What Kōkiri Lab is

A STEM Inquiry Platform. A PhD research instrument. A community learning programme.

The problem

Learning improves when thinking is visible, structured, and grounded in evidence. Most tools capture outputs. Kōkiri Lab captures reasoning — how students think, not just what they produce.

How we built it

Kōkiri Lab follows a design-based research approach, developed through iterative cycles in real classrooms. It is grounded in inquiry-based learning, constructivism, and epistemic cognition. Built alongside a PhD at Monash University studying whether digital trace data can detect reasoning quality in Year 7–8 students.

The kōkako

In te ao Māori, the kōkako is a forest voice — curious, persistent, and carrying what matters across distance. In Kōkiri Lab, the kōkako is your design partner: it asks, it never replaces your judgment. The Māui story reminds us that small, careful actions can sustain something essential. VOICE is the inquiry arc — Venture, Observe, Infer, Create, Evaluate — and the wattle tracks how your scientific voice deepens over time: from first measurement to full tohu.