My story, your story, our stories

This activity encourages children, their family, and the wider community to come together to share their migration stories, or those in their communities and rohe.

On this page

Teaching concepts

  • Topics: Identity, culture, migration and mobility.

  • Concepts: Whakapapa, whanaungatanga, tūrangawaewae.

Everyone has a migration story

Everyone has a migration story. It may be the story of their ancestors' journeys hundreds of years ago or their great-grandparents' voyage to early Aotearoa New Zealand. In more recent years, it may be the story of why they left their place of birth to find a new home.

This activity is about recognising and understanding each other's personal contexts and valuing diversity in communities.

Holding a local event and inviting others to join you to share migration and settlement stories could make this activity even more meaningful. Encourage pioneering companies or long-standing local businesses to share the stories of how or why they established themselves in the local community.

Colour photograph of 3 hands united above a satellite image of Earth.

Image credit: Photo by Capri23auto. Pixabay. License to use.

Storytelling keeps community knowledge alive

For some communities, stories about creation, connections to the land and sea, historical accounts, traditional knowledge, and teachings have been kept alive through storytelling.

These stories are often the fabric of a community's local history, knowledge, and culture. Some are thousands of years old.

Many of them have been passed down from generation to generation without ever being written down.

Suggested activity

  • Discuss your family history.

  • Identify the stories in your family.

  • Organise to share these stories amongst family, friends, or as part of a community event.

  • Make a record of the stories. Write them down or capture in a small video. Do whatever you decide best captures the story for future generations.

  • Share your stories with your family, your friends, and possibly at your local library.