Did Maori People Sail to Antarctica 1300 Years Ago? How Can We Know?

Analyze short videos and text excerpts for messages about Maori voyages to Antarctica, about credibility in media messages and about which voices are included or excluded in historical research.

Grade Levels

Upper Elementary, Middle School

Objectives

• Students will learn about how and why Maori people have traveled to Antarctica.

• Students will consider credibility in media reports about historical events.

• Students will reflect on whose voices are considered part of the historical record.

Media Included

• The first video is a trailer for a 2026 film that follows Maori astronomer Professor Rangi Matamua and language expert Mataia Keepa during a winter expedition to Antarctica.

• The second is a video posted to Facebook by New Zealander Will Hammond who hosts “Will’s World: Exploring History.”

• The five-page student reading is made up of text excerpts from:

  • An online article published by CNN, a multinational news media company owned by CNN Worldwide, a division of Warner Bros,

  • An 1898 book by Stephenson Percy Smith, a New Zealand author who researched oral histories and wrote about the origins of the Maori people,

  • An article published in the Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand, an independent, national academy of sciences in New Zealand,

  • A response to reading #3 published in the Journal of the Royal Society of New Zealand and

  • An article published in “Massey News,” the official research and campus news service for Massey University in New Zealand.

Guiding Questions

[Objective] Students will learn about how and why Maori people have travelled to Antarctica.

• VIDEO Question: What does this say about why Maori people go to Antarctica?

• TEXT Question: What does this say about Maori voyages to Antarctica?

[Objective] Students will consider credibility in media reports about historical events.

• TEXT Question: How do your experiences and identity shape your judgment about the credibility of each message?

  • Do no harm cautions should apply whenever we ask students to consider the ways in which their identities inform

    their reactions to media documents and potentially charged topics. Each of these documents has the potential

    to spark strong emotions and possibly contentious interactions in a class with diverse gender, racial and political

    identities. Since a teacher cannot know all the identities represented within their classroom it’s important to

    introduce these topics with recommendations and guidelines for respect and compassion for one’s fellow learners.

[Objective] Students will reflect on whose voices are considered part of the historical record.

• VIDEO Question: What does this say about whose stories from the past help guide us in the present?

• TEXT Question: What does this say about whose voices are included and excluded in the historic record?

*This lesson was created in collaboration with Project Look Sharp.