Te reo-the functional chunks

As teachers of te reo we need to provide students with many opportunities to use the language they are learning.  However, students often do not get enough opportunity to use the language.
I remember a wise person saying to me “the person doing all the talking is doing all the learning” in a second language class. Often that is the Kaiako.
Functional Chunks of Language are phrases or expressions that students learn as a chunk without necessarily understanding the grammatical structure.  However they learn where and when to say the phrases when communicating (i.e. the function). Functional Chunks of Language will empower students to use the language often. These phrases might include:
  •      I have a question
  •         What page?
  •      oops, sorry my mistake
  •     Yes/no
  •      I don’t understand


Because so many of us are learning te reo Māori as we teach it, questions and commands  are good functional chunks for the Kaiako to use as they are often repeated many times. I know many of you are using these “shout outs” as a prompt and to get you started using te reo.
  After referring to the shout outs a few times you will be impressed by how quickly students learn and use them.  It may pay to explicitly go over them a few at a time and praise those who use them.  If a student attempts to make a comment or ask a question in English that is one of the functional phrases on the wall point to it and have all the tamariki say it in te reo Māori.
Now, it is my preference to have signage in te reo Māori only but I know many of you prefer having the english translation underneath. I have done this for most of them.
These are great to have as a reference on the wall. They also serve to empower the ākonga as they can see what they have learned.

These shout outs are an updated version of previous ones and I have been asked by so many of you for copies of them. Download from below. Are there any other high frequency phrases that would be useful?

Download these functional chunks below

Let me know how they work out for you!