📚 Unit Plans → 🌍 Global Indigenous Solidarity: Senior Inquiry
Years 11–13 Tikanga-ā-Iwi / Social Sciences

Global Indigenous Solidarity: Senior Inquiry

Indigenous peoples represent less than 5% of the global population but hold tenure rights over roughly a quarter of the world's land, intersecting about 40% of its remaining intact ecosystems (Garnett et al., 2018). This unit examines how Indigenous knowledge offers evidence-based solutions to climate change, inequality and justice.

Two routes, one kaupapa: this is the senior (Years 11–13) route. Teaching Years 9–10? The junior route applies the same indigenous-solidarity inquiry at Level 4–5 demand: Māramatanga ā-Ao — Global Indigenous Solidarity →

Indigenous Knowledge as Global Solution

Indigenous peoples represent less than 5% of the global population but hold tenure rights over an estimated 38 million km² of land across 87 countries — more than a quarter of the world's land surface, intersecting about 40% of its remaining protected and ecologically intact landscapes (Garnett et al., Nature Sustainability, 2018). This unit examines how Indigenous knowledge offers real, evidence-based solutions to climate change, inequality, and justice — and, in Lesson 4, why the widely-repeated "80% of biodiversity" claim does not hold up to scrutiny.

"He waka eke noa"

We are all in this together.

Unit Modules

1

Indigenous Worldviews

Shared values, diverse expressions. Relationality and reciprocity across cultures.

Values Protocols
2

Global Colonialism

Analysing colonialism as a global system. Patterns of dispossession and extraction.

History Systems
3

Resistance Networks

From AIM to Idle No More. Building transnational solidarity movements.

Activism Solidarity
4

Climate Justice

Indigenous leadership in the climate crisis. Traditional ecological knowledge in action.

Climate Science
5

Building Solidarity

Turning shared analysis into shared action across borders.

Action Alliance
6

Narrative Power

Who tells the story, and what that does to whose account is believed.

Media Voice
7

UNDRIP in Action

Rights, responsibilities, and the global legal frameworks protecting Indigenous mana.

Law Rights

Global Framework

Global Analysis

  • Comparative Studies: Identifying patterns.
  • Network Analysis: Mapping connections.

Cross-Curricular

  • Geography: Land rights.
  • Science: Eco-knowledge.

Contemporary

  • Climate: Protection.
  • Tech: Digital sovereignty.

Related Handouts & Worksheets

Curriculum alignment

  • The New Zealand Curriculum (2007) · Social Studies · Level 8 (Years 12–13): “Understand how ideologies shape society and that individuals and groups respond differently to these beliefs.”
  • And: “Understand how policy changes are influenced by and impact on the rights, roles, and responsibilities of individuals and communities.”
  • 🪤 Te Mātaiaho (2025) ends at Phase 4 (Years 9–10), so it provides no anchor at Years 11–13 — NZC 2007 is the applicable framework here.

📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot

Ngā Whāinga Ako — Learning Intentions

Students will investigate global indigenous solidarity movements through a historical lens, using whakapapa of resistance to trace how communities have organised across borders to assert tino rangatiratanga and mana motuhake. This unit connects Aotearoa's struggle for sovereignty to broader international movements for indigenous rights and decolonisation.

Ngā Paearu Angitū — Success Criteria

  • ✅ I can analyse and compare perspectives from multiple indigenous resistance movements globally.
  • ✅ I can explain how solidarity across difference has strengthened indigenous rights campaigns.
  • ✅ I can evaluate the significance of international indigenous solidarity for Aotearoa New Zealand.

Differentiation & Inclusion

Scaffold support: Provide graphic organisers for comparing movements. Entry-level tasks focus on identifying key events; extension tasks require evaluating the effectiveness of solidarity strategies and writing a persuasive historical argument.

ELL / ESOL: Pre-teach key historical terms (sovereignty, solidarity, colonisation, decolonisation). Provide bilingual glossaries where available; allow discussion in home language first.

Inclusion: Use structured note-taking templates and chunked readings. Neurodiverse learners benefit from visual timelines and choice in how they demonstrate understanding — oral, visual, or written formats all valid. Ensure content is presented sensitively given the potential for personal connection to histories of dispossession.

Mātauranga Māori lens: Centre whakapapa as a methodology — tracing the genealogy of resistance ideas across cultures and time. Frame the hīkoi as both a political act and a cultural expression of rangatiratanga. Connect to the whakataukī: "He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata."

Prior knowledge: Best used after foundational study of colonisation and the Treaty of Waitangi. Familiarity with basic historical inquiry skills is recommended.

📊 Assessment Framework

Formative Assessment

  • Lesson 1 (Indigenous Worldviews): Can students identify and compare at least two indigenous knowledge systems (e.g., mātauranga Māori, Aboriginal Dreaming, Lakota cosmology) and articulate how each frames the relationship between people and place? Assessed through the worldview comparison graphic organiser.
  • Lesson 2 (Colonialism as a Global System): Can students explain colonisation as a system of power rather than a series of events, and identify patterns across at least three colonised contexts? Assessed through the systems-of-power annotated diagram and class discussion.
  • Lessons 3–4 (Resistance Networks & Climate Justice): Can students trace how indigenous resistance movements have connected across borders, and evaluate the effectiveness of indigenous-led climate justice campaigns? Assessed through the resistance timeline and case-study comparison.

