Kaitiaki Tikanga: You have built your whare. You have declared your rangatiratanga. Now, you must act as a leader. The final step is to give back to the community. Your challenge is to create a taonga that will help others build their own strong whare.
Kaitiaki Toi: This is your masterpiece! Your chance to take everything you have learned and weave it into a beautiful, powerful gift. What story will you tell? How will you capture the hearts and minds of your audience?
Knowledge (Māramatanga)
- Understand the project brief, timeline, and assessment criteria.
- Identify a target audience and a specific well-being need to address.
- Recognise the different roles required for a successful group project.
Skills (Pūkenga)
- Collaboratively brainstorm and select a project idea.
- Form a group and assign roles and responsibilities.
- Begin to create a project plan with clear, actionable steps.
Values (Wairuatanga)
- Embrace the role of a teacher and a kaitiaki for others.
- Value the process of collaborative design and creation.
- Take ownership of a significant, long-term project.
Media Anchor | Watch & Discuss (10 minutes)
Video Anchor: Intro to Large Language Models
Use this source as technical context before teams scope their Digital Kaitiaki Challenge projects.
- Which project idea solves a real community issue rather than just showcasing tech features?
- What evidence will your team collect to prove your solution is working?
Whakatūwhera | The Challenge is Issued (20 minutes)
Main Activity: Unpacking the Brief
- The Launch (10 mins): The teacher formally introduces the "Digital Kaitiaki Challenge." They read the project mission: "Your mission is to work in a whānau group to design and prototype a 'digital taonga' that helps a specific audience strengthen one of the four walls of their digital whare."
- Rubric Review (10 mins): The teacher hands out the 'Project Brief & Rubric' and goes through the four key assessment areas (Hauora-Centred Design, Systems Thinking, Whakawhanaungatanga, Cultural Storytelling). This ensures students know exactly what is expected from the very beginning.
Main Learning | Forming the Whānau Groups (35 minutes)
Main Activity: The Planning Workshop
- Group Formation (5 mins): Students form their whānau groups of 3-4.
- Brainstorming (15 mins): Using the 'Project Planning Template', groups work through the initial brainstorming questions:
- Which of the four `taha` (walls) will we focus on?
- Who is our target audience? (e.g., younger students, parents, peers)
- What kind of digital taonga will we create? (e.g., a video, a quiz, a poster series, a simple game)
- Role Assignment (10 mins): Groups discuss and assign roles based on their strengths (e.g., Project Manager, Lead Designer, Tech Specialist, Lead Storyteller). They write these on their planning template.
- Initial Sketch (5 mins): Each group creates a very rough first sketch or mind map of their idea.
Consolidation | Declaration of Intent (15 minutes)
Main Activity: Pitching the Plan
- Group Pitches (15 mins): Each whānau group gives a 1-minute "pitch" to the class, declaring their chosen `taha`, their audience, and their basic project idea. This creates accountability and allows for early feedback.
Whakakapi | The Work Begins (5 minutes)
Main Activity: Final Instructions
- The teacher concludes: "The challenge has been accepted. Your plans are sound. The next lesson will be a full workshop. Come prepared to build, to create, to weave your taonga. Your kaiako mentors will be available for consultation. Mauri ora!"
📋 Teacher Planning Snapshot
Ngā Whāinga Ako — Learning Intentions
Students will engage with this resource to explore digital kaitiakitanga — applying tikanga Māori principles of guardianship, manaakitanga, and whanaungatanga to their digital lives, spaces, and technologies.
Ngā Paearu Angitū — Success Criteria
- ✅ Students can explain how kaitiakitanga applies to digital environments and online communities.
- ✅ Students can connect tikanga Māori values to ethical decision-making in digital contexts.
Differentiation & Inclusion
Scaffold support: Provide sentence starters and visual frameworks to scaffold access at the entry level. Offer extension tasks that deepen ethical analysis — for example, comparing digital tikanga principles to international AI ethics frameworks.
ELL / ESOL: Pre-teach key kupu (kaitiakitanga, manaakitanga, whanaungatanga, tikanga) with bilingual glossaries. Allow students to express ideas in their home language first before translating to English.
Inclusion: Chunk tasks and provide clear visual instructions. Neurodiverse learners benefit from structured choice in how they demonstrate understanding (e.g., verbal, written, or visual). Affirm diverse digital experiences as valid starting points.
Mātauranga Māori lens: Digital kaitiakitanga frames technology through Te Ao Māori — our digital spaces are extensions of our marae, our data is part of our whakapapa, and our online behaviour reflects our mana. Tikanga Māori provides a powerful ethical compass for navigating the digital world.
Prior knowledge: No specialist digital technology knowledge required for entry-level engagement. Best used after introductory lessons on tikanga Māori or as part of a digital technologies unit.
Curriculum alignment
- Te Mātaiaho (2025) · Technology · Phase 4 (Years 9–10) · Design, Make, and Innovate (Knowledge): “Intelligent systems (e.g. AI) use data and algorithms to make predictions or decisions”
- NZC (2007) · Technology · Level 4: “Understand how technological development expands human possibilities and how technology draws on knowledge from a wide range of disciplines.”