Ngā Takohanga e Wha - The Four Responsibilities

A paper by Centres of Innovation (COI) team members from Round two COI, Te Kōpae Piripono.  This paper discusses leadership in Early Childhood Education (ECE) from within a whānau context, where all members of a community are viewed as leaders. The paper also proposes that leadership be viewed in relation to four key responsibilities: Being Responsible, Having Responsibility, Taking Responsibility and Sharing Responsibility.

Introduction
Early childhood COI are part of New Zealand's early childhood strategic plan, Pathways to the Future, Ngā Huarahi Arataki (2002), whose goal is, to "foster research and development in the ECE sector and reflect New Zealand's heritage of ingenuity and innovation," (p. 15). The objective of COI is to help improve quality in ECE services by sharing innovative ECE practice, and by reflecting on quality practices using action research. The first cycle of six centres began in 2003.

Te Kōpae Piripono is an immersion Māori ECE centre, based in New Plymouth. In 2004, Te Kōpae Piripono was announced, along with three other New Zealand centres, as a Round two COI. A central focus of Te Kōpae Piripono's research is the role of whānau and leadership in enhancing young children's learning and development.

Discussion and literature about leadership in ECE tend to focus on the roles and responsibilities of professional teaching communities. This paper encourages us to consider a different perspective. It argues that, for Māori at least, leadership and learning are best fostered in the context of whānau, where all members of a community are viewed as leaders, in their own right and in their own way. The paper also proposes that, within this whānau context, leadership be viewed in relation to four key responsibilities - Being Responsible, Having Responsibility, Taking Responsibility and Sharing Responsibility. The concept of the Four Responsibilities seeks to strip away traditionally understood Western structures and notions about leadership and, instead, focus on what really matters - people and relationships.

Leadership in ECE
Many writings on leadership in ECE focus predominantly on the roles of formal leaders in ECE centres, that is, centre directors, supervisors and teachers. This literature assumes that any debate about this topic relates to organisational and professional leadership. Even articles that critically analyse leadership in ECE (Moriarty, 2002) tend to approach it from the dominant discourse of the early childhood professional whose role and responsibility it is to "devolve" power to families in decision-making processes. Often, little is discussed about the role and involvement of children and both their immediate and extended families. Rodd (1998) argues effective leadership in early childhood is about striving to create a community of practice and providing a high quality service. These factors, she argues, contribute to setting the "tone and psychological climate" that are the hallmark of a "quality programme".

However, Lambert (2002, p. 38) argues, "Everyone has the right, responsibility and ability to be a leader". Leadership, she points out, is often construed as being the work of the leader. According to Lambert, leadership should be viewed as enabling "reciprocal processes" among people so they can create new meanings toward a shared goal. Therefore, leadership becomes, "manifest within the relationships in a community, manifest in the spaces, the fields among the participants, rather than in a set of behaviours performed by an individual leader" (Lambert, 1995, pp. 32-33). Kagan and Bowman (1997) argue leadership in ECE is a social construct that involves a set of reciprocal relationships, rather than a static entity, or a set of attributes or competencies. Bryson (in McLeod, 2002) describes leadership as being a "collective enterprise, involving many people playing different roles at different times" (p. 38). Pellicer (2003) adds that leadership is much more than a position, a title, or a mandate to be in charge, and more than a set of personal qualities or complex skills. Sergiovanni (1992, as cited in Pellicer, 2003), maintains that the "heart" of leadership is what a person believes, values, dreams about and is committed to.

Lambert (1995) contends that leadership is made visible not by the position people have but by what they do and how they behave. These "acts of leadership", she argues, are quite different to "role leadership", because they enable participants in a community (in our case Te Kōpae Piripono whānau) to be leaders in their own way. Leadership, Lambert argues, is therefore viewed as an "inclusive field of processes" (p. 47), where all members have the opportunity to be leaders. Lambert adds it is important that all members of a learning community gain similar skills, "in order for them to participate fully in the processes of creating communities together" (p. 102).

Bryson and Crosby (2004, p. 298) argue that effective leadership in community organisations and communities is "a collective enterprise involving many people playing different roles at different times". Indeed, the same people will be leaders at times and followers at times in the pursuit of a common goal or vision. Raelin (2003) challenges us to take a "fresh" look at traditional notions of leadership and "follower-ship". He argues that the use of the word follower is inappropriate in any discussion about leadership, because it has connotations of "doing what you are told because you are less valuable than the leader" (p. 36). However, leadership and follower-ship are one in the same process (Raelin, 2003; Kagan and Bowman, 1997).

