title: Focusing on teachers as learners in professional learning communities

authors: Swanson, Carolyn Julie

abstract: Practising teachers are part of professional learning communities in many educational settings. In this piece, the editors unpack what we mean by the term learning community and outline the nature of professional learning that can occur in professional learning communities. Like all good ideas, the concepts of communities of practice and communities of learners get captured, digested, and become formulas or recipes that have lost the full flavour of the original concepts. Therefore, it is crucial that we re-question the aims of professional learning communities and critically examine their current configurations. Are our professional learning communities safe places, where members can challenge current thinking, take risks and learn together with a shared purpose, and refresh ourselves? Or are the participants compelled to attend, working off someone else’s agenda and direction and lacking the freedom to explore?

text: Focusing on teachers as learners in professional learning communities Practising teachers are part of professional learning communities in many educational settings. In this piece, the editors unpack what we mean by the term learning community and outline the nature of professional learning that can occur in professional learning communities. Like all good ideas, the concepts of communities of practice and communities of learners get captured, digested, and become formulas or recipes that have lost the full flavour of the original concepts. Therefore, it is crucial that we re-question the aims of professional learning communities and critically examine their current configurations. Are our professional learning communities safe places, where members can challenge current thinking, take risks and learn together with a shared purpose, and refresh ourselves? Or are the participants compelled to attend, working off someone else’s agenda and direction and lacking the freedom to explore?

year: 2018

title: Recent and historical sedimentation and sediment characteristics of Ōhiwa Harbour, New Zealand

authors: La Croix, Andrew D.

abstract: The Bay of Plenty Regional Council is seeking to understand historical and recent sedimentation in Ōhiwa Harbour, a barrier-enclosed lagoon, to help establish sediment accumulation rates and water quality limits in accordance with the Resource Management Act (1991) and the NZ Freshwater Policy Statement. To provide sedimentation data that is independent of sediment plate data already being collected by the Council, and to supplement other historical data, a series of nine vibracores, nine box cores, and 73 surface sediment samples were collected from across Ōhiwa Harbour.
Three key vibracores were analyzed for their radionuclide activity (²¹⁰Pb and ²²⁶Ra) in an attempt to determine their sediment accumulation rates. However, no rate could be established due to very low and irregular radionuclide activity through the cores. It is probable that the method did not work due to the combined effects of hydrodynamic mixing and bioturbation.
Sedimentological analysis was undertaken on all nine vibracores and box cores, which indicated that the intertidal sediments consist of five distinctive depositional units: clast supported calci-gravel, ripple to cross bedded sand, bioturbated sand, laminated to rippled silt, and bioturbated silt. Recognition and interpretation of these units will be useful for future workers interested in reconstructing the evolution of sedimentation within the harbour.
Grain size of core sediment and surficial sediment around the harbour was compared to historical surface sediment maps. They show clearly that Ōhiwa Harbour is becoming muddier through time, although in a non-linear and complex way with some parts of the harbour getting sandier. The perimeter of the harbour and the upper harbour are the main areas affected by a fining grain size trend.
Loss-on-ignition (LOI) of sediment indicates that organic carbon is more concentrated in fine-grained sediment than coarser sediment across the harbour. No clear stratigraphic pattern of LOI could be established. However, surface sediments display larger LOI along the perimeter of the harbour where the proportion of mud is greater.
Three recommendations are put forth based on the results of this study, as well as gaps in knowledge discovered during data collection and analysis. The first is that determining longer-term (decadesâ€“millennia) sediment accumulation rates may be achievable by carbondating the abundant shell material contained within cores. The second is that calculation of sediment compaction under its own weight ('autocompaction') may help determine the causes of sedimentation and erosion in the harbour. The third and final recommendation is for repeat surface sediment surveys to be undertaken regularly, at intervals no greater than every five years. These insights will together yield a more complete picture of past, present, and future sedimentation and its effects in Ōhiwa Harbour.

