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📚 Unit Plans → 🤖 Unit 7: Digital Tech & AI Ethics
3 Lessons 6-8 weeks

Unit 7: Digital Technologies & AI Ethics — Navigating the Future of Artificial Intelligence

Critical and practical introduction to AI through Māori data sovereignty, algorithmic justice, and community-led innovation. Students interrogate power in digital systems and prototype future-forward solutions grounded in tikanga.

Year Levels
Years 10–13 (Senior Secondary)
Duration
8–10 weeks · 25–30 hours
Learning Areas
Digital Technologies, Science, Social Studies

📖 Unit Overview

This 8-10 week unit examines the ethical, social, and cultural implications of digital technologies and artificial intelligence. Students explore how emerging technologies impact Indigenous communities, develop critical frameworks for evaluating technological systems, and envision digital futures grounded in tikanga Māori.

Rather than accepting technology as neutral, students analyze power structures embedded in digital systems and develop skills to advocate for ethical, culturally-responsive technological development.

🌟 Contemporary Context (2025): This unit responds to rapid AI development including ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, and image generators like DALL-E and Midjourney. It highlights indigenous-led AI initiatives like Te Hiku Media's Papa Reo (world's first Indigenous-owned speech recognition AI) as models for ethical technology development grounded in data sovereignty and community control.

Year Levels: Years 10-13 (Senior Secondary)
Duration: 8-10 weeks (25-30 hours)
Learning Areas: Digital Technologies, Science, Social Studies

📋 NZC Curriculum Alignment

This unit addresses achievement objectives across multiple learning areas of the New Zealand Curriculum.

💻 Digital Technologies / Hangarau Matihiko

DTECH 5-3 Designing & Developing

Understand how to design, develop, and evaluate digital systems that address authentic purposes.

Unit Connection: Students evaluate existing digital systems for bias and design culturally-responsive alternatives.
DTECH 5-4 Digital Systems

Understand how digital systems are designed, developed, tested, implemented, and evaluated.

Unit Connection: Lesson 2 critically examines AI development processes and identifies where bias enters systems.

🔬 Science / Pūtaiao

NOS 5-2 Nature of Science

Appreciate that scientific knowledge and theory develop as new evidence becomes available and as existing evidence is viewed in new ways.

Unit Connection: Examines how AI/ML systems generate knowledge and the epistemological implications of algorithmic decision-making.

🌏 Social Studies / Tikanga-ā-Iwi

SS 5-10 Place & Environment

Understand how technological developments impact on society and the environment.

Unit Connection: Throughout unit - examines how digital technologies reshape social relationships, power structures, and cultural practices.

💡 Key Competencies / Ngā Pūkenga Matua

🤔 Thinking

Students develop critical evaluation frameworks for assessing technological systems and their societal impacts.

🤝 Relating to Others

Understanding how technology mediates relationships and shapes community connections in digital spaces.

🌱 Participating & Contributing

Advocating for ethical technology development and participating in digital sovereignty movements.

🔍 Managing Self

Developing healthy relationships with technology and making informed choices about digital tool use.

🎓 Pedagogical Approach

Critical Technology Studies

This unit rejects technological determinism, instead positioning technology as shaped by social, cultural, and economic forces. Students learn to ask who benefits and who is harmed by specific technological developments.

Indigenous Data Sovereignty

Grounded in principles of data sovereignty and drawing on Te Mana Raraunga's work, students explore how Māori communities can exercise control over data about their people, lands, and knowledge systems. Te Hiku Media's Papa Reo project serves as a real-world exemplar of Indigenous-led AI development.

Hands-On Exploration

Students directly engage with AI tools (ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini, image generators), prompt engineering, and digital systems to develop practical literacy alongside critical analysis skills. Learning by doing builds both technical competence and critical awareness.

Current & Relevant (2025 Context)

Unit content reflects November 2025 AI landscape including generative AI explosion, ongoing debates about AI regulation, and growing Indigenous data sovereignty movements globally. Students engage with actual current events and real-world AI ethics challenges.

✅ Assessment Overview

Formative Assessment (Throughout Unit)

  • Lesson 1: AI myth-busting accuracy, knowledge systems comparison quality
  • Lesson 2: Bias case study analysis, justice framework application
  • Lesson 3: Personal ethics framework construction, scenario reasoning
  • Lesson 4: Tikanga design principles integration, prototype quality
  • Lesson 5: Engagement with vision creation process

Summative Assessment (Lesson 5)

🎯 Digital Futures Vision Project - Students create a compelling vision of Māori digital sovereignty in 2050

Format Options:

  • Written narrative (short story or news article from 2050)
  • Visual art (illustration, digital art, storyboard)
  • Video/audio (mock documentary, podcast, TikTok from future)
  • Tech prototype (app/system sketch with explanation)
  • Policy proposal (official digital sovereignty framework document)

Assessment Criteria (see Lesson 5 for full rubric):

  • Imagination & creativity in envisioning positive futures
  • Cultural grounding in tikanga Māori and tino rangatiratanga
  • Technical understanding demonstrating unit learning
  • Pathway thinking (realistic steps from present to future)
  • Presentation quality and communication clarity

→ View Full Summative Assessment Details in Lesson 5