(Photo from: http://www.temenos.ac.uk/temenos-going-global-2013-conference-and-large-person-centred-groups/)
CREATING A SUSTAINABLE FUTURE: Relating the Ontario Curriculum to Relevant Topics
The
Ontario Social Studies Curriculum Document allows teachers to incorporate a
variety of “Big Ideas” or Themes into their teaching practice that can be
easily built on throughout elementary and secondary school. These themes can
not only be relevant to the expectations within the document itself, but can
also be relevant to the interest of students themselves and current issues occurring.
This blog will focus specifically on the Grade Eight curriculum expectations for
Geography and History, providing various lesson ideas and resources as I
process through this course. To begin, I will focus the remainder of this post
on the theme of Sustainability.
Sustainability is a new addition to the Social
Studies Curriculum Document. However, there is a lot of interaction that can be
done with this theme as well as integration with other subject areas. For
example, students can learn about the various renewable energy sources, which
connects to the Grade 8 Science Curriculum as one