Clendon Park’s Kapa Haka authors

I’ve been working with tamariki at Henderson North School on a book celebrating a famous pūrākau story from Te Kawerau ā Maki. Today we launched the pukapuka as part of the school’s Matariki celebrations. Ngā mihi Te Kawerau ā Maki for trusting us with your taonga story, and Donna Nee Tumuaki of Henderson North Kura…

I’m working with young writers at Flatbush School this term and today we had an inspiring visit by Raymond Sagapolutele. Raymond is a professional photographer and an amazing role model for our young Pasifika storytellers. “You are orators and your story is important,” Raymond said. “A lot of times us adults don’t listen to children,…

Tonight I went to watch Rosalina by the Sau e Siva Creatives at Mangere Arts Centre. The guys adapted the story from a legend in my book, Samoan Heroes. It’s pretty cool seeing the way they took the story from off the page and brought it to life on stage with a celebration of Samoan culture,…

Today we celebrated the launch of Stand Your Ground, a book I did with young people at Sancta Maria College. This was the first book I made sponsored by the Oceania Literacy Trust which is a trust a few of us started to help improve literacy and wellbeing in our young people. “The students who…

I did a talk at Ashburton Intermediate today – told the children a story about how a book about rocks changed someone’s life. After the talk these four boys came sprinting into the library asking where the books on rocks are.  ‘Why do you want to read those?’ I asked the boys. ‘We want knowledge,’…