Lesson 4: Te Ture me te Whakatau

Ngā Whāinga Ako — Learning Intentions

Students will engage with this resource to develop te whakaaro māramatanga — critical and analytical thinking skills — examining claims, evaluating evidence, identifying bias, and constructing reasoned arguments. This unit frames critical thinking through both Western analytical traditions and the kōrero-based reasoning of Te Ao Māori.

Ngā Paearu Angitū — Success Criteria

• ✅ Students can identify a claim, evaluate the evidence supporting it, and detect potential bias or fallacy.
• ✅ Students can construct a reasoned argument using evidence, acknowledging counter-perspectives.

Differentiation & Inclusion

Scaffold support: Provide argument frames (claim → evidence → reasoning → counter-argument) for entry-level access. Use structured controversy activities where students argue assigned positions. Offer extension tasks requiring students to analyse a real media article or policy document using the lesson's critical framework.

ELL / ESOL: Pre-teach argumentative language structures ("I argue that…", "The evidence suggests…", "However, one might counter…"). Allow oral argument as a first step before written production. Sentence frames and argument maps lower the language barrier while maintaining cognitive demand.

Inclusion: Structured debate and discussion formats benefit all learners — particularly neurodiverse students who thrive with explicit rules and clear roles. Affirm that disagreement done respectfully is a high-value academic and civic skill. Allow quiet processing time before group discussion. Offer written alternatives for students who find oral argument challenging.

Mātauranga Māori lens: Te whakaaro māramatanga — enlightened thinking — reflects a long tradition of reasoned debate in Te Ao Māori. The whare (meeting house) is a place of kōrero, where multiple perspectives are heard before decisions are made. Tikanga requires that arguments be made with integrity and respect (mana). Māori oratory (whaikōrero) is a sophisticated critical tradition — whakataukī encode compressed wisdom that often challenges surface-level thinking.

Prior knowledge: Best used within a sequence building critical thinking skills progressively. No specialist knowledge required for entry-level engagement with structured tasks.