You can contact LEARNZ, part of CORE Education, at:
Postal Address:
PO Box 13 678,
Christchurch 8141,
New Zealand
Testimonials
ShakeOut
The field trip allowed children to think deeply about emergencies, which was relevant to what we were learning in class about preparing an emergency plan. It was real life experiences from children to children which was great and the children were engaged because it was with other learners at their level.
Leigh Kaye from Frimley School
It was good to have a child's perspective in the videos and background pages were good science information. The field trip enabled and empowered students to have an understanding of others' experiences and the impact these experiences have on themselves and the world in which they live.
Debbie Purves from Te Whanau o Waitangi
The field trip connected the students to issues about earthquakes in a practical way. It was also great to connect with children who have been in earthquakes - this gave a realism and reality to the trip. Andrew (the LEARNZ Teacher) is marvellous - he really helps to ignite curiosity in the students.
Jennifer Kitchin from Weston School
The field trip was a great lead in to the Shake Out drill earlier today and complimented our topic on civil defence. Related well to Science - Natural disasters as well as civil defence and emergency management.
Brenda Town from Town Family Home School
The kids thought it was a cool way to learn and they also said that the Shakeout drill now made a lot more sense i.e. why we do it. We found that the variety of different ways the information was presented made it interesting and accessible for all levels.
Judy Edwards from Waterlea Public School
The content was very appropriate as they were able to relate it to their own experiences, having experienced a 5.8 earthquake the night before. The audioconference was an excellent opportunity to focus on asking quality questions with a purpose and to interact with experts.
Keryl Lee-Kelleher from Makuri School
Brilliant! It was my first time but it was a great way to get detailed information from an expert, live. The children in my class were asking loads of questions relating to answers given, which gave them lots of things to think about! The field trip related to "Participating and Contributing", as all my children got involved in thinking about their own emergency kits and some said they needed to get one.
Melanie McLennan from Somerville Intermediate School
It helped with critical thinking, managing personal plans and responsibility in a disaster. A great way to have a different teaching medium with other experts to answer questions and supply information.
Timothy Crawshaw from Newtown School
Resiliance was a key idea we discussed, as were some of the key competencies and their application in real life situation. Right level, good content.
Jeremy Meadows from Woodhill School
Great to follow this field trip while preparing for Shake Out on Thursday. Engaging way of learning for students. Lots of great information given and the opportunity to ask questions of experts.
Deirdre Hutton from Holy Family School Wanaka
We think this (field trip) was very effective as we are much wiser about what we need to do at school and at home, to be prepared during and after an earthquake. LEARNZ is a remarkable online learning community which allowed us to get information on earthquakes from schoolchildren, parents and teachers.
Susan Hodge from Elm Park School
We used this across the school - very appropriate. It linked well with the main ShakeOut event, managing selves, and collaboration.
Nicola Stevenson from Worser Bay School
Very appropriate - supported student learning about earthquakes and doing the ShakeOut drill. Interesting, motivating and flexible - students get a lot from having readings, videos, audioconferences, activities, and photos.
Jan Flannery from Masterton Primary School
Very relevant for year 7 students. I really like the audio voice over which has allowed the lower reading level students to work with a lot of independence, without having to wait for the teacher to say the word / discuss the word / explain context etc.
Kersty Millar from Reporoa College
My Yr 5&6 class were very engaged with this field trip. The information was easy to access for the students who find reading difficult (great to have an NZ voice reading the background pages), but there was enough for my high achieving students as well. The live audio conferences were very useful - next time we will definitely put ourselves down for a speaking school role!
Melinda Bolton from Paerata School
We used the videos and some background pages for discussions.
Jennifer Barrow from Kaniere School
Kea
Term one we studied ' Birds of NZ' - this field trip gave us the chance to revisit knowledge and add to it. Students felt actively involved. It also links well to the values, key competencies, learning areas, and principles of NZC
Helen Gibson from Hilltop School
This trip was most effective in supporting the theme of 'Kaitiakitanga' for my Year 4 class. The programme supports modern learning approaches very well and combined fabulously with SOLO. The children all loved it and it has really inspired them to want to learn - they were keen to get on the computers each morning to catch up with the latest happenings.
Pamela McDowell from Westbrook School
It inspired the children to wonder more deeply about the topic and made it 'real' for them going on the field trip. As a first-time user I received fantastic support to have my class connect with Shelly and the scientist to have our questions answered - the whole class was extremely excited about this.
Elizabeth Faithful from St Clair School
The children learned lots and looked forward each day to seeing and hearing what had happened - kind of like the next chapter in a book! The trip was really well planned and organised and supported the children through the inquiry process fabulously. It ticked all the boxes and more. Thanks.
Lesley Johnston from Firth School
My students learned heaps about kea and the amazing people working with them. Students love these virtual field trips which provide for different levels of learning at the same time. We asked questions, did shared and independent reading, did shared and independent topic writing, art, technology, poetry and incorporated measurement and mapwork into this study topic.
Martie Andrew from Awakeri School
We used a lot of the information from your field trip for our current unit about developing an enrichment toy for an animal at the zoo, as the Hamilton Zoo has keas to entertain. One comment was: 'This was the most fun research we have ever done!' The kids loved the videos and quizzes and we especially liked the listening option of the background pages for our low readers.
Sabine Hartmann from Karangahake School
Hugely effective in that everything we wanted the students to do was covered by you in an engaging and motivating way. We covered most areas of the curriculum, as well as fostered a new understanding of what 'virtual' actually means!
Jacqueline Barrett from Westbrook School
Awesome field trip - students loved the videos, taking part in the audio conference etc. Really like how the background reading pages have an audio file - great for my ESOL students and for supporting students at different reading levels.
Emma Watts from Remarkables Primary School
Found the SOLO based questions for the videos useful for guiding students, really helping slow starters and students less engaged in science. The activities and quizes were also useful for year 10 science.
Lucy Meagher from Havelock North High School