USP Vagahau Niue students publish books

The students of Niue Primary school and Niue High School will be using reading materials in Vagahau Niue thanks to the 10 students of the USP course on Vagahau Niue.

Yesterday afternoon the USP students launched their books written especially for their course on Teaching materials for Vagahau Niue.

Held at the Education department and attended by the Minister of Education Hon. Sauni Togatule and Acting NZ High Commissioner Nigel Ewels.

The reading books are written for three different levels of Vagahau learners; for the emergent reader, the early reader and for the fluent reader.

This is the second year of the Certificate in Vagahau Niue Course first offered by the University of the South Pacific in 2019 and the students will complete their program next year in time to graduate in October.

The lecturers of the Vagahau Niue Course are Birtha Togahai, Sifa Ioane and Pitasoni Tanaki. The published books written by the USP Vagahau Niue students tell stories about everyday life in Niue using their own pictures.

“Going on the journey with the students has taught me three things. Students just learned to appreciate Vagahau Niue as more than just speaking it, secondly Vagahau Niue Grammar is more complex and need to be taught at earlier levels and the third is that Vagahau Niue is the language of the elite because everyone and anyone can speak English but only a few speaks and writes Vagahau Niue fluently.” said Togahai