"If we have reached a point in our organisational evolution that we no longer need leaders 'out in front', then in the same vein, we no longer need our followers 'back in line' (Raelin, 2003, p. 36). Crosby and Bryson (2005) promote the idea of a "shared-power" world where leadership rests with those both with and without formal positions of authority. They argue that a shared power situation:

Enhances the power of the participants beyond the sum of their separate capabilities. ... We see power as not just the ability to make and implement decisions (a traditional view) but also the ability to sanction conduct and, most important, to create and communicate shared meaning (Crosby and Bryson, 2005, p. 29).

Whānau as the context for leadership, learning and development
Māori early childhood education is predominantly born out of whānau, hapu and iwi educational aspirations for their tamariki mokopuna (children and grandchildren). The best-known Māori early childhood institution is Te Kōhanga Reo (the Māori language nest). However, there are also Whare Kōhungahunga (Māori immersion early childhood centres) and Puna Kōhungahunga (whānau playgroups). Māori early childhood services are mainly whānau run and whānau driven.

Because of the emphasis on whānau, Māori early childhood systems and leadership structures tend to follow traditional Māori cultural norms. At an organisational level, there is a requirement to follow kawa and tīkanga-conventions, protocols and customs. These include the conventions of pōwhiri (welcome), poroporoaki (farewell), tangihanga (funeral rites), hui (formal and informal whānau meetings), hākari (whānau celebrations) and haerenga (whānau excursions). This whānau context also informs and influences the nature of social interaction and relationships, and the distribution of various roles and responsibilities. Everyone's skills, abilities and contributions are integral to achieving the collective aspiration. Therefore, rather than denoting position, authority and recognition, leadership from this perspective tends to focus on contribution and responsibility. Hond-Flavell wrote of the Kōpae Piripono approach:

Whānau (family) is intrinsic to kaupapa Māori and a fundamental element of the Te Kōpae Piripono paradigm. Whānau is both the philosophical context and the structural and functional vehicle for this educational initiative. In the whānau context of Te Kōpae Piripono it is expected that the children will experience a kaupapa Māori early childhood education that will provide them and their families the springboard to fulfilled lives unencumbered by any sense of inadequacy, self-doubt or insecurity that has been the legacy of colonisation for so many other Māori (Bishop and Glynn, 1999), (Hond-Flavell, 2005, p. 2).

Hond-Flavell argues the ongoing learning and development of the entire whānau at Te Kōpae Piripono both underpins and enhances children's own learning and development.

Every member of Te Kōpae Piripono has a contribution to make to the whānau that is valued in its own right. Everyone benefits in some way, in addition to the personal satisfaction and emotional reward that derives from participation in the Te Kōpae Piripono whānau (2005, p. 23).

In metaphorical terms each member (adult or child) of Te Kōpae Piripono is located at some level of the poutama, the learning and development staircase. Rates of progress are variable, depending on personal circumstances, however all movement is upwards. This is the poutama of whānau development and every member of Te Kōpae Piripono is in training for leadership roles (2005, p. 26).

This whānau-learning concept sits comfortably with some western literature/authors. Lambert (1998) talks about leadership being 'the reciprocal learning processes that enable participants in a community to construct meaning toward a shared purpose' (p. 18). She asserts that leadership in this context means learning with and among members of a community that shares goals and visions. Lambert focuses on teachers as leaders. However, transposing these ideas into a whānau context reveals striking similarities. Lambert argues that working in this model of leadership, members:

• convene and facilitate dialogue (hui and narrative)
• mentor newer members (tuakana/teina - the concept of the older sibling looking after and guiding a younger sibling)
• pose inquiry questions (the concept of ako, interchangeable learning and teaching roles, Tamati, 2005)
• invite others to engage and participate in new ideas (te whakawhanake whānau).

According to Stoll, Fink and Earl (2003), effective leaders honour the uniqueness of each group member and use their strengths to try to modify their weaknesses to optimise the ultimate focus - young children's learning and development. The result of such leadership, they argue, is a "moving wheel" populated with colleagues who are committed to learning, learn together, and share a belief that learning should be valued for its own sake and for others' well being and development. Lambert (1995) argues that, within the context of reciprocal relationships anyone can choose to lead in such a leader/participant relationship.

A whānau-learning concept also links with Raelin's concept of leadership practice, with the following characteristics:

• Concurrent: More than one leader can operate in any community at the same time
• Collective: The community does not solely depend on one individual to mobilise action or make decisions on others' behalf
• Collaborative: All members of the community, not the position leader, are in control of and may speak for the entire community. Leaders realise that everyone counts, every opinion and contribution sincerely matter
• Compassionate: Each member of the community is valued regardless of his of her background or social standing and all points of view are considered, regardless of whether they conform to current thought processes. By demonstrating compassion, one extends unadulterated commitment to preserving the dignity of others.

Ngā Takohanga e Wha /The Four Responsibilities
He aha te mea nui o te ao? He tangata, he tangata, he tangata.

Te Kōpae Piripono's research question hits at the heart of two fundamental concepts outlined in this paper: leadership and whānau.

