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

An interesting style of learning - lots of potential. This has been a great experience as a teacher and for the class.
While all students benefit from the material, I found this one to be especially relevant to our local Maori students. It was also very useful as part of our reading programme when used with a graphic organiser for finding, selecting and retrieving relevant information.
This field trip supported the key competencies and learning areas well.
This field trip was perfect for our combined Māori and Health studies for Term 1. My class were able to use this at school and in their home with parents. Very satisfying to observe students personalising the learning.
It supported my year 9 topic of migrations. A great way of bringing the subject alive.
It was excellent, it fitted in really well with our topic as well as curriculum values, principals, KCs. Students got a lot out of the Waka virtual field trip and were excited by it.
Students could see links between real voyages (now) and those made by our ancestors. The programme was well thought out, informative, and had many options to use it in a variety of ways. It was engaging, fun, and a great way to learn something through a different medium.
It helped to provide a traditional context for teamwork, which was the focus of our inquiry last term. I felt the information was a good level for our learners (year 4).
The students were able to be self directed through this field trip. They then published a blog about their experiences.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
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.
We used this across the school - very appropriate. It linked well with the main ShakeOut event, managing selves, and collaboration.
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.
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.
Reinforced other learning on natural disasters, emergency procedures and being prepared.
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!
We used the videos and some background pages for discussions.