Evie Gilbert (Left) and Jessie Parwell (Right)measure how long Jessie can stand on one leg at Piripiri School, as part of CensusAtSchool 2023. PHOTO SUPPLIED
THE night of March 7 is census night, when Kiwis provide a five-yearly official count of people and dwellings in Aotearoa New Zealand.
And local kids are now prepared.
Several King Country kura took part in CensusAtSchool survey recently, as part of a worldwide campaign supporting children to learn about statistics.
It offers an intriguing glimpse into students’ views of their own lives.
Thousands of primary, intermediate, and secondary school students around the country answered questions on their favourite ice cream flavour, time spent on digital devices, alcohol, how many close friends they have, their overall happiness, and their favourite sport to play.
They measured their feet and weighed their schoolbags.
All seven students at Te Anga’s tiny Piripiri School took part.
Principal Matthew Jackson signed up after encountering the programme at a previous school.
“It was really engaging. The children were able to respond to the questions in the census and then go out and generate the data.”
It also “spiralled” into useful mathematics and statistics learning, he said.
Matthew’s personal favourite – and very interactive – question saw students measuring how long they could stand on their left legs with their eyes closed.
He said programmes like the CensusAtSchool exposed kids to ideas and concepts outside what they might encounter in everyday life.
By doing so it connected them to the wider world – “letting them know what else is out there,” he said.
Census At School co-director Rachel Cunliffe told King Country News that her organisation wanted to provide something special to pique kids’ interest in statistics.
The former University of Auckland statistics lecturer said the programme helped keep things engaging for the students.
“If you’re getting boring stats that are old and about things that don’t interest you, you’re not going to engage and really want to understand the importance of the data and what it means for you.”
Rachel said the CensusAtSchool questions could kick off a passionate class discussion: an example was one about blocking on social media.
“You’ll get people talking about it … the benefits and the pros and cons of blocking and why people block. [Kids realise] this is actually important to my life. All the questions we put in there are designed for them to get really engaged with the data,” Rachel said.
Fellow co-director Anne Patel said students learned about the value and usefulness of data.
“Data is all around us and they can “see” themselves in the data to get a real feel for patterns and variation.
“The experience helps students see the importance of statistics in today’s world – and they love finding out what other students are thinking and doing,” she said.
This year is the 11th time the biennial CensusAtSchool survey has been conducted.
Schools participate voluntarily. Supervised by teachers, students used digital devices to answer 30 questions in English or te reo Māori about their lives and opinions.
