The 7-8pm hour on Sunday evenings on RNZ National features a news bulletin followed by One In Five – “a programme exploring the issues and experience of disability”. This is followed at 7:35pm with Voices – “a weekly programme that highlights Asians, Africans, indigenous Americans and more, from Iraq to India to Indonesia and East Asia, spanning Morocco to Madagascar, Belize to Brazil. These are our local-born and immigrant ethnic minority communities, New Zealanders with stories to share”. At 7:45pm there is The Week in Parliament. In this recording:
7.05pm - One in Five: Taking New Steps with Technology
Bridget Carter admits she has followed her son, Nathan, to school. The 12-year-old Canterbury boy, who is on the autism spectrum, has just started walking to Darfield High with some friends. And, for Bridget and the rest of his family, it’s another "wow moment".
"That's just been a huge, fantastic breakthrough."
She says, while she initially followed him to ensure he was safe, she was also keen to get photos of the big moment. And she believes the new independence has been good for his confidence. "He's actually excited about going to school with them." Bridget Carter says part of what has enabled him to take this new step is the use of an iPad.
It offers visual supports and prompts to help Nathan interact with the other children. "Just to say 'Hi, how are you?' and then they know that he may not say anything on the way to school but they're just so good at talking to him."
Nathan Carter is one of a number of children throughout the country taking part in research by the University of Canterbury.
A senior lecturer, Dean Sutherland, says the work examines the children's responses to three communication techniques: picture exchange, manual sign language and the use of an iPad. He says most of the participants found the iPad easy to learn and 70% of them preferred it as a communication tool for requesting toys or other objects.
Mr Sutherland says, while the research and iPad use have not been conclusively linked to any communication gains, he has seen big changes in some participants. "We have had a number of children on the study that have gone from being virtually non-verbal to speaking quite fluently and reasonably effectively in social situations."
Nathan's teacher aide, Sam Newbigging, has also seen significant changes in him since they first met back at PlayCentre.
She says Nathan often uses the iPad to record himself doing an activity and then watches it back."It just opens up a new world for him that he can write down and then remember more things. He can go back and process new experiences in his own time and learn from them."
As an example, while I was conducting my interview, Nathan photographed me and detailed my visit in his journal.
Dean Sutherland says the next step will be to see what role the iPad can play in developing more complex language skills.
Meanwhile Bridget Carter says the way her son records himself on the tablet has already taught him some new ways to interact with his peers. She says Nathan loves ten pin bowling and, by recording himself doing it and following visual supports on the iPad, he is now able to initiate contact with other children and ask them to play with him. "He might mention someone's name and say he likes them or he wants to play with them so it is really exciting as parents to see that progress." She says people often under-estimate what children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) are capable of.
"Quite often people focus on what they can't do but there's so much that they can do."
And Bridget Carter says her philosophy has always been to follow Nathan's lead in what he wants to do. "He's telling me now, like taking him to school, 'Mum, go home' when we get to school and things like that."And she says each new achievement can be built on to help with other areas of development. "Think to the stars in terms of what he is capable of because nobody knows but him."
7.31pm - Voices: Sister City collaboration opens Chinese New Year
Its the ultimate of bringing together the two cultures. We've always wanted to do a fusion piece. What is beautiful about this piece was that it was created by all the dancers involved in it, taking on ideas about their cultures and expressed through dance. The three Chinese dancers were bought in specially to work with local dancers. Linda Lim, Festival Organiser, Asian Events Trust, Chinese New Year Wellington.
As the brightly-costumed children of Yau Yi Yun (Chinese Kindergarten) are herded by busy parents in readiness for their performances they stop momentarily to gaze in awe at the professional dancers backstage.
A group of professional New Zealand and Chinese dancers are collaborating to open Chinese New Year in style at the TSB Arena on Wellington's waterfront.
Our own renowned choreographer Deirdre Tarrant (Footnote Dance) has got together with two professional Chinese dancers and one exchange student (who has never danced before in her life!) to combine Chinese, Māori and European symbolism into their movements on the main-stage.
Every year there is a spectacular opening, but this year Nicole Foy is resplendent in a fiery red full-length cheongsam. As she sings 'Pokarekare Ana' Nicole is embraced in the serpentine movements of two huge dragons. Then the Chinese and New Zealand dancers enter and seamlessly weave the whole piece into a dream-like fusion.
How did this collaboration start and how were new friendships forged between countries? Dierdre Tarrant answers;
The Xiamen Association were looking to do collaborations. We've worked together in previous new year festivals but we wanted to develop it to be more interactive and contemporary and particularly to do with youth. So we all went to yum-char and wrote ideas down!
Wellington's sister city Xiamen often sponsors performers to travel to New Zealand during important cultural festivals, along with a host of other sponsors like the Asia New Zealand Foundation. The Wellington Xiamen Association often assist in training young dragon dancers here but this time they brought classical Chinese dancers in to train other New Zealand performers;
We discussed the symbolism, we all came up with ideas; export economy, ocean, water, food, similarities between important symbols like Chinese jade and Māori pounamu. It was a real collaboration - the costumes themselves are painted by calligraphy artist Stan Chan. Then Icebreaker came to the party and developed a special bright red merino shirt for the dancers too. And with three dancers; Anni who came from Xiamen, Jill from Singapore and Ada from Shenzhen City to share their culture with us.
All the way from Xiamen, with a PHD in dance, Anni Wang is both ballet and traditional Chinese folk dance trained at the prestigious Beijing Academy of Dance. Anni's traveled around the world performing and teaching, she's even tutored performing teams involved with the Beijing Olympics. It's Anni's first time to New Zealand so I asked her what she enjoyed the most about this creative collaboration;
It's my first time to do contemporary dance in this way, but I loved it! Diedre is such a good teacher, a good choreographer, I so enjoyed the combination of the dance. I will miss my new friends.
Jill Go (Chinese name Wu Shuqin) hails from Singapore and is completing her second year with the New Zealand school of dance. During this collaboration Jill loved learning about new cultures;
It's really quite an eye opener. I've learned so much about the iconic images of New Zealand, like the kowhai, things I didn't know before. I really enjoy this process of collaboration with others.
Ada is a 17 year old exchange student from Wellington Girls College, she's only been in the country a couple of weeks too. When Dierdre found herself one Chinese dancer short it was Ada's international teacher who connected her with this promising young student from Shenzhen City in China. But Ada was initially very nervous, she hadn't danced on stage since she was in Chinese Kindergarten and this was her first time on stage in front of such a huge audience. Ada loved the experience. I asked Dierdre how Ada fared as the newbie;
Beautiful as the peonie, a case of natural talent. We've go her into my dancing classes now, she's going to keep dancing!
Janet Andrews is the President of the Wellington Xiamen Association. She tells me it was a coup to get Anni over, especially as a dance teacher with huge experience. Taking the opportunity to share Anni's knowledge of the traditional folk dance forms from around China, the association certainly plan to bring Anni back with even more Xiamen performers next time.
With only ten days from Anni's arrival to bring the whole performance together, it was intensely focused and richly rewarding. Both Deirdre and Anni would love to work together again in the future, so Chinese New Year of the Monkey in 2016 will be the time to watch out for their next creation.
7.45pm – The Week in Parliament:
MPs debate the Prime Minister's decision to commit military to Iraq, with the Government blocking Opposition attempts to force a vote on the matter. Sue Moroney's Paid Parental Leave Bill fails to pass final hurdle. Cook Islands Prime Minister makes submission to Social Services Committee. Te Papa bosses attempt to explain a major budget deficit. NZ on Air Board back decision to fund X Factor NZ.