Summative Assessment

Solidarity & UNDRIP Analysis (Lessons 5–7): Students build toward a culminating inquiry connecting global indigenous solidarity to Aotearoa. The capstone has two deliverables:

  • Analytical Essay or Presentation: Evaluate the significance of international indigenous solidarity for Aotearoa New Zealand, using evidence from at least three movements studied. Must engage with UNDRIP as a framework and assess its practical impact on indigenous rights in at least two national contexts.
  • Solidarity Strategy Proposal: Design a contemporary solidarity action connecting a local Māori rights issue to global indigenous networks, drawing on the strategies analysed in the unit (legal advocacy, protest, narrative power, climate action). Justify the approach with historical evidence.
🚀 Extension Activities
Entry-level: Solidarity Timeline

Create a visual timeline of key moments in global indigenous solidarity from the 1970s to the present, using events from at least three countries studied in the unit. Annotate each event with who was involved and what they were fighting for. Deliverable: An illustrated timeline poster or digital infographic with at least 8 annotated events.

Developing: UNDRIP Country Comparison

Research how two countries have implemented (or resisted implementing) the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Compare their approaches, examining what factors enable or block implementation. Connect findings to Lesson 7's analysis of UNDRIP in action. Deliverable: A structured comparison report with evidence from government policy, indigenous advocacy organisations, and media sources.

Mastery: Narrative Power Documentary Pitch

Drawing on Lesson 6's exploration of narrative power, develop a documentary pitch that tells the story of an indigenous solidarity movement not covered in the unit. Research the historical context, key figures, strategies, and outcomes. Analyse how the movement's narrative has been shaped by media and by the communities themselves. Deliverable: A written documentary treatment (800–1200 words) with a storyboard of 6–8 key scenes, including primary source evidence and a critical reflection on whose voices are centred.

🔗 Unit Progression & Next Steps

Students progress from understanding indigenous worldviews to analysing global systems of power and resistance, and finally to evaluating contemporary solidarity mechanisms:

  • 📖 Lesson 1: Indigenous Worldviews — Explore diverse indigenous knowledge systems and how they frame relationships between people, land, and community. Establish the conceptual foundation for understanding what solidarity is built upon.
  • 📖 Lesson 2: Colonialism as a Global System — Analyse colonisation as a system of power with common patterns across contexts. Examine how colonialism disrupted indigenous governance, language, and connection to whenua.
  • 📖 Lesson 3: Resistance Networks — Trace how indigenous communities have organised across national borders to resist colonisation and assert sovereignty, from pan-Māori movements to international indigenous congresses.
  • 📖 Lesson 4: Climate Justice Leadership — Investigate indigenous-led climate justice campaigns and evaluate how environmental advocacy has become a site of global indigenous solidarity.
  • 📖 Lesson 5: Building Solidarity — Analyse the strategies and challenges of building solidarity across cultural, linguistic, and geographic difference. Examine what makes solidarity effective and what risks co-option.
  • 📖 Lesson 6: Narrative Power — Explore how indigenous movements use storytelling, media, and cultural expression to challenge dominant narratives and build public support for rights and sovereignty.
  • 📖 Lesson 7: UNDRIP in Action — Evaluate the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a framework — its achievements, limitations, and the gap between declaration and implementation across different countries.

Bridge: This unit prepares students for deeper engagement with contemporary issues of sovereignty, environmental justice, and political activism — connecting naturally to units on civic action, Treaty co-governance, or the emerging politics of climate adaptation.

Pedagogical Foundations | Ngā Tūāpou Akoranga

Global indigenous solidarity is not sentiment — it is a political, legal, and epistemological movement connecting indigenous peoples across vastly different contexts. Three researchers explain why this unit’s approach is rigorously theoretical, not merely humanistic.

Decolonising Research
Linda Tuhiwai Smith
Smith’s decolonising methodologies framework provides the analytical backbone for understanding what indigenous solidarity actually means as a political project. Solidarity is not pity or alliance from outside; it is the recognition of shared structural conditions (dispossession, knowledge suppression, legal exclusion) across different colonised contexts. Students who have read Smith can analyse indigenous rights movements in Australia, Canada, or Bolivia through the same lens they apply to Aotearoa.
Critical Pedagogy
Paulo Freire
Freire’s concept of the oppressed as the subjects of their own liberation — not the objects of others’ charity — is the distinction between solidarity and saviorism that this unit must navigate. Students learn to analyse indigenous rights movements from within their own logic and demands, not from the perspective of external evaluators of their validity. The critical lens is applied to every actor in the story, including those presenting themselves as allies.
Kaupapa Māori
Graham Smith
Smith’s work on Kaupapa Māori as a political project — not just an educational framework — situates Aotearoa’s indigenous rights movement within the global context this unit examines. His framework gives students in this unit a grounded local case from which to read outward: if you understand what tino rangatiratanga demands and why, you understand what Ngarrindjeri sovereignty demands and what Lakota treaty rights demand, because the underlying structure is the same.

→ Explore all theorists at Te Whare Ako — Teaching Theory