Making the Ontario Curriculum Work for Learners

“Headwaters Academy students will meet or exceed all expectations of the Ontario curriculum.” 

This has long been our promise at Headwaters Academy.  I’m reminded, in writing and saying this, to be humble as I’d much rather say that our students will “meet and most likely exceed all expectations”, such is my confidence in the value of restructuring school such that it meets the needs of students rather than adults.  But, aside from our larger concepts of putting children back in to their world and community (Trailblazer Thursdays, Research and Design classes, Outdoor Education, and Entrepreneurship come to mind immediately as hallmarks of our program), how will we, in the ‘nuts and bolts’ of regular school life, achieve this mandate?

Enter our curriculum.  Dr. Barb Smith has been writing and leading our ever-growing team of writers in producing curricular resources that will form that backbone to students’ day to day work.  I must stop here to admit, that as an experienced educator, I feel much like the majority of teachers when I hear the words ‘curricular resources’.  My mind almost immediately switches off as I know, with mounds of research to back it up, that it is the teacher that makes the biggest difference upon student outcomes.  However, beyond school reform and selecting excellent teachers (our first round of finalists all made note of how rigourous our standards are when it comes to teacher selection and how they will now seek out other employers who seek the same), curriculum is the next biggest influence on student outcomes.  So how is ours different?

First, Dr. Smith and her team have, over the past 30 years, taken the 10,000 piece jigsaw that makes up the Ontario curriculum and made sense out of it.  She finds pieces of the curriculum that are alike, groups them, and boils them down to essential skills.  In a metaphorical sense she takes  a 10,000 piece jigsaw and puts the sections together to make it make sense:

The team then sorts out pieces that might be best taught together.  For instance, knowing that we will undoubtedly be studying the local ski industry as part of our community studies (integrating science, social studies, math, and language) Barb has included a look at Blue Mountain snowfall data.  This study, in and of itself, provides students with the opportunity to use their unit conversions, addition skills, multiplication and division skills (if they’re able), graphing, and data interpretation/management.  It also has the flexibility, for a struggling math learner, to be just one of these things.  Making this decision on complexity beyond what’s on the paper becomes the domain of the student and teacher together… but we can easily see the adaptability of this study for a number of grade levels (this assignment falls within Junior Stream math resource, indicating Grades 3-5 with reach to Grade 6).

Did I also mention that the team looks for local connections such as ski areas, or, in later lessons, the Thornbury Fish Ladder?

Another part of the planning process involves making decisions about places where focused study, of a longer duration, would benefit students.  For instance, in the Language Arts program our curriculum moves students through poetry, tall tale writing, short stories, and finally to the production of a novel with a sustained focus in each area to promote mastery of the craft.

Finally, I’d like to display here my favourite part of our curricular resources (as the boring principal I am!).  At the front and back of each resource Dr. Smith and her team have shown how and where we meet each of the Ontario curricular standards.  This provides parents, students, and teachers with a quick snapshot-guarantee that we are, in fact, giving students the opportunity to “meet or exceed all Ontario curricular expectations” (and, I should note, Barb has also aligned these expectations with the Common Core and Alberta curriculum – thus ensuring a VERY well-rounded program!).

{All sample work taken from the Headwaters Academy Junior Stream Math Resource – Part Numbers.  All copyrights reserved.}