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 I happened to look at Te Rangatahi (Book 1) today. I was happily surprised to see that I understood everything in the first chapter. I looked at the final few pages too, and ascertained that I knew most of that content too.

So my method works at least as well as a textbook!

But oh, how tedious and boring that first chapter is, jam-packed as it is with pronouns and family relationships! Its guiding principle must be that it is necessary to drill grammar points in force so they stick. That is certainly not necessary.

Still, I'll skim through the book just to see where my gaps are. 

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Māori Resources used to date

Reference:

Making Māori Sentences – Lyndsay Head 

Te Kete Kupu dictionary/grammar

The Reed Māori Picture Dictionary

Maori Grammar & Conversation (1926) Sir Apirana Ngata 

Te Rangatahi Book 1

Māori Word Frequency List

Clinical Psychology glossary

Neri Rook

Children’s books:

Tangaroa’s gift

I te Tīmatanga

Te Rātaka a Tama Hūngoingoi (Diary of a Wimpy Kid)

Hare Pota me te Whatu Manapou

Kurī Pango

Tamatekapua + CD

Ihenga + CD

The Singing Dolphin

Hatupatu and the Birdwoman

The Legend of the Seven Whales

Cultural:

He Whiriwhiringa

Mihipeka 1

Mihipeka 2

Mihipeka 3

Growing up Māori

Ngā Kōrero a Mohi Ruatapu

Poems, Traditions & Chaunts of the Maories (1853) Sir George Grey 

YouTube:

Māori playlist

Waka Huia TV

Polyglotalot

He Whanau Tata – Keri Kaa

Automatic Language Growth

The Maori Language 

Online:

Google Translate (Māori capability since mid-2019)

Māori dictionary website

Internet Archive

Te Whāriki Online

Spotify:

Everyday Māori

Te Reo Māori podcast

Other: (platforms etc.)

20 Tongues 20 Moons Blog 

Libraries 

Tūhono 

Te reo week 

Excel 

Beamafilm 

Boy (movie)

802

 I went looking online for Youtube videos about te reo Maori. I came across one by Grant Whitbourne that recommended the book Te Rangatahi as the best Maori resource, according to the speaker.

I posted this comment:

I have my own copy of Book 1 (reprinted in 1973). I would agree with you that Te Rangatahi is good, but I don't think it is as good as it could be. Strengths (in my opinion) narratives, illustrations, simplicity, many useful sentences, and structures. Weaknesses (again in my opinion) insufficient scaffolding, unclear objectives (since section headings are in Maori), too many exercises and gap fills, and a 'backwards' arrangement of each chapter i.e. it starts with a narrative which it then breaks down. I would like to see a more bilingual approach where the Maori and the English texts are set side by side. The overall approach of this book is 90% left-brain-style thinking, and only 10% right-brain-style thinking.

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 The first edition of Te Rangatahi (Book 1) was written by Hoani Retimana Waititi (pictured above) and published in 1962. My reprint dates back to 1973, a time when I was still at high school.

What I like about the book is that each chapter starts off with a connected text in Maori that the rest of the chapter unravels. Yesterday I selected sentences from the fifth chapter (Te Wahanga Tuarima: Te Pamu a Hata) that I could only half understand, in the belief that by the time I got to the end of the chapter I would be confident concerning.

Hope that makes sense!