Hello everyone! I hope the summer's been great for you.
The new HME 2013-2014 schedule has been set, and you can see it here. Details will be sent out for our first evening meeting shortly.
In the meantime, there's some information regarding the new Social Sciences curriculum that one of our members kindly forwarded:
1. New Curriculum
This has even slightly modified so make sure to look that up but this will help with reference to what the next point speaks on.
2. The following points were made to us by the Halton Region Board Liaison Karen Wolridge about our programs and the important features to focus on.
Points
1. The teachers will be new to this SS curriculum - so any visual cues/charts/graphics or word/phrase hooks that are lifted from the Curriculum itself will be useful - sort of like a shortcut for teachers.
2. Within any SS field trip the teacher now more than ever must consider prefacing the trip as well as following it up within the classroom. She suggested an e-activity sent to the teacher before hand (pre-activity questions) to prep their visit and a possible take home activity after visiting.
3. The mandate of all subject areas within all Units of Study is integration with other curriculum subjects.
4. Identifying the curriculum strand that our programs relate to is good - but where possible we should choose an element(s) in our programs which relate to these two: OVERALL EXPECTATIONS, RELATED CONCEPTS.
5. The INQUIRY PROCESS within OVERALL EXPECTATIONS is an important facet to connect our stream's to.
6. The Citizen Education Framework graphic on page 10 is an essential template for them.
7. Consult page 192 for anything to do with Maps & Globes....As well look at page 147 B1.2 under Skills/Activities...keep these in mind.
8. What is really essential for every program stream is to identify or highlight a BIG IDEA. Teachers will be looking for this as a validation/reason for taking a trip. It may be this simple (internally) for them...they have to have a BIG IDEA to justify the BIG BUCKS (bussing).
9. She made sure that we note that Native connections, studies where applicable to Grade 5 which was always covered in Grade 6 but has shifted to Grade 5... so there will be a slew of Grade 5 teachers that will be looking for assistance with their class - potentially a field trip.
