David Riley

 I have 15 years teaching experience as an English and Drama teacher. I was Head of the English Department at Tangaroa College for 3 years. I am now Head of Performing Arts and Specialist Classroom Teacher.  Because the literacy needs of our students are so great I have had extensive training in understanding literacy and in designing strategies to improve it.  My teaching practise has been referred to in a book on educational theory: Listen to Culture, by Professor Dr. Angus MacFarlane of Canterbury University [NZCER 2004].  Selected to participate in a research project out of Waikato University – ‘The teaching of literature in multicultural schools’.  Literacy strategies I have used were outlined in an address by Professor Terry Locke [Education Department, Waikato University] at a conference of the New Zealand Association for Research in Education. Locke, T., with Riley, D. (2007).What happened to educational criticism? Engaging with a paradigm for observation. Paper presented at Education in the Pacific: NZARE Annual Conference, Christchurch, 4-7 December, 2007  In 2009 my work with a rap club for disengaged students featured in the New Zealand Herald, Radio New Zealand and Television One.  Completed writing a book called We Are the Rock. It is a collection of profiles of achievers with Niuean ancestry – such as Frank Bunce. It is written for teenagers. The book is soon to be published by Little Island Press [Auckland].  I am currently working on my next book for teenagers – an authorised biography of the rugby league player Benji Marshall.  Member of Advisory Group with the Ministry of Education to develop a Senior Secondary Teaching and Learning Guide for the Arts in 2010. The guides were published in two parts, the first relating to pedagogy , the second specific examples of approaches within a range of disciplines and contexts. The guide for the Arts aims to foster innovative teaching practice in secondary schools as part of a process supporting The New Zealand Curriculum implementation plan.