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This paper reports on a collaborative action research project that directed attention to the opportunities Physical Education presents to develop learning associated with three of the key competencies detailed in the New Zealand Curriculum; thinking; managing self; and relating to others. Three teachers in one secondary school explored the meanings each of these key competencies could take on in physical education and, specifically, ways in which adjustments to learning intentions, content, pedagogy and assessment variously helped them bring key competency learning to the fore. Attention is drawn to the benefits teachers saw arising from an enhanced focus on learning, shifts to more student-centred pedagogy, and questions that the research generated for the department's curriculum planning. Discussion also highlights the value of research approaches that emphasise collaboration and support professional learning.

This paper focuses on the significance of curriculum value orientations for curriculum implementation and, therefore, for teacher education. The paper draws on data arising from research undertaken with six Health and Physical Education teachers in Aotearoa New Zealand to explore issues pertinent to Physical Education teacher education (PETE). Selected findings from the study are presented and critically engaged with from a teacher education viewpoint to specifically address (i) considerations relating to students' value orientations that teacher educators need to be cognisant of, and (ii) issues arising for teacher educators seeking to engage with value orientations in undergraduate and/or post-graduate PETE programmes. The paper foregrounds the highly personal nature of value orientations in considering their significance in teacher education programmes and is written from the position of the author as a teacher educator committed to raising student teachers' awareness of value orientations and their influence on curriculum and pedagogy. Attention is drawn to the significance of course content, practicum, critically reflective practice, and programme structures in relation to efforts to embed value orientations into teacher education programmes. (Contains 1 figure.)

Many contemporary international physical education curriculum documents have a socio-cultural and critical orientation, which promotes the implementation of a critical pedagogy. Aotearoa New Zealand is no exception. This paper reflects our ongoing efforts to address, from a practical pedagogic perspective, the implementation of a socio-critical curriculum and articulation of critical pedagogy in senior secondary school physical education. We draw attention to the challenging nature of articulating critical pedagogical theory in school practice. We identify the understanding and interrelationship of social construction, multiple perspectives, and hegemony as key aspects in the teaching and learning process that support the development of student teachers' criticality and in turn their ability to critically analyse. We present these concepts as part of a Critical Analysis Process, a model that is designed to facilitate questioning by student teachers of their own status quo beliefs and practices. It is a model that is a work in progress.

Scholarly work in the field of legal geography has grown dramatically in recent decades. While much legal geography scholarship has been influenced by a European-North American perspective, we argue that a distinctive legal geography scholarship also emanates from outside the dominant perspective. Here, we review research from Australia and New Zealand/Aotearoa and label this work as Antipodean legal geography (ALG). We suggest ALG research has made a significant contribution to global legal geography scholarship through an emphasis on environmental law and policy problem solving and through efforts to de-colonialise and expand legal geography's remit. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Perinatal women are highly vulnerable to developing mental health issues and particularly susceptible to a recurrence of psychiatric illness. Poor mental health during the perinatal period can have long-term impacts on the physical and psychiatric health of both mother and child. A potentially useful strategy to improve women's mental health is through a mobile application teaching mindfulness, an evidence-based technique helping individuals focus on the present moment. Methods: A mixed method, prospective randomised controlled trial. The study group comprise women aged 18 years and over, who are attending the public and private maternity clinics at Mater Mothers' Hospital. A sample of 360 prenatal women will be randomised into the intervention group (with the use of the mindfulness app) or usual care. Participants will remain in the study for 11 months and will be assessed at four timepoints for changes in postnatal depression, mother-infant bonding, and quality of life. A cost-effectiveness evaluation will also be conducted using quality-adjusted life year (QALY) calculations. A random selection of intervention participants will be invited to attend focus groups to give feedback on the mindfulness app. Discussion: Previous studies have found mindfulness interventions can reduce stress, anxiety, depression, and sleep disturbances in a prenatal population. The risks of the intervention are low, but could be of significant benefit for women who are unable to attend face-to-face appointments due to geographical, financial, or time barriers; during endemic or pandemic scenarios; or due to health or mobility issues. Trial registration: This study was approved by the Mater Misericordiae Human Research Ethics Committee (83,589). Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry (ANZCTR) ACTRN12622001581752 (https://www.anzctr.org.au/Trial/Registration/TrialReview.aspx?id=385107&isReview=true). Registered on 22 Dec. 2022. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Much of the evidence translation literature focuses narrowly on the use of evidence in the initial policy formulation stages, and downplays the crucial role of institutions and the inherently political nature of policy making. More recent approaches acknowledge the importance of institutional and political factors, but make no attempt to incorporate their influence into new models of evidence translation. To address this issue, this article uses data from a comparative case study of bowel cancer screening policy in Australia, the United Kingdom and New Zealand, to propose alternative models of evidence incorporation which apply to all stages of the policy process.

