The Talking Stick by Dot Meharry

Today, we had a special visitor in Room 14. Mr Greaves (Karamea's Dad) read us a story called The Talking Stick by Dot Meharry. It's about a boy called Hohepa who makes a talking stick for his whanau because they are forgetting the old ways.

We learnt that the Te Reo word for talking stick is Tokotoko. Tokotoko help people to tell their stories.

Mr Greaves explained the word whakapapa. We learnt that whakapapa is who we are and where we come from.

Mr Greaves is an artist - he showed us some special Maori symbols. He explained to us that the symbols we choose to draw on  our talking stick share our story, who we are. Harlem came up with a wonderful idea of decorating our talking sticks with shells - we will do this over the next few weeks.

We know its important that everyone has a chance to share their ideas so we are going to use the talking sticks in class to help us share our stories.

Cahlia working on her tokotoko

Harlem and Zack drawing and talking about their tokotoko designs

Karamea and Ayden