Gail Gillon: University of Canterbury professor on the Government excluding Māori words from future kids' books

Education Minister Erica Stanford has received some backlash by excluding most Māori words from five-year-olds' school phonics books.

A Ministry of Education report shows Stanford decided to exclude all Māori kupu - except characters' names - last year, out of concern it would confuse children.

Canterbury University's professor Gail Gillon helped develop the phonics readers.

She says confusion doesn't appear to be an issue. 

"The evidence that we have would suggest that our five-year-old children are coping very well with the inclusion of just a few kupu Māori in these early readers."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Heather Duplessy Ellen Now on the books, the Education Minister
is cutting marti words from future editions of some books
used to teach reading to five and six year olds.
The books in question are from the Ready to Read
Phonics Plus series. Now Professor Gail Gellen from the University
of Canterbury was one of the people who led the
development of that series and is with us now, Hey,
Gail Kyoda header has Erica got a point that kids

(00:22):
need to learn the phonics sounds in one language before
they then switched to the phonic sounds in another language.

Speaker 2 (00:29):
Well, the evidence that we have would suggest that our
five year old children are coping very well with the
inclusion of just a few koupon mariti in these early readers.
We have evidence from over twenty nine thousand five year
old children from across the country who are using these
readers as part of our Better Start literacy approach, and

(00:49):
the teachers are doing a wonderful job and using these
readers to really improve children's literacy skills.

Speaker 1 (00:54):
Okay, so tell me about this evidence. So have we
done a test here where we've selected a group of
kids and we've given them just one language in the
phonic sounds, and then another group of kids with two
languages and phonic sounds and seeing how they compare to
each other.

Speaker 2 (01:07):
No, we haven't done that type of experimental research. The
research we have done, though, has shown that the approach
that uses these readers in a controlled way. Through using
these readers compared to using other types of literacy approaches,
has shown that the better stant literacy approach is more
effective than other approaches. So we have data at that

(01:29):
large group level to show that these readers being included
in the year one teaching approach is working really well.

Speaker 1 (01:36):
Hold on, Okay, so, Gail, So we don't know if
better Start just English is better than better Start English
plus Mari.

Speaker 2 (01:45):
Well, the Marty we're talking about is a few koupoo, Mary, No, I.

Speaker 1 (01:48):
Do understand and listen. I'm pro MARII language. Don't get
me wrong. Don't think that I'm not into this. I'm
like wholeheartedly into it. But we don't know for sure,
do we because we haven't actually tested this.

Speaker 2 (02:01):
Well, we haven't tested Mary versus English as teaching media.

Speaker 1 (02:04):
Okay, So then, so, Gail, doesn't it stand to reason
just using common sense that when you're trying to teach
kids English. It's it's difficult enough with the phonetic sounds, right,
You've got a for aviation, A for apple for apple.
Now you're chucking an a for hour. It's going to
get really confusing for these little dudes, isn't it.

Speaker 2 (02:22):
Well, English is confusing in itself. Why of course, how
these words are introduced are in the same way as
that we introduce a number of words in English that
are also confusing, in other words, that are simply told
to the child as they read the line of text.
So it's no more confusing introducing a word like kai
or manu or kapa hakka than it is introducing a

(02:45):
word like said or they.

Speaker 1 (02:47):
But that's my point. I mean, and I'm saying this
because I'm trying to teach my boy to read at
the moment, and I'm all, I'm not going well bloody
hard because English is just so so messed up. But
the thing is, I and I'm not trained in this,
so obviously I'm going to make huge mistakes. But what
I am finding is that already trying to explain to
him the aberrations that we have in English is bloody

(03:09):
hard enough without chucking in or o as well. So
then my question is, I mean, does it not mean
are we going to offend people if we just let
the first three years be exclusively English phonetic and then
we chuck the Marty sounds and after year four maybe well.

Speaker 2 (03:25):
Of course in English we're integrating to our Mary all
the time. So this is an opportunity as we begin
to teach our readers right from five, to introduce just
a few Kooper Maria into those texts. Now, remember this
is in the context of some beautiful stories that are
really relevant and purposely written for our New Zealand cultural context,
and the teachers have support and how to gradually introduce

(03:48):
these words alongside the English words that they're using. So
it's not like we're putting a whole lot of Marty
words into one book. They're gradually introduced. And the evidence
is very clear here that the data we have from
twenty nine thousand children is suggesting we are not confusing
children by using these readers. Well with Marty, some of

(04:09):
the readers.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
With respect our kids cannot read properly in this country.
So we haven't got great evidence, have.

Speaker 2 (04:15):
We We do from the better start at Tricia approach.
That's where you're wrong. We published this data. We have
very clear evidence that the better start the Tricya approach,
which uses these readers as part of the teaching approach,
is significantly accelerating reading, spelling, oral language, phonics and phony

(04:35):
awareness of our five and six year old children. Listen
that research is published internationally.

Speaker 1 (04:40):
I really appreciate and you're the experts. I will defer
to you. Thank you, Professor Gal Gillen, director of the
Child well Being Institute at the University of Canterbury. For
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