Bowel cancer is a serious health problem in developed countries. Australia, the United Kingdom (UK) and New Zealand (NZ) reviewed the same randomised controlled trial evidence on the benefits and harms of population-based bowel cancer screening. Yet only NZ, with the highest age standardised rate of bowel cancer mortality, decided against introducing a bowel cancer screening programme. This case study of policy making explores the unique resource, ethical, institutional and political environments in which the evidence was considered. It highlights the centrality of context in assessing the relative worth of evidence in policy making and raises questions about the suitability of knowledge utilisation strategies.

This paper identifies "quality" as an internationally relevant concept to be problematised in contemporary debates about physical education (PE). Drawing on the conceptualisation of curriculum by B. Bernstein in 1977, pedagogy and assessment as three inter-related message systems of schooling, the paper presents and explores curriculum, pedagogy and assessment as three fundamental dimensions of "quality PE". Discussion addresses what quality in each dimension may mean in PE, and demand in practice. Contemporary initiatives in Australia and New Zealand provide a reference point for exploring the prospective application of quality conceptualised in terms of the three inter-related dimensions. Attention is drawn to frameworks in mainstream education that may be utilised in endeavours to critically review current practices, and inform developments directed towards achieving quality in PE. It is argued that achieving quality in PE requires that quality is pursued and demonstrated within and across curriculum, pedagogy and assessment, and that meanings of quality always need to be contextualised in cultural, social and institutional terms. (Contains 4 notes, 4 tables, and 2 figures.)

