You can contact LEARNZ, part of CORE Education, at:
Postal Address:
PO Box 13 678,
Christchurch 8141,
New Zealand

Resources that we used were excellent, thought provoking and have my whole class sold on taking care of kauri. Teaching kit very helpful, well thought out, age appropriate.
It has benefited all akonga (that includes me). We knew nothing about kauri dieback disease until this field trip. Really relevant to us in Northland.
It illustrated clearly community engagement, ecological sustainability, participating and contributing. Students were interested. It also helped in the Nature of Science ... seeing how the community can work with the scientists on an issue.
Very informative as to what is happening on our doorstep, and we did not know about it. We are now going to contact DOC in our area and finding out more that we can do to help locally. All children saw things they related to, and saw the relevance of what they were learning. Nice to have the extra background from maori perspective.
Easy to access and structured well for independent work. Just the right level and interest.
Children really enjoyed learning about kauri dieback. We participated in all three web conferences and I am pleasantly suprised at how much the children learned. The field trip links well to the Key Competencies as well as our school values, and was inclusive of all cultures.
Related to our personal environment, local issues, and experiences at camp. Very relevant to developing a MLE and BYOD environment. Combined literacy, science, social science. Andrew (the LEARNZ Teacher) was friendly, engaging, and related well to students and experts.
They (LEARNZ virtual field trips) are informative and they reinforce what I am teaching. We had watched with real disappointment the Kauri Grove in Cambridge and our local area die in last year's drought.
It was a really good way for students to learn about NZ and what's happening currently and in a manner that they could choose how they participated; some were more independent and others more supported.
We live in the north and are surrounded by Kauri trees. Our students are now aware that kauri trees are under threat as they did not know this initially. I feel science is a very important part of the curriculum and want to encourage students to interact with the New Zealand environment. We are now going to visit the local bush and observe our trees.
The visual and aural activities of the virtual fieldtrips, real time and recorded, are an immediate way to bring the wider environment into the classroom. The field trips and their material are flexible enough to give opportunities for a variety of uses in the classroom.
It brings things alive for the kids, as many are visual learners. Fabulous to learn from experts. It covered participating and contributing beautifully, and we also connected it to "Understanding about Science".
We used this field trip to help us cover our Deep Learning Topic of Past and Present. it was very helpful in many aspects as we also wanted a science based focus in this area. The activities and background pages were useful for self management.
Fitted in very well with our non-fiction reading strategies and gave information that we weren't aware of. Also topical with the news broadcast about Coromandel.
Students were motivated by the field trip and made gains in reading, research, and critical thinking.
LEARNZ adds a rich IT experience to the class learning, that relates to local topics and utilises local expertise very well.
Photos generated a lot of discussion.
Linked through te reo me nga tikanga Maori - caring for our environment. Redwood Forest is in our area so able to connect to it through this field trip. Related to the NZ Curriculum - Community engagement, Cultural diversity, Future focus and the Vision - Confident, Connected, Informed, Contribuors.
We found it an effective way to learn. It focussed us on our work and was more interesting than just picking up a book. We would use LEARNZ again because we get to learn more about what's outside of our local community.
The field trip was yet another way to utilise the tools in our digital classroom. My recommendation to colleagues is this resource, while valuable when it links to current teaching and learning, has also proven to be excellent for use with smaller groups to extend critical thinking and learning linked to a real context.
It gave them the sense of being there, and the children were motivated and empowered to make a difference. The children loved watching the videos, and it made the whole learning process more authentic.
Engaging and relevant. My tamariki loved learning about the kauri. The field trip allowed them to engage with and utilise the learning we were doing in the classroom.
My students enjoyed it and learnt so much. They were inspired and did their own projects on kauri dieback. They learnt to do inquiry learning. They enjoyed the videos and doing the activities to test their knowledge.
Linking a community issue with young adults (in this way with LEARNZ), has been empowering for the students. They are able to contribute to conversations outside the classroom using science and cultural based knowledge.
My class always enjoys the Learnz Field Trips, regardless of the trip we enrol in. The LEARNZ teachers are so enthusiastic, it really teaches the children things that I can't.