Latest / Early Edition with Ryan Bridge / Phil Palfrey: Kaitao Intermediate Principal on the ERO report showing improvement in Maths and English

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Phil Palfrey: Kaitao Intermediate Principal on the ERO report showing improvement in Maths and English · Early Edition with Ryan Bridge

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: More evidence that the education is on a role and
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  Speaker 1: you report out this morning. It's the Education Review Office.
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: Primary age kids are not only getting better at English
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  Speaker 1: in math, they're more excited about doing it. Three quarters
• 0:10
  Speaker 1: of parents say their child's showing clear progress. Teachers are
• 0:14
  Speaker 1: positive too. Phil Palfrey is with us from Kital Intermediate School.
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  Speaker 1: He's the principal there.
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  Speaker 2: Peel.
• 0:20
  Speaker 1: Good morning, morning, Yoda, Yoder. Good to have you on
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  Speaker 1: the show. So thank goodness. We've made some changes to education.
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  Speaker 1: Looks like it's bearing some early fruit.
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  Speaker 2: Yes, well, it seems to be. I haven't read the report,
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  Speaker 2: to be honest, but I'm not surprised. I think that
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  Speaker 2: the new curriculum, even though some of it's in drafts,
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  Speaker 2: still is especially for literacy, but we are seeing progress.
• 0:50
  Speaker 2: I think it's to be fair, it's also to do
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: with the fact that I think our schools are building
• 0:56
  Speaker 2: good relationships with parents, and parents are really more comfortable
• 1:00
  Speaker 2: working with schools. We you know, we really try hard
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  Speaker 2: to make sure our parents are involved as best as possible.
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  Speaker 2: I will say I there's I just I can only
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  Speaker 2: speak for my school, but I know that the kids
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  Speaker 2: have developed great relationships with their teachers. And the teachers
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  Speaker 2: work really hard to build those relationships, and I think
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  Speaker 2: that's equally important, if not more important, than any curriculum changes,
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  Speaker 2: and something I love to see.
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  Speaker 1: Well, why is because I'm just reading the report, Nearly
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  Speaker 1: all schools have started using the refreshed curriculum for English
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  Speaker 1: and maths. Yes, it's something like ninety seven eighty five
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  Speaker 1: percent depending on whether you're talking about English or maths
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  Speaker 1: and now using the new curriculum. And the report, yes,
• 1:43
  Speaker 1: clearly says that this is what they're putting it down to,
• 1:46
  Speaker 1: because I guess what you're saying is it's it's teachers
• 1:50
  Speaker 1: and students getting on better and involving parents more. Why
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  Speaker 1: is that suddenly changed?
• 1:56
  Speaker 2: You know? Well, you know, we can't forget COVID, which
• 2:01
  Speaker 2: did some strange things. But I don't know. I just
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  Speaker 2: think that everybody realizes how important education is, and more
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  Speaker 2: and more people are realizing that children just have a
• 2:12
  Speaker 2: bit of a blique future if they opt out earlier
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  Speaker 2: from school, and that to keep them in school is
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  Speaker 2: really important. Children are getting back to school, enjoying school more,
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  Speaker 2: and I just think that's just because I think a
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  Speaker 2: whole lot of people are just realizing that that they
• 2:29
  Speaker 2: can't progress in their life if they don't get a
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  Speaker 2: reasonable education or a good education.
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  Speaker 1: Phil In terms of attributing any credit to Erica Stanford,
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  Speaker 1: I've spoken to a couple of schools and principles now
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  Speaker 1: and it seems like it's the sort of everyone's walking
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  Speaker 1: on eggshells, not wanting to say it. Do you think
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  Speaker 1: she's doing a good job.
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  Speaker 2: I think that she. I think I think the changes
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  Speaker 2: in the correctum have been really good and really positive.
• 3:02
  Speaker 2: I think she's doing a good job, and she's where
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  Speaker 2: she has seen that there was a little bit of
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  Speaker 2: flimsy stuff going on there, and I agree with that,
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  Speaker 2: and I kind of always have. I've always thought that,
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  Speaker 2: for example, was mess I mean, I've been around a
• 3:15
  Speaker 2: long time, and I remember wondering why we had to
• 3:20
  Speaker 2: get rid of our textbox a long long time ago.
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  Speaker 2: And I know that some people still see textbooks as
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: a darly word, but I never did. And I couldn't
• 3:29
  Speaker 2: understand why we went away to photocopying and doing a
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  Speaker 2: whole lot of other things, and that we didn't because
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: because I didn't see the basics being taught. And I
• 3:38
  Speaker 2: think that there's still an emphasis on basics, and I
• 3:42
  Speaker 2: think that's where still parents have a role to do
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: that too. For example, an intermediate school, we really stress
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  Speaker 2: the fact that you need to know your own basic
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: times tables and that's never changed. But somewhere along the
• 3:56
  Speaker 2: line people thought that, you know, maybe they could learn
• 3:59
  Speaker 2: it if they needed to learn it. No, no, no,
• 4:00
  Speaker 2: you have to learn it. You have to know it,
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  Speaker 2: and you have to be able to just roll them off,
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  Speaker 2: you know. And I couldn't do that when I was young,
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  Speaker 2: so I know how that that affected me. So that's
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  Speaker 2: why I'm sort of really making sure that the teachers
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  Speaker 2: are still going over basic facts with the kids because
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  Speaker 2: it's really really important. But see, we use the new
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  Speaker 2: Oxford University Press resources which have been provided by the government,
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  Speaker 2: so you can say that's a good thing because it's
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  Speaker 2: wor really well and we see we're starting to see
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  Speaker 2: progress in our kids in maths, which is really really exciting,
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  Speaker 2: really happy.
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  Speaker 1: Right, Phil, appreciate your time this morning, Phil Palfra who
• 4:38
  Speaker 1: they can't tell intermediate principle Time For more from earlier
• 4:42
  Speaker 1: edition with Ryan Bridge. Listen live to News Talks it
• 4:45
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