Merry Christmas to all and thank you to members who have run and supported association activities throughout 2010.
Professional development this year has been excellent in many areas with big numbers attending. Christchurch hosted the graphics/ DVC day with 83 attending special thanks to Motu and Ron for their presentations. Ron’s resource is being copied onto a disc and can be posted to you for a cost of $15 by sending address ,cheque to Canterbury GTTA Hillmorton High School PO Box 33-115 Christchurch 8244 Att Max Maddison.
Our writers continue with the task of completing level 2 and 3 into next year and we thank them for the time and commitment they put into the task. Thank you also to Tricia our National secretary and Piki our Treasurer. Have a safe and happy holiday Break.
Best wishes Max Maddison President NZGTTA
max
Welcome to a New Year which is already fast reaching the mid term point. This year the Association is once again involved with members playing key roles in the ongoing curriculum development areas at level 2 and 3 in Technology and Graphics/ DVC. The executive meet twice a year to report on what is happeneing in regions and to continually devcelop professional development opportunities for our members. We are keen to build on last year’s success particularly in the area of Graphics / DVC. On April the 9th we will meet in Auckland as an executive then followed by a Graphics/DVC Forum open to all Teachers in the region to look at the changes and current issues. For my part I am reaching the end of my role as National President and a 30 year connection with NZGTTA. My wife and I are finally doing our OE starting in May for several months. A caretaker President will be elected at the April meeting with full elections set for the AGM in September. I encourage all members to support their local branch and stay informed with the ongoing changes. All the best for 2011. Max Maddison President
Chris Donaldson
Good Evening,
Have just logged into the site to see what has been so secretive for so long. Is it just me, or are our teachers and members being left out. I retain a reasonably active membership with my local branch through either myself or through my staff, but it seems that a lot of stuff is happening within a small group of the national association without any communication to the grassroots level. I thought it would be really useful for me to view the teaching and learning guide for Design and Visual Communication especially since the implementation of the new suite of DVC standards is well under way. I’ve searched everywhere for this to be told it is available on the GTTA website as long as you have membership. What about the majority of DVC teachers around the country that don’t have membership. But then again, it makes little difference, because when I tried to access that document under your resources, I have been told I don’t have permission!!
As a National Association you seem to be very distant from the grassroots teachers you purport to represent. Having said that I guess I shouldn’t be complaining – you are all doing what you think is best. It just irks me that over the last 10 years or so there has been very little communication or line of communication between the decision makers of our subjects and teachers at the chalkface. It also irks me that although I recognise that government finance is tight we seem to have been neglected by both the MOE and NZQA when it comes to curriculum alignment and implementation of the new standards for our learning area. I also noted that the minutes of your Sept 2010 meeting highlighted some issues with communication at different levels. Also a concern about unsatisfactory membership numbers. Neither of these issues are new. They have dogged the association since the early 1990’s to my recollection. If you are worried about membership, you might consider making some improvements communicating with some of your key stakeholders. I know too well the pressures of time for national executive, and that you too are teachers taking on additional tasks in this role. Somehow if GTTA is to be relevant it has to determine it’s role. It doesn’t necessarily need to provide resources, Other bodies do that and as an association I suspect we would struggle to resource these on line and keep them current. This has been the case since the WEBSite was first developed back in the 1990’s. I would have thought that the prime role for GTTA should be to advocate for and represent on behalf of all technology teachers, our learning area, politically, strategically, pedagogically and socially so that the curriculum documents, learning guides and assessment tools provide the best outcomes for the whole range of students that we teach. After looking through this site, I’m afraid I don’t see anything like that as a vision. Perhaps I’m too far out of touch.
Merry Christmas to all and thank you to members who have run and supported association activities throughout 2010.
Professional development this year has been excellent in many areas with big numbers attending.
Christchurch hosted the graphics/ DVC day with 83 attending special thanks to Motu and Ron for their presentations.
Ron’s resource is being copied onto a disc and can be posted to you for a cost of $15 by sending address ,cheque to Canterbury GTTA Hillmorton High School PO Box 33-115 Christchurch 8244 Att Max Maddison.
Our writers continue with the task of completing level 2 and 3 into next year and we thank them for the time and commitment they put into the task.
Thank you also to Tricia our National secretary and Piki our Treasurer.
Have a safe and happy holiday Break.
Best wishes
Max Maddison
President
NZGTTA
Welcome to a New Year which is already fast reaching the mid term point. This year the Association is once again involved with members playing key roles in the ongoing curriculum development areas at level 2 and 3 in Technology and Graphics/ DVC.
The executive meet twice a year to report on what is happeneing in regions and to continually devcelop professional development opportunities for our members. We are keen to build on last year’s success particularly in the area of Graphics / DVC.
On April the 9th we will meet in Auckland as an executive then followed by a Graphics/DVC Forum open to all Teachers in the region to look at the changes and current issues.
For my part I am reaching the end of my role as National President and a 30 year connection with NZGTTA.
My wife and I are finally doing our OE starting in May for several months. A caretaker President will be elected at the April meeting with full elections set for the AGM in September.
I encourage all members to support their local branch and stay informed with the ongoing changes.
All the best for 2011.
Max Maddison
President
Good Evening,
Have just logged into the site to see what has been so secretive for so long. Is it just me, or are our teachers and members being left out. I retain a reasonably active membership with my local branch through either myself or through my staff, but it seems that a lot of stuff is happening within a small group of the national association without any communication to the grassroots level. I thought it would be really useful for me to view the teaching and learning guide for Design and Visual Communication especially since the implementation of the new suite of DVC standards is well under way. I’ve searched everywhere for this to be told it is available on the GTTA website as long as you have membership. What about the majority of DVC teachers around the country that don’t have membership. But then again, it makes little difference, because when I tried to access that document under your resources, I have been told I don’t have permission!!
As a National Association you seem to be very distant from the grassroots teachers you purport to represent. Having said that I guess I shouldn’t be complaining – you are all doing what you think is best. It just irks me that over the last 10 years or so there has been very little communication or line of communication between the decision makers of our subjects and teachers at the chalkface. It also irks me that although I recognise that government finance is tight we seem to have been neglected by both the MOE and NZQA when it comes to curriculum alignment and implementation of the new standards for our learning area. I also noted that the minutes of your Sept 2010 meeting highlighted some issues with communication at different levels. Also a concern about unsatisfactory membership numbers. Neither of these issues are new. They have dogged the association since the early 1990’s to my recollection.
If you are worried about membership, you might consider making some improvements communicating with some of your key stakeholders. I know too well the pressures of time for national executive, and that you too are teachers taking on additional tasks in this role. Somehow if GTTA is to be relevant it has to determine it’s role. It doesn’t necessarily need to provide resources, Other bodies do that and as an association I suspect we would struggle to resource these on line and keep them current. This has been the case since the WEBSite was first developed back in the 1990’s. I would have thought that the prime role for GTTA should be to advocate for and represent on behalf of all technology teachers, our learning area, politically, strategically, pedagogically and socially so that the curriculum documents, learning guides and assessment tools provide the best outcomes for the whole range of students that we teach. After looking through this site, I’m afraid I don’t see anything like that as a vision. Perhaps I’m too far out of touch.