Our whānau are spread across the country. We have 7 children and 14 mokopuna. Only one of our children has full time work while the others struggle to find work. All our mokos have done or do now participate in early childhood education. We come from a proud Māori family. Our parents are actively involved in iwi and Māori development activities. They have passed on to us and in turn our mokopuna the value of land, of home, of whānau and of whanaungatanga.
With the support of whānau ora, we did a PATH plan for ourselves where we came together with other whānau in a marae-based setting, to look at where we wanted to be as a collective whānau in 20 years time. It was a wānanga, 15 adults and 22 children – where we soaked up new learning about our whānau, our marae, our iwi what whānau ora means to us and ourselves.
Our Whānau Ora plan has goals that are about staying connected as whānau, looking after our health, developing our papakainga and setting up a whānau enterprise. Our work on a PATH brought us together. The PATH honored what we wanted as a whānau .
We are grateful for the opportunity to come together as whānau and we want to support other whānau to do the same.
Advice to researchers:
- Use tools that help Whānau talk to one another about where they’re heading.
- The PATH is an awesome tool. It’s transformational. Whānau Ora has changed our lives.