The initial unregulated flow of firearms into New Zealand was problematic in terms of the impacts that resulted for the Indigenous population. The tight regulation that followed in the second half of the nineteenth century was akin to a civil war situation, as firepower was denied to groups in rebellion against the Crown. In the twentieth century, as the country stabilised, regulation evolved to a civil setting, encompassing applicant age and suitability and the registration of firearms. Although firearms control remained important over the following decades, by the early 1980s, registration had largely been done away with, and the trend moved from 'prohibited' to 'restricted' types of firearms. The law moved towards greater regulation after the first mass shooting in 1990. However, when it came to the second in 2019, the system reverted to prohibition of the type of firearms used in the atrocity, a rethinking of who was fit and proper to possess a firearm and a reintroduction of comprehensive registration for all firearms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Molecular phylogenetic analyses and morphological characters of the grass supersubtribe Poodinae (tribe Poeae, PPAM clade) were evaluated with the goal of determining the relationships of single‐flowered spikelet genera recently classified in subtribe Cinninae and the sister genus of the New Zealand endemic genus Simplicia. A total of 136 samples representing 40 genera and 105 species were analyzed for three plastid (matK, trnC‐rpoB, trnT‐trnL‐trnF) and two nuclear ribosomal DNA markers (ITS, ETS). The Cinninae subtribe, including Aniselytron, Cinna, Cinnastrum, Cyathopus, and Simplicia, was recovered as monophyletic with weak support only in the combined analysis with known/putative hybrid taxa removed. Cinna (excluding Cinnastrum) resolved as paraphyletic due to the position of the morphologically distinctive Cyathopus. Cinninae are characterized by flat leaf blades, open panicles, small, strongly compressed, single‐flowered spikelets, with a rachilla extension, and lemmas that are awnless or with a short subterminal awn. The genus Cinnastrum is resurrected for Cinna poiformis and differs from Cinna in its broader glumes and subterete caryopsis with solid endosperm. Simplicia is likely most closely related to the southern and eastern Asian genus Aniselytron, with which it shares unequal and short lower glumes and spikelet disarticulation above the glumes, in contrast to the other three genera of the subtribe. The HSAQN clade, which has mainly multi‐flowered spikelets and is sister to Cinninae, is named subtribe Hookerochloinae, including Arctagrostis, Hookerochloa, Nicoraepoa, Saxipoa, and Sylvipoa. The DAD clade, which is known to be of reticulate origin postulated here as involving Cinninae, is named subtribe Dupontiinae, and includes Arctohyalopoa, Arctophila, Dupontia, and Dupontiopsis. These three subtribes, together with subtribes Alopecurinae, Beckmanniinae, and Ventenatinae (along with Brizochloinae not tested here), make up the well‐supported Alopecurinae superclade within supersubtribe Poodinae. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article shows the way in which official security agencies in New Zealand have grown and evolved since 1840. It displays a country which has shown itself repeatedly willing to accept the needs for security intelligence agencies and all of their associated relationships. However, successive generations have increasingly placed restraints around them to ensure that the practices and principles that such agencies operate are in accordance with the restraints and standards that New Zealanders value. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite advancements in surgical techniques and materials for rotator cuff repair procedures, primary repair failures remain common. This study examines the use of electrochemically aligned collagen (ELAC) threads woven into biotextile scaffolds as grafts to repair critical infraspinatus tendon defects in New Zealand White rabbits. Three surgical treatment groups were evaluated: rabbits undergoing direct repair as operative controls, rabbits receiving ELAC scaffolds alone, and rabbits treated with mesenchymal stem cell (MSC)‐seeded ELAC scaffolds. In each animal, the intact, contralateral infraspinatus served as an internal positive control. Tendon–bone constructs were harvested after 3 months in vivo and outcome measures included biomechanical testing, histological staining, and immunohistochemical staining. Biomechanical testing revealed that maximum load‐bearing capacity was comparable between all groups, while MSC‐seeded scaffold repairs exhibited increased stiffness relative to non‐seeded scaffold repairs. Histological staining revealed robust collagen deposition around ELAC fibers and increased cellularity within the continuum of woven scaffolds as compared to native tendon. Immunohistochemical staining revealed presence of collagens I and III in all groups, but procollagen I and the tendon‐specific marker tenomodulin were only observed in seeded and non‐seeded ELAC scaffold repairs. Findings of this pilot study warrant continued investigation of ELAC biotextile scaffolds for repair of critically‐sized rotator cuff tendon defects. © 2018 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Biomed Mater Res Part B: Appl Biomater 107B: 1864–1876, 2019. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article, the author presents her views regarding the criticality in the practice of physical education in schools of New Zealand. She reports that teachers of higher secondary classes encouraged themselves to develop a socio-critical perspective by the adoption of inquiry-based and critical pedagogical approaches. She states that most of the teachers have implemented the physical education practice.

The fragmentation of habitats in intensively managed farming landscapes is often considered to be partly responsible for butterfly population decline in Europe and the USA. Although relatively little is known about New Zealand butterfly ecology, agricultural landscapes in lowland New Zealand are managed similarly to those in Europe and ecosystem services (ES) in these landscapes are generally at a low level. In the northern hemisphere, attempts are being made to address the problem through agri-environment schemes, but such farmer compensation is not available in New Zealand. Instead, landowner- and research-led initiatives are currently the only potential approaches. One such project in the Canterbury province, New Zealand, is the Greening Waipara project. This aims to return native plants to viticultural landscapes and enhance ES, and while research has sought to quantify economic benefits of the project, there has been no work to establish if the plantings are improving or are likely to improve non-target invertebrate biodiversity, for example arthropods that are not biocontrol agents. In the first study of its kind in New Zealand, butterfly surveys were conducted in vineyards and linear mixed modelling techniques were used to identify the most important vegetation and structural features which may influence butterfly distribution. While the native planting areas were not important for butterflies, remnant patches of native vegetation in unproductive areas were vital for sedentary species. These results are discussed in relation to the conservation of native species in New Zealand vineyards and in the context of conservation in and around farmland in general. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article investigates the suspended sediment (SS) loading rates from the Motueka River catchment into Tasman Bay, New Zealand. It identifies the geological formation in the headwaters of the rive as a storm-generated source of highly elevated concentrations of nickel and chromium in river margin sediments. It reveals that an estimated SS discharge of 161,000 tonnes into the bay was the result of a major storm in 2005, focused in the upper catchment.