text: Recent and historical sedimentation and sediment characteristics of Ōhiwa Harbour, New Zealand The Bay of Plenty Regional Council is seeking to understand historical and recent sedimentation in Ōhiwa Harbour, a barrier-enclosed lagoon, to help establish sediment accumulation rates and water quality limits in accordance with the Resource Management Act (1991) and the NZ Freshwater Policy Statement. To provide sedimentation data that is independent of sediment plate data already being collected by the Council, and to supplement other historical data, a series of nine vibracores, nine box cores, and 73 surface sediment samples were collected from across Ōhiwa Harbour.
Three key vibracores were analyzed for their radionuclide activity (²¹⁰Pb and ²²⁶Ra) in an attempt to determine their sediment accumulation rates. However, no rate could be established due to very low and irregular radionuclide activity through the cores. It is probable that the method did not work due to the combined effects of hydrodynamic mixing and bioturbation.
Sedimentological analysis was undertaken on all nine vibracores and box cores, which indicated that the intertidal sediments consist of five distinctive depositional units: clast supported calci-gravel, ripple to cross bedded sand, bioturbated sand, laminated to rippled silt, and bioturbated silt. Recognition and interpretation of these units will be useful for future workers interested in reconstructing the evolution of sedimentation within the harbour.
Grain size of core sediment and surficial sediment around the harbour was compared to historical surface sediment maps. They show clearly that Ōhiwa Harbour is becoming muddier through time, although in a non-linear and complex way with some parts of the harbour getting sandier. The perimeter of the harbour and the upper harbour are the main areas affected by a fining grain size trend.
Loss-on-ignition (LOI) of sediment indicates that organic carbon is more concentrated in fine-grained sediment than coarser sediment across the harbour. No clear stratigraphic pattern of LOI could be established. However, surface sediments display larger LOI along the perimeter of the harbour where the proportion of mud is greater.
Three recommendations are put forth based on the results of this study, as well as gaps in knowledge discovered during data collection and analysis. The first is that determining longer-term (decadesâ€“millennia) sediment accumulation rates may be achievable by carbondating the abundant shell material contained within cores. The second is that calculation of sediment compaction under its own weight ('autocompaction') may help determine the causes of sedimentation and erosion in the harbour. The third and final recommendation is for repeat surface sediment surveys to be undertaken regularly, at intervals no greater than every five years. These insights will together yield a more complete picture of past, present, and future sedimentation and its effects in Ōhiwa Harbour.

year: 2022

title: What’s in a name? The sense of reference, the rigidity of designators and the history of causes when determining the names of the two main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand

authors: Parker, Martin

subjects: New Zealand

abstract: The New Zealand Geographic Board recently revealed that the two main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand have never been officially named. The revelation made both national and international news and led to a large number of publicly aired comments on the matter, suggesting that something so fundamental and seemingly innocuous as naming is in fact likely to generate a good deal of controversy, no more so than in a bicultural/bilingual context. This paper will examine the phenomenon of naming from a number of angles. After discussing a layperson’s idea of what is meant by the meaning of names, we shall attempt to apply a number of theoretical models from the field of Language Philosophy to the case of the main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand: the Descriptivist approach of Frege and Russell, Kripke’s Rigid Designators, and Causal Grounding theory. We shall conclude that, in the case of applying the first two of these, there is a question mark over whether any of the current names for the two islands, both Māori and Pākehā, are in fact names at all; in terms of applying the theory of Causal Grounding, we are drawn to the conclusion that in history lies the key to the future.

text: What’s in a name? The sense of reference, the rigidity of designators and the history of causes when determining the names of the two main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand The New Zealand Geographic Board recently revealed that the two main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand have never been officially named. The revelation made both national and international news and led to a large number of publicly aired comments on the matter, suggesting that something so fundamental and seemingly innocuous as naming is in fact likely to generate a good deal of controversy, no more so than in a bicultural/bilingual context. This paper will examine the phenomenon of naming from a number of angles. After discussing a layperson’s idea of what is meant by the meaning of names, we shall attempt to apply a number of theoretical models from the field of Language Philosophy to the case of the main islands of Aotearoa/New Zealand: the Descriptivist approach of Frege and Russell, Kripke’s Rigid Designators, and Causal Grounding theory. We shall conclude that, in the case of applying the first two of these, there is a question mark over whether any of the current names for the two islands, both Māori and Pākehā, are in fact names at all; in terms of applying the theory of Causal Grounding, we are drawn to the conclusion that in history lies the key to the future.

year: 2010-02