Te Reo Māori as a Subject: The Impact of Language Ideology, Language Practice, and Language Management on Secondary School Students’ Decision Making

Abstract

Te reo Māori, the Indigenous language of Aotearoa (New Zealand), remains ‘endangered’ despite concentrated ongoing efforts to reverse declining numbers of speakers. Most of these efforts have focused on te reo Māori immersion education settings as these were considered the most effective means to ensure the survival of the language (May & Hill, 2008). More recently, the home has been identified as an important setting for language regeneration (Te Puni Kokiri, 2011). Despite the fact that the vast majority of secondary school-aged students (both Māori and non-Māori) attend English-medium schools, these settings are seldom considered as having potential to increase numbers of te reo Māori speakers. This article reports findings from a case study of one English-medium secondary school where factors surrounding the uptake of te reo Māori as a subject were investigated. Using Spolsky and Shohamy's (2000) language policy framework as an explanatory lens, it was revealed that even when students’ language ideologies orient them towards learning te reo Māori, language management and practice decisions can discourage rather than encourage this choice.

Learning te Reo Māori via Online Distance Education: A Case Study

“…For these figures to become real rather than aspirational, measures for language regeneration, in addition to those currently in place, must be afforded attention. Jeurissen (2014) argued that English-medium secondary schools be considered fertile ground for regeneration, not least because of sheer numbers: according to 2011 roll return data for years 7 to 13, the number of Māori students in bilingual/immersion schools was 5.4%, with the other 94.6% of Māori students attending English-medium schools (Ministry of Education, 2015). Although the number of Māori students attending English-medium schools is high, fluent teachers of te reo are scarce.…”

“…Table 1 displays relevant details for the students, all of whom were 15-16 years old. Most of these students were participants in a previous study that investigated factors relating to the uptake of te reo Māori as a subject in an English-medium secondary school (Jeurissen, 2014). They were interviewed as year 10 students because they were considering studying te reo Māori in year 11.…”

“…Despite this, the girls found the level of language in the online course challenging. Whilst this could be viewed as a problem with the course, data from the previous study (Jeurissen, 2014) signalled that the number of hours instruction that students had received in te reo Māori before year 11 was insufficient. Moreover, one of the students in the current study, Sarah, had not taken te reo in year 10 at all.…”

“…In 2012 this was the case for approximately 430 students throughout New Zealand (Ministry of Education, 2014). These students included six from one school that was the site of a previous study that investigated factors relating to the uptake of te reo Māori as a subject (Jeurissen, 2014). These six students, who were to some extent motivated to learn te reo Māori as an outcome of being participants in the previous study, chose this language option because there was no teacher available to teach National Certificate of Educational Achievement (NCEA) level one at their school.…”

Towards an Indigenous Transdisciplinarity

“…Concerted pushback against these colonising influences was initiated in the mid 1970s with the revival of the Māori language. This was followed by efforts to decolonise state education in the 1980s and disciplinary science in the late 1990s [14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21].…”