Research process for finding out our local history of Waerenga-O-Kuri

We wanted to know about the local history of buildings and early farming in our district, as our school is over 100 years old. The country store across the road from the school is still open, and the hall is being used every Friday by the community and often by the school as well.

Our class used the SAUCE Inquiry model by Trevor Bond.

S: setting the scene (asking the rich question as a focus for researching)
A: acquiring the research
U: using the research acquired
C: celebrating the understanding of the research
E: evaluation.

The most important skill we learned was to ask the right question. We used Trevor Bond's rubric for questioning and found that at the beginning most of the class were not very good at posing a rich question, so were at stage 3. But we have improved. Most of us are now asking questions at stage 5 or 6. Selecting the right question took a long time, but it helped when we came to searching for information. We kept looking at the question while researching so answering the question became our focus.

Some of the questions we wanted to find answers for were:-

What has happened to the store since being established in 1888?
How tough was early farming and why did they do it?
What is the early history of Waerenga-O-Kuri?
When was the hotel built and what future did it have?
What is the history of our local hall and why was it rebuilt in 1989?
What is the history of our school?
What effect did Cyclone Bola have on our district?

Our information sources were the school centenary booklet, our parents and grandparents, and a history of Waerenga-O-Kuri which was written and published by one of the student's grandmothers, Mrs Hall.