Te Atatū Intermediate - Amber Aratema

Name: Amber Aratema

School: Te Atatū Intermediate 

Programme: Te Taiao: Pūtaiao in Action in Te Atatū Peninsula

Region: Auckland

Host: Dion Pou Ecologist - Te Atatū Marae Whānau

Te Atatū Intermediate values the importance of science in today’s society and the need to develop students' science knowledge and skills. Participating in the Science Teaching Leadership Programme will allow the school to further enhance its science programme and lift the engagement of science across the whole school. Te Atatū Intermediate wants to engage students in authentic local curriculum contexts and help them to become scientifically literate. The school is located a short walk away from Orangihina (Harbourview). It is important students learn about this ecologically significant wetland and how they can take action as kaitiaki to protect it. The Science Teaching Leadership Programme will allow Amber to engage her school community in learning more about the natural world around them, the Nature of Science and mātauranga Māori from the connections and experiences she will gain through her placement ‘Te Taiao: Pūtaiao in Action in Te Atatū Peninsula’. 

Amber has a BSc (Hons) degree in Zoology and has been teaching science for over twenty years. She has taught science across the age ranges from year 7 to year 11 and Biology up to year 13 in the UK and New Zealand. She has been the Science Specialist teacher at Te Atatū Intermediate for the last eight years. Amber values the importance of the Nature of Science and mātauranga Māori in science teaching and learning and is looking forward to developing her knowledge further in these areas. 

Amber’s placement ‘Te Taiao: Pūtaiao in Action, Te Atatū Peninsula’ will have her working alongside ecologist, Dion Pou, from Te Atatū Marae Whānau. She will learn about the ecological research and monitoring happening in Te Atatū Peninsula and how mātauranga Māori can inform the application of science. She will experience the Nature of Science in action in her school's local area, with the possibility of field surveys in Northland, the Coromandel Peninsula and the wider Waitemata. 

The overarching project Amber will be involved with is the generation of place-based networks of monitoring and research, as well as education and engagement based on the foundational Te Ao Māori principles of whakapapa and place. The focus is therefore the application and integration of science projects within a place-based context. This will involve a range of science and citizen science projects (including Urban Tuna abundance and distribution research, Chenier research, Water testing, Marine benthic monitoring, Bird monitoring and pest monitoring and control). A programme of environmental observation and record-keeping, set against traditional seasonal and temporal markers, will also be undertaken simultaneously with the monitoring, citizen science, and research work. Taken altogether, as a single body of work, this will be used to develop local maramataka. Finally, this body of work will be informed by, and populated with, traditional and contemporary Māori korero such as Matariki.

Through Amber’s placement, she will gain a much deeper understanding of the Nature of Science and mātauranga Māori and she is looking forward to taking her learning back from the Science Teaching Leadership Programme and enhancing the teaching and learning of science at Te Atatū Intermediate.