Over the last 12 years we have worked hard to build confidence in public speaking in both te reo Māori and English for our rangatahi. Ngā Manu Kōrero is one of the avenues that we use to hone their skills, experience a positive Māori setting, challenge them to debate and increase their confidence.
Ngā Manu Kōrero ā-Rohe - Otago-Southland Regionals - 13 June - Ōtākou
The responsibility for hosting the regional competition is shared between Murihiku and Ōtākou, having turns year about. In 2019 it was again Ōtākou's turn. As an organisation HWK have taken a lead in the host responsibilities for Ngā Manu Kōrero regionals since 2011 after we hosted the National Competition here in Dunedin in 2010.
This year we worked with Gemma Tuhega, the Māori teacher at The Taieri College and a whānau member of HWK, to host the competition in the school’s new performing arts centre. We have held the competition over two days the last three times we have organised the competition.
As we have each year we try to encourage as many of our rakatahi to compete as we can, this year we had a speaker in each category from King’s, Tyson Harmer: Senior Māori, Andre Taani: Junior Māori, Taumana Pene: Senior English, and Ethan Rangitutia: Junior English. Queen’s had a speaker in each of the English categories, Jordyn Katipa-Martin: Senior English and Vanessa Munro: Junior English. And, for the first time, a speaker from our Home School in Senior Māori, Kiringāia Cassidy. We were unable to replicate our successes from 2018, but all of our speakers represented their whānau with pride. Our King’s junior English speaker, Ethan Rangitūtia was a crowd favourite and placed 3rd. Our Junior Māori speaker, Andre Taani placed a commendable second and the two senior English speakers battled it out as they had the year previous Jordyn Katipa-Martin who qualified the previous year in that section was unlucky not to qualify again this year. Jordyn was edged out of the top spot by King’s senior English speaker, Taumana Pene. Kiringāua Cassidy representing HWK Home School placed first in Senior Māori and qualified for his third national competition and first in the senior section. This was the first year the Kura Kaupapa Māori o Ōtepoti competed and their speaker in junior Māori, Maia Rakete took the top spot in that section.
Overall the competition concluded successfully with three Ōtākou winners and one Murihiku based winner qualifying to compete at the national competition in Palmerston North in September.
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