Nehemiah Kuhaulua

Ms. Terry

Senior Seminar

26 September 2019

Expert Interview Summary and Reflection

Expert Interview: Kumu Kane, 8th Grade Hawaiian Studies Teacher,

September 26th, 2019. 8:40-9:10, Room 101

My Expert Interview was with Kumu Kane, the 8th grade Hawaiian Studies teacher. It
was a very easy-going conversation, very calm and our conversations had an easy flow. I
showed him a schedule I made of the first two months I plan to teach and we went over
scheduling the classes so Hawaiian Studies can be earlier in the day instead of the afternoon. I
asked him if there are kids who absolutely don’t care about the culture and aren’t as interested.
Of course, there are a few but those kids are the ones who are against school in general. I
explained that I don’t want to take away class time from their regular lessons so using the last 20
minutes of class will work out fine. When the kids start getting the hang of things, then we can
use less time. Something I also plan on doing with the students is to take them out paddling to
give them more hands-on experience of the culture. Kumu Kane said it’s a good idea to have
them do it as a grade, like a beach day, instead of individual classes. While talking about the
project as a whole, I asked if there are ways for me to convince the kids to look into the culture
more and Kumu Kane said I can definitely try. Persuasion will be my best friend during this
project. He used the quote, “You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make it drink.” I can
introduce the kids to the culture, but it’s up to them if they want to dive deeper. I can steer them
in the right direction and give them insight, they can obviously use the knowledge in a positive
way, but if they want to take it farther or not is their choice. My goal is to have them interested in
the culture and if I can have at least one kid ask me to teach them more than I know I reached my
goal.
We also discussed the classroom as a whole. There are about 23-25 kids per classroom
and there are three blocks in the whole grade so that’s about 70 students. I can safely say I’m
very nervous to deal with that many kids. I asked if there are any students who I should look out
for, like the students who are disruptive, but Kumu Kane said this year’s batch is calmer and
nicer than last years. I’m excited but also a little scared, a room full of 13-year-olds is worse than
a pack of rabid dogs, in my opinion, both can chew me up but one of them will leave me
emotionally scarred. A big piece of advice Kumu Kane gave me is repetition is the only way
they’ll retain anything. I’ll need to constantly go over the words with them until they can recite
everything without my help. I also want to teach at least one student the calls for E Ho Mai so
they can call it without me. I feel like the hula will be harder because not everyone can dance,
even if they learn the basics, so I’ll need to be extra patient with them. I also told Kumu Kane
that even after my senior project is complete, I’ll still be in the classrooms to help out when
graduation is nearing. On Monday I’m going into the third period block, 8C, and introduce
myself and the project. I won’t start teaching them yet, I want to get to know them better and see
how they behave in the classroom. I’m excited for this project because it involves two things I
enjoy, teaching kids and Hawaiian culture. I can’t wait to start.

Here are some of the questions I asked:

● If there are kids who don’t care about the culture at all, how can I change their minds?

● Is it possible to take the students paddling to give them more hands-on experiences of the

culture?

● How do you keep them engaged?

● Can we use the last 20 minutes of class for me to teach them?

● How many students do you have per classroom?