How does whānau development at Te Kōpae Piripono foster leadership, across all levels, to enhance children's learning and development?

How might leadership look for an individual whānau member, be that a child, a parent or a teacher? And, what might it specifically entail for the whānau as a collective whole? These are the questions Te Kōpae Piripono has been pondering as part of our COI research. Just as the concept of whānau is an interrelated mix of roles, responsibilities and relationships, so too is leadership - both individual and collective - a negotiation of these three concepts.

The articulation of our definition of leadership is a fascinating process. It causes us to consider not only our own individual philosophies but also our collective ones. More than this, it encourages us to consider our shared understandings as well as differences and challenges to our own thinking. At Te Kōpae Piripono, we believe that if you take the traditional western hierarchical structure out of the thinking about leadership, you are left with people and relationships. Therefore, if we follow on from Lambert's argument, that every person has a right, responsibility and ability to lead, then every person at Te Kōpae - whether adult or child - is a leader. For us, leadership is about four key responsibilities: Te Whai Takohanga - Having Responsibility; Te Mouri Takohanga - Being Responsible; Te Kawe Takohanga - Taking Responsibility; and Te Tuku Takohanga - Sharing Responsibility. The following demonstrates our evolving theory of leadership at Te Kōpae Piripono:

• Te Whai Takohanga - Having Responsibility relates to having designated roles and positions of responsibility.
• Te Mouri Takohanga - Being Responsible relates to an individual's attitude and actions. Being responsible is about being professional, acting ethically and appropriately, being honest, being positive and open to others and different perspectives.
• Te Kawe Takohanga - Taking Responsibility is about courage, risk-taking, having a go, taking up the challenge and trying new things.
• Te Tuku Takohanga - Sharing Responsibility is about sharing power, roles and positions. But more than this it is about relationships. Sharing responsibility denotes an interaction and engagement with others, being able to listen to others' points of view, acknowledging different perspectives and also asking for and providing assistance.

Why use of the term "responsibility"? It is an interesting question to consider. Answering it might perhaps be best done with another question. This paper has already discussed the more widely accepted construct of leadership in ECE, that of those in formal roles who act as enablers, facilitators, net-workers and motivators of teams. But what of the description of people who consider themselves none of these, at least not yet? How do they come to regard themselves and be acknowledged by others, as leaders in their own right? It is through having responsibility and sharing responsibility, than being encouraged and supported to take responsibility, that whānau members - individually and collectively - come to be responsible? With the support of the whānau, individuals come to understand the important role they play in driving their own and others' learning. As Lambert (2002, p. 38) puts it, our definition of leadership determines how people participate in the notion of leadership.

Leadership is, therefore, both an individual and collective responsibility. Focusing on the notion of responsibility serves to remove the spotlight on people's status, rank and position. It offers no commentary on people's feelings, fears, or lack of confidence. Rather, it articulates the expectation of everyone's contribution and involvement. The "four responsibilities" implies a person's right and ability to lead. In our view, every person is already a leader, whether they realise it or not. The concept of responsibility encourages and challenges us to consider the nature and level of our courage and commitment to ourselves and others, to step up to the plate, in our shared endeavours as a whānau learning community. What people do for their own and others' ongoing learning - sincerely, genuinely and passionately - is both the essence and the evidence of leadership.

As Crosby and Bryson (2005, p. 49) put it, leadership begins with understanding "what truly matters to you". For those least accustomed to the idea that they are leaders in their own right, summoning the courage to step up and "take responsibility" is probably their greatest challenge. Yet, for others "sharing responsibility" might be their challenge. It is also important to note that "being responsible" is an essential component of each of the four responsibilities. Traditional definitions of leadership in ECE are most closely aligned to that of "having responsibility". While this is an important component of leadership it is not the only one. Just as importantly, and interrelated, are the other responsibilities - being, taking and sharing. In fact, having responsibility could be seen as a natural evolution of the other three responsibilities.

Conclusion
The Four Responsibilities are, fundamentally, about individuals and how they perceive themselves. They are, and perhaps more importantly, also about relationships, perceptions, feelings, attitudes, and interactions with others. How people interact and perceive themselves and their relationships with others plays a central role in what people think and do as leaders. But leadership is about choice. We can choose to be or do - or otherwise - any of the four responsibilities. Contemplating leadership from this perspective encourages us to consider ourselves in relation to "having, being, taking and sharing" responsibility. What do we need to exercise the four responsibilities? And how can we foster a learning community where everyone is a leader and where everyone's contribution matters? They are questions only we ourselves can answer.

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Author contact details

Te Kōpae Piripono
Old Barrett Street Hospital Complex
34 Barrett Street
Ngāmotu
New Plymouth
New Zealand
Telephone/fax: 06 758 3751
Email: tekopaepiripono@xtra.co.nz

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