Evaluate primary and secondary sources and explain how a source's origin shapes the perspective it records — and the gaps it leaves behind.
- A Distinguish between primary and secondary sources and give a correct example of each from NZ history.
- A Identify one piece of evidence that supports a perspective I am studying for my internal.
- M Explain how the author's identity and context shapes what a source tells us — and critically, what it leaves out.
- M Apply the SOAPSTONE framework to analyse one primary source in depth, identifying purpose, speaker, and tone.
- E WHAKAHŌHONU: Explain why over-reliance on official written records distorts our picture of historical perspectives, using a specific NZ example to show why oral sources and under-represented voices matter.
Lesson 2: Types of Evidence — Ngā Tūāhuatanga
Who wrote the record — and whose voice is missing from it?
Ngā rauemi — Resources for this lesson:
📄 Source Sorting Cards — 12 cards (print 1 set per group of 3) 📄 SOAPSTONE Worksheet (1 per student) 📄 PEE Graphic Organiser (already distributed in Lesson 1)Whakatūwhera — Cultural Opening 5 min
In te ao Māori, knowledge was carried through kōrero tuku iho — spoken narratives handed down through generations. For most of human history, including Māori history in Aotearoa, the most important knowledge was not written on paper. It was encoded in waiata, whaikōrero, and the memories of tohunga and kaumātua. These oral sources are just as valid as any government document — yet they rarely appeared in older textbooks, and are still under-represented in many archives.
Today we ask a bigger question than "what is the evidence?" We ask: who decided what got written down? Who had access to paper, ink, and power? Whose records were preserved in archives — and whose were burned, ignored, or never created in the first place?
"He kōrero tuku iho, he taonga tuku iho."
Pronunciation: [hɛ kɔːrɛrɔ tuku ihɔ, hɛ taɔŋa tuku ihɔ]
A narrative passed down is a treasure passed down. — The oral record is not less than the written record. It is differently preserved.
Kuputaka — Key Vocabulary 7 min
Students copy these into their history glossary. Practise pronunciation as a class before moving on.
A source created by someone who was directly involved in or witnessed the event — a letter, speech, photograph, official document, diary, or oral testimony from the time. "Ōrite" means original or direct.
A source created later by someone who was not present — a textbook, documentary, academic article, or Wikipedia. Built from primary sources but filtered through the later author's interpretation and context.
The identity, role, time, and purpose of whoever created the source. Who was this person? What did they stand to gain? What did they fear? This shapes every word they chose to write — and every word they chose to omit.
What a source does not say — the voices, events, or perspectives that were excluded, silenced, or never recorded. Excellent students always ask: whose account is absent from this record, and why?
Knowledge transmitted through speech across generations — whaikōrero, waiata, pūrākau. Accepted as legal evidence in NZ courts and Waitangi Tribunal hearings. A legitimate historical source.
Subject · Occasion · Audience · Purpose · Speaker · Tone · Original form. A systematic method used by historians and assessed at NCEA Level 2–3.
He Whakamārama — Primary vs Secondary: The Distinction That Matters
Created at the time of the event, by someone present or directly involved.
- Governor Grey's 1863 proclamation (original government document)
- A soldier's letter from the Waikato to his family in England, 1863
- Wiremu Tāmihana's recorded speech on the Kīngitanga, 1858
- Oral testimony from a Dawn Raids survivor (their lived experience)
- A rangatira's waiata composed in response to land confiscation
- Photographs taken during the 1981 Springbok Tour protests
Created after the event, using primary sources as raw material.
- Your Level 2 History textbook chapter on the NZ Wars
- A 2019 documentary about the 1981 Springbok Tour
- Wikipedia article on the Treaty of Waitangi
- A 2021 academic journal article on Dawn Raids policy
- A Waitangi Tribunal report (1985) — analysis of historical events
- A museum exhibition panel created in 2005
Ngā Mahi — Activities
1Kōmaka — Source Sorting 10 min
In groups of three, receive the Source Sorting Cards. The pack contains 12 sources about the NZ Wars period, including:
- Governor Grey's 1863 memorandum to the Colonial Office
- A settler family's letter from the Waikato, 1863
- Two newspaper articles from settler papers (1863)
- A modern NZ history textbook chapter (2018)
- Wiremu Tāmihana's recorded speech, 1858
- Oral history transcript from a Waikato kaumātua (1987)
- Photographs of confiscated land surveys (1865)
- A Waitangi Tribunal report excerpt (1985)
- A Wikipedia article on the NZ Wars
- A 2010 academic journal article on raupatu
Task: Sort into three piles: Primary / Secondary / Unsure. Then discuss the edge cases as a class. Was Wiremu Tāmihana's speech recorded at the time, or transcribed later? Does that change its status? Why?
