The Art of Taiaha by Liam Ratana is a reflective non-fiction text that weaves personal experience with cultural history to explore the significance of taiaha training as a pathway to identity, discipline, and belonging for tāne Māori. Through first-hand narrative and rich descriptive detail, Ratana shares his journey attending a wānanga on Mokoia Island, where men and boys from across Aotearoa gather to learn the protocols, movements, and responsibilities of mau rākau. The text situates taiaha practice within whakapapa, tikanga, and the legacy of kaumātua Mita Mohi, whose vision transformed taiaha into a vessel for healing, purpose, and positive change. Powerful, immersive, and deeply personal, the text supports students to understand culture and leadership through lived experience and voice.

The text is ideal for integrated learning across literacy, social sciences, and health, supporting inquiry into identity, cultural revitalisation, leadership, and wellbeing in Aotearoa New Zealand.

This pack contains a range of structured literacy activities including

• Spelling rules ck / dge / drop the e / y as a consonant or vowel
• Sounds of -ed
• Exploring parts of language - adverbs, adjectives, nouns, verbs etc
• Doubling or not when adding -ing, -ed
• Floss rules
• Compound words
• Identifying and naming suffixes
• Identifying and naming prefixes
• Vowel teams
• Root words
• Controlling 'r'
• Diagraphs
• Schwa words
• Ghost diagraphs
• -oo- and -oo- / -au and -ow / 
• Hard and soft c and g
• Common subordinating conjunctions
• And much more!!

Curriculum Phase: Phase 3
Year Level: Year 8

English (NZC Levels 4–5): reading for meaning and critical thinking, analysing author perspective and voice, understanding personal recount and reflective non-fiction, synthesising information, exploring descriptive language, identifying themes of leadership and purpose

Social Sciences – Aotearoa New Zealand Histories: Māori cultural practice, identity and belonging, continuity and change, community leadership, whakapapa, tikanga, and collective responsibility

Health and Physical Education: wellbeing, resilience, discipline, relationships, emotional regulation, respect for self and others

Text type: Non-fiction, personal recount, reflective narrative, cultural narrative

Key words include: Aotearoa New Zealand histories, culture, identity, kaitiaki, Lake Rotorua, mana, Mokoia Island, mau rākau, Ngāti Rangiwewehi, taiaha, taniwha, Te Arawa, tūpuna, wānanga, leadership, resilience, community, tikanga, whakapapa