A new Aotearoa history curriculum brings with it a chance to do things better, writes Airana Ngarewa.

History class in high school was where I endured the most explicit expressions of bigotry. It was a platform for prejudice, every misinformed idea given a microphone in the spirit of open debate. It was not uncommon to hear my peers describe tangata whenua as gangsters and criminals. It was more common to hear them label my tūpuna savages and suggest Māori were lucky Pākehā came along before they wiped themselves out. The worst I was personally dubbed by a teacher – as I recalled recently for E-tangata – was a Māori extremist.

Compared to what many other Māori suffered, I got off lightly. It seems wherever you are in the motu, all sorts of hateful stuff gets said when you lock a pack of teenagers – their only education about New Zealand history what they’ve heard at home – into a room and ask them to share. Every political position from the dogmatic to the downright xenophobic is advocated for by one student or another, every class-wide conversation slowly spiralling into the secondary school equivalent of a Facebook comment section. 

There were only a few other Māori in this class with me. Outnumbered, we were made to play a perpetual game of defence, expected to answer for and explain everything Māori. The Māori Party, Māori television, the Māori electorate. Time and again, our people were painted to be privileged and time and again, it was up to us to recall the historical circumstances which called these institutions to be. The fight for the foreshore and seabed, the wrongful portrayal of Māori in the media, the land wars of the 1860s and a restrained attempt by the government of the time to repair race relations. When it worked it went well enough. We put together an argument that justified their, and by extension our, presence. But it didn’t always happen like this. For one reason or another, we’d fail to upend our peers from their contempt, the class leaving the lesson unconvinced of whatever we happened to be debating. The inequality of the criminal justice system, the function of treaty settlements, the real origin of Moriori. 

We would reflect on the latter for days on end, constructing among ourselves the perfect combinations of facts, stats and stories to ensure these stalemates never happened again. The textbooks could only do so much and our teacher was unprepared to intervene. What was needed was a rōpū capable of providing context, answering questions and checking bias whenever it reared its ugly head. Such was our responsibility to this kōrero tuku iho – to our tūpuna. 

Having become a teacher myself, I reflect on this now as history will soon be compulsory for every student from year one to year 10. It is an addition that has been celebrated by many whanau Māori, and rightly so. Finally our stories, the many stories that have shaped this country – the stories of tangata whenua, of migrants, of women – will be told. Despite my experience, I appreciate it as an unequivocally good thing. 

My father, Darren Ngarewa, is one of the foremost historians of South Taranaki history, especially concerning iwi Māori. His man cave is filled with the esoteric writings of missionaries, paintings from soldiers, rare Māori manuscripts and newspaper articles written as the major events of this rohe played out. It is because of him I have come to appreciate the power of history, its capacity to illuminate, enlighten and explain. It’s because of him I know its importance, and because of my experience as a teacher, I know just how much it has to offer our young people.  

Even so, there is a part of me that looks upon this change with less optimism. This feeling lies not with the curriculum itself, but with how it may be implemented – how it may be delivered to our young people. On the whole, the teachers I’ve worked with have been deeply knowledgeable about their fields and passionate about what they do. In combination with the Teaching Council’s commitment to developing tikanga me te reo Māori in the workforce, I have even greater confidence in their capacity to implement this new curriculum.

And yet I wonder how a teacher today might respond to the bigotry earlier mentioned. How they might address prejudice? How they might respond to open displays of discrimination? And I wonder how they might care for tauira Māori, and other vulnerable students, as lesson by lesson they unpack two centuries of injustice? There is the obvious like collaborating with mana whenua and co-constructing the rules of engagement, but these alone only begin to address the questions above.

Fortunately, teachers have a year to prepare for New Zealand history in schools. We have a year to plan how we might work alongside local iwi who remain the keepers of so much rarefied history, a year to determine how we might ensure our classrooms remain a positive learning environment, and a year to think through how we might manage the misinformation and disinformation young people are inundated with online and at home. 

I wish I could say I knew exactly what needed to be done. But I don’t and it would be wrong to pretend I did. Like everyone else, I continue to grapple with how this new curriculum will be best delivered. And while I can be certain about what didn’t work for me, I believe it is only our young people who can guide us towards what will work for them.