2SOAPSTONE — He Tātaritanga Hōhonu 20 min
Using the SOAPSTONE Worksheet, analyse this primary source — Governor Grey's 1863 Proclamation to the Waikato people:
"The Government of New Zealand must now proceed to take into its own hands the whole of the country between the Waikato River and the sea as far north as the Mokau River... The Waikato tribes have committed acts of rebellion against the Queen's authority, and Her Majesty's Government has consequently determined to proceed against them with the forces now at its disposal..."
— Governor George Grey, Proclamation to the Waikato people, 11 July 1863. New Zealand Gazette.
| Letter | Stands for | What to identify and analyse |
|---|---|---|
| S | Subject | What is this document literally about? Summarise in one sentence — not your interpretation, just what it claims. |
| O | Occasion | What was the historical context when this was written? What events had just occurred? (Consider: Kīngitanga movement, 1860 Waitara dispute, rising tension in the Waikato.) |
| A | Audience | Who was the intended reader? (The Waikato people? The Colonial Office in London? Settler newspapers? All three simultaneously?) How does that shape its language? |
| P | Purpose | What did the author want this document to DO? (Justify military action? Issue a legal warning? Demonstrate authority?) Note: there can be more than one purpose. |
| S | Speaker | Who wrote this? What was Governor Grey's role, background, and prior history in NZ? (He had been Governor before, 1845–53, and had signed the first Land Purchase Acts. Why does this matter?) |
| T | Tone | What feeling does the language create? Authoritative? Threatening? Formal? Choose three adjectives and back each up with specific words or phrases from the text. |
| O | Original form | How was this originally published? (New Zealand Gazette = official government publication.) Who would have seen it? Who would NOT have seen it? What does that distribution tell us about its purpose? |
3Ko wai kei te huna? — Whose Silence? 15 min
Teacher-led structured discussion. Students contribute orally and take brief notes in their exercise books. There is no worksheet for this activity — the thinking is the product.
- Who held the pen in 1863? — Who could read and write in English? Who had access to government archives? Who owned and ran newspapers? (Answer: predominantly British Crown officials and educated settler men.) What does that structural fact mean for what got recorded?
- What is missing from our source sorting pack? — Look back at the 12 cards from Activity 1. How many were written by Māori people, in te reo Māori, at the time of the event? (Very few.) Why is that? Is it because Māori had nothing to say — or because their records were not preserved in the same way?
- Kōrero tuku iho as legitimate evidence. — Oral traditions were Māori's primary record-keeping technology. They preserved perspectives on land confiscation, the Treaty, and the NZ Wars in waiata, whaikōrero, and pūrākau. But these were rarely included in textbooks until recent decades. Why? (Answer: power — whose history got taught in state schools?)
- The Waitangi Tribunal as a turning point. — Established 1975, the Tribunal specifically accepts Māori oral testimony and oral evidence about Treaty breaches. For the first time in NZ law, kōrero tuku iho was given legal weight alongside written Crown documents. What does this institutional change tell us about how the very definition of "valid evidence" is not neutral — it is political?
4Whakahōhonu i tō PEE — Strengthening Your Evidence 10 min
Return to your PEE Graphic Organiser from Lesson 1. Find the "Evidence" row for each perspective you began building. Now upgrade each piece of evidence using today's SOAPSTONE thinking.
Before (Achieved level):
"The British Crown wanted to take Māori land."
After (Merit level):
"In a proclamation published in the New Zealand Gazette on 11 July 1863, Governor Grey — acting as the Crown's representative and using the formal language of legal authority — justified military invasion of the Waikato by framing Māori resistance as 'rebellion,' revealing the Crown's perspective that their claim to absolute sovereignty was non-negotiable and that Māori political organisation was inherently incompatible with British law."
The Merit version names the source (who, what, when, where), applies SOAPSTONE analysis (Speaker's role, Purpose), and embeds it in P·E·E structure. From Lesson 2 onwards, never accept vague evidence in student writing — specificity is the single most reliable marker of Merit vs Achieved.
Aromatawai — Formative Assessment 5 min
Exit Ticket (individual)
On a sticky note or the back of the SOAPSTONE worksheet, students write:
- "One primary source I could use in my internal is... It shows [perspective] because..."
- "A gap in the historical record for my event is... This gap exists because..."
Teacher action: Students who cannot complete item 1 need direct help identifying a specific source before the case study lessons. Do not proceed to Lesson 3 without this. A student who has no source has no evidence and cannot reach Merit.
He kitenga — What to Watch For
- Students dismissing sources as "biased" — redirect: "All primary sources reflect a perspective. Bias means deliberate distortion. Our job is to analyse what the source reveals and what it conceals — not to dismiss it."
- Students treating secondary sources as more reliable — clarify: secondary sources are useful summaries but are further from the event and shaped by the historian's own era and values. A 1960s textbook on the NZ Wars is also a historical document.
