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

My students from this field trip are now very connected to kauri, that four weeks ago was just another native tree. Very powerful to have online learning with experts. Made a national taonga come alive and made kauri dieback real, relevant and contextual. Brings in elements of Nature of Science and the Social Science curriculum.
It is a highly motivating tool for learning. Children were highly engaged about kauri and continue to have discussions about their learning. Saves me as a teacher a lot of time as almost all of the planning and preparing is done for me. Great to be able to "call on the expert" from my classroom. Makes learning very accessible.
Fun, engaging, easy to use once you get your head around it all, kids love it, lots of different technology options. Some great info to challenge gifted and talented learners. Great to see the inclusion of Maori vocab.
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.
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.
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.
Engaging and can be tailored to the specific needs of a small group of students. Uses all of the Key Competencies. Enabled students to self regulate their learning.
Activities that went with the videos were fantastic.
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.
As an Enviro school it is wonderful to be interfacing with experts in the field on real issues in real time. Some of my students go onto Learnz to explore further as additional home learning. Great to hear them educating their parents about what's happening to our mighty taonga, Kauri. LEARNZ is the most marvellous educational resource for NZ teachers. This is my 14th year with Learnz and I get great great support if I need it. The staff are truly amazing at every level.
I used a lot of independent learning time using the background pages which promoted managing self. Also promotes community engagement, future focused thinking. It is well integrated across the curriculum and supports a range of learning types.
Set at a great level for year 7 and 8 students. A lot of the planning has been organised for you. Great learning experience. Majority of students loved the topic and the quality of the work completed was outstanding.
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.
I like that we can do the work live, or delay it to suit our needs, and either way not miss out on any of the content. It helped the children to further understand the need to value our natural environment and how easy it is for us to lose a taonga through lack of awareness or willingness to contribute. This topic also increased their cultural awareness.
My 31 mixed-ability children were completely engaged in our study. It was such an authentic context for us, as we are a silver enviroschool and we have three kauri at our school that we are learning to protect. Was great for the children to see real science in action; they were very interested in the laboratory work.
The kids get really engaged with what they are learning about. Because it is real the kids really respond to it. We can make links to what is happening around our area, also.
Totally in line with our Disasters topic. Worked well with the Key Competencies we aligned with our unit. Backchannel was great for the class next door.
Learnz field trips allow the students to develop all of the key competencies, principals and values of the NZ curriculum, and complements an innovative learning environment. This Geohazards field trip was very relevant and at an appropriate level for our year 7 and 8 students.
Enables chn to get experience of environments they may otherwise not get and interact with real scientists. Special needs pupils enjoyed the computer simulations. Maori pupils appreciate the Maori explanations of geo happenings.
The field trip supported both our social sciences and science learning areas. The students loved the real life content and particularly enjoyed the audio conferences. I like the fact that we can revist the fieldtrip resources throughout our learning unit ... which will come in handy when the students need to research a natural disaster that may occur in our area (Nelson) and how to prepare for it.
The students now have an increased sense of responsibility and citizenship regarding Geohazards, especially as I was able to completely integrate the learning into my reading and writing programme. The resources are amazing and so perfect because they are about N.Z. and show how scientists work.
This field trip supported the "Future Focus" principle for my group of Year 6 students, as they were exposed to aspects of the reality of living in a small country that lies on the junction of two tectonic plates. They developed their understanding by making 3D models.
It gave real life situations to our study. My Maori student liked the fact that the list of geothermal (Ngawha) terms were able to be related to the study. The videos were great - most enjoyable. Students gained skills in note taking as well as knowledge which they later used to write a report on the Tarawera eruption. We are going to the buried village for a class trip so the children are very excited about what they will see.
Very appropriate for my multi level and age class. Well supported. The field trip enabled learners to gain knowledge in aspects of geology which they then used in writing and oral language. Students were highly engaged. Excellent resource!
The live link up is great. Great to be able to observe, listen to experts at work. Real life context.