, Wendy Slatter, Julie McMahon, Iain Cook-Bonney met with Serena Lewis and Estea Fuli in Dunedin for a very productive Teacher Refresher Course coordinators meeting earlier this month. Planning for the potential Digital Technologies and Coding course was a key focus of this meeting.
Website
Please check the TENZ website and remember to login to your TENZ account to check your membership details and complete your profile. Many changes have been made. Mike is putting in many hours on this and would love to hear your thoughts. If you have any queries or suggestions regarding the website, please contact Mike Forret at [email protected] .
Regions
If you have not received a membership email, please contact Wendy Slatter on [email protected].
Auckland/Northland Region A professional learning day was held with Mindkits, Our Schools, Tyne Crow from the University of Auckland and Treena Brand from Team Solutions. We had a very large turnout and all attendees received a PLD certificate, a link to shared files of slides and the video presented during the day. Please contact Wendy Slatter if you have any queries.
Waikato/Bay of Plenty In Term 4, on the 15 November, a meeting will be combined with a visit to Waikato Valley Chocolates at Horotiu followed by food and drinks at the Cock and Bull. Please contact Steve Andrew on [email protected] if you have any questions or suggestions about future events.
Central Region Central Region TENZ is still looking for a Central host who will offer us a meeting space. If you can host us by offering us a staff-room or technology space to meet, please contact Wendy Slatter either by email or phone her on 021 795 366.
Wellington Region A social event is planned for the 5 or 6 December. Please contact Wendy Slatter if you have any queries.
Southern South Island If you can offer to be a meeting host, please contact Bill Boyes on [email protected] or Wendy.
Northern South Island Region– A social even is planned for the 8 November. Please contact Wendy Slatter either by email or phone her on 021 795 366.
Students – If you have joined under a student membership, our Students’ Regional Chair, Kaelin Jones will be contacting you regarding the change-over from a student membership to an individual or institution (through your school) membership. Thanks to those who have already responded to Kaelin’s email. The process is still ongoing. We look forward to welcoming you to our professional organisation.
Contact Us
We regularly receive emails from members, requesting information or suggesting new directions. We want to build a strong, connected and collaborative technology education community and, to this end, we are keen to hear from you. Please feel free to contact us with any queries, new developments or suggestions you might have, either via our website https://tenz.org.nz/contact or by direct email or phone.
Best wishes
Louise Milne
(Secretary of TENZ)