- Students struggling with SOAPSTONE — reduce to Speaker + Purpose only. These two elements unlock most source analysis at this level. Add other letters in Lessons 3–4 as confidence builds.
He Kōrero mā te Kaiako — Teacher Notes
Activity 2 is the most cognitively demanding in this lesson. If the class is struggling with the Governor Grey text, reduce SOAPSTONE to S·P·T (Subject, Purpose, Tone) — this still produces solid Merit-level analysis. Better to go deep on three letters than surface on seven. SOAPSTONE can be revisited and deepened in each subsequent case study lesson.
Some students will have been taught (implicitly or explicitly) that only written sources "count." Address this directly and plainly: the Waitangi Tribunal and NZ High Courts accept oral evidence. Te reo Māori kōrero tuku iho has legal standing. This is not a cultural concession — it is recognition that the written archive was never neutral or complete.
Rather than banning Wikipedia, teach students to use it as a finding tool: scroll to the References section, click through to cited sources, and evaluate those. This is a genuine research skill. If a student's only source is Wikipedia, prompt: "What is Wikipedia's source for this claim? Can you find that original document?"
Level 2 History marking schedules reward students who name specific sources: "In [source], [group/author] stated..." Students who write "There is evidence that..." without a specific citation cannot exceed Achieved. From Lesson 2 onwards, build the habit of source specificity in every PEE paragraph — it must become automatic before the internal.
Hononga ki te Kāinga — Whānau Connection
Ask someone at home: "Do you know any stories from our whānau about [a historical event — the NZ Wars, the Dawn Raids, the Springbok Tour, or coming to Aotearoa]? Were those stories written down, or were they passed on verbally? Why do you think that is?"
Many students' whānau carry oral histories that are genuine primary sources. These conversations validate kōrero tuku iho as evidence and often produce powerful personal connections to the case studies in Lessons 3–6. Students who bring properly attributed whānau oral history into their assessments are demonstrating Excellence-level historical thinking about source types.
Whakaaro — Reflection
Every source is both a window and a wall. It opens a view onto one part of the past — the part the author could see, or chose to show. It also blocks our view of everything outside that frame. Being a historian means asking simultaneously: what is this source showing me, and what is it hiding from me? Who wrote it, and what did they gain or lose by framing it this way?
In Aotearoa, this question carries particular urgency. For most of NZ's written history, Māori perspectives were documented by others — by missionaries, government officials, and journalists who had their own purposes. The project of recovering and centring Māori voices is ongoing, and it is part of what makes NZ history distinctive and essential to study with care and honesty.
📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot
Ngā Whāinga Ako — Learning Intentions
Students will engage with this resource to develop NCEA Level 2 historical thinking skills — examining how and why different groups held distinct perspectives on significant events in Aotearoa New Zealand's past, and constructing analytical essays using the PEE (Point–Evidence–Explanation) framework.
Ngā Paearu Angitū — Success Criteria
- ✅ Students can identify the values, beliefs, and circumstances that shaped the perspectives of different historical groups.
- ✅ Students can construct a well-evidenced analytical essay that moves beyond description to explain why perspectives were irreconcilable.
Differentiation & Inclusion
Scaffold support: Provide PEE sentence frames and perspective analysis templates for entry-level access. Students new to historical essay writing benefit from annotated exemplars showing the difference between describing and explaining a perspective. Extend capable writers by asking them to explain the enduring significance of the perspective clash — why does it still shape Aotearoa today?
ELL / ESOL: Pre-teach key historical vocabulary (perspective, corroboration, reliability, significance, agency) with visual glossaries. Allow oral explanation of perspective analysis before written essay drafts. Sentence starters and argument frames lower the language barrier without reducing the historical thinking demand.
Inclusion: Essay writing is cognitively demanding — chunk the process across multiple sessions with formative checkpoints. Neurodiverse learners benefit from explicit essay structure guides and colour-coded paragraph planning. Oral history discussion forums are a valid alternative assessment pathway for students who need them.
Mātauranga Māori lens: This achievement standard centres events where Māori perspectives have historically been marginalised or misrepresented. Placing tangata whenua perspectives as the primary lens — not as "the other side" — is an act of historical justice. Whakapapa provides a framework for understanding why events like the NZ Wars, land confiscations, and the Dawn Raids were not isolated incidents but linked expressions of colonial power. Tino rangatiratanga and mana motuhake frame what was at stake. Students develop empathy and critical historical consciousness together.
Prior knowledge: Students should have foundational knowledge of the relevant historical events (NZ Wars, Treaty of Waitangi, Dawn Raids, or other case study). Familiarity with the PEE structure supports engagement with essay-focused resources.
Curriculum alignment
- NCEA Level 2 History · (5 credits): “Interpret different perspectives of people in an historical event that is of significance to New Zealanders”