Dycomm
For a group or pair dycomm task, where the students have different but essential bits of information they need to combine, give one student some information from a birthday invitation (the start time, the day of the week, and the venue) and the other student different information (the name of the birthday girl or boy, the finish time, and the month) – see resource sheet 7.4. Get them to ask each other questions and give each other answers in te reo Māori to combine their information in order to create the complete invitation.
Alternatively, you could give one of the students some information about the first three days of a local community Matariki celebration and the other student some information about the programme for the remaining four days. Can they combine their information and use their Māori to fill in the respective information gaps in order to get the whole picture (the week’s programme for the celebration)?
Even more difficult would be the two-way negotiation needed to decide on the seating arrangements for a celebratory hākari (feast), if you give each student half the guest list and pieces of information about, for example:
– why certain guests may want to sit next to each other
– who has a partner
– who speaks Māori
– which guests are elders
– which guests are young people.
Dycomms (information gap tasks) do not need to be done in person. They could be done by email, texting, or Skype. The main thing is that your students negotiate meaning with each other. More information about dycomm tasks can be found under the heading "Using tasks and activities" on this page.