💬 Week 5: Collaboration & Communication
Students refine their messages, practice their presentations, and engage with whānau and community partners to prepare for the final action day.
Focus Question
How can we effectively communicate our findings and call others to action?
Ngā Mahi - Week 5 Activities
1. Rehearsal & Feedback (20 mins)
Activity: Practice the 3-minute presentation in pairs using Feedback Slips.
- Model: Teacher demonstrates a 3-part talk using a sample poster
- Partner Check: Does the talk include data and a clear CTA?
- Identify one "Glow" (strength) and one "Grow" (next step)
2. Polishing & Rubrics (20 mins)
Activity: Finalize posters and presentations using standardised rubrics.
- Use the Poster Rubric to check layout and content
- Review the Oral Rubric for voice and eye contact
- Check: Is there one data point and one community quote included?
3. Community Outreach (15 mins)
Activity: Prepare invitations for whānau and community partners.
- Complete the Whānau Invite/Permission forms
- Discuss: "Who else should we invite? (Local iwi, council, neighbours?)"
- Briefly present to the class for final volunteers
4. Media Anchor — Aotearoa New Zealand’s first emissions reduction plan (Ministry for the Environment) (10 mins)
Activity: Use this clip to strengthen community-message framing before final rehearsals.
- Pause and discuss: Which message structure in the clip makes people want to act?
- Transfer task: Revise one line of your 3-minute talk using a stronger call-to-action.
💡 Differentiation Strategies
- Scaffolding: Offer buddy-presenting or trios for support
- Support: Provide sentence stems for the Call to Action
- Extension: Draft a newsletter blurb for the school's weekly update
📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot
🌊 Kaitiakitanga this week — Speaking for the awa, not over it
This week the kaitiakitanga is mana. What this changes: ākonga check their talk for who is speaking — if their message quotes or represents mana whenua, it needs their agreement first, and if it does not, it should say plainly that this is the class's own view. Presenting someone else's position as your own is the thing to avoid, not a detail of style.
Unit-wide success criteria
Assess this week against its own criteria above. The unit-wide criteria live once on the unit overview — they are not repeated here, so nobody marks the week against the wrong list.
Differentiation & Inclusion
Scaffold support: A structured brief for the audience — who they are, what they already believe, what would change their mind. Extension: present to an actual external audience.
ELL / ESOL: Rehearse the presentation in pairs before any group; allow presenting from written notes or a recording.
Inclusion: Communication mode is free — spoken, visual, written, recorded, signed or AAC. The evidence being communicated is what is assessed, not the delivery.
Water guardianship in Aotearoa is simultaneously cultural, legal and scientific — Te Awa Tupua legislation gave the Whanganui River legal personhood, so these are not separate conversations. When ākonga communicate this week, they should be able to say which of the three grounds their argument rests on, because different audiences answer to different ones.
Curriculum alignment
- Science — Ecosystems: Biotic and abiotic factors in ecosystems can affect distribution and abundance of organisms.
- Te Mātaiaho (2025) · Social Sciences · Phase 2 (Years 4–6) · Geography (Knowledge): “People interact with and use places, resources, and environments for personal, social, cultural, and economic reasons.”
- NZC (2007) · Social Studies · Level 3: “Understand how people make decisions about access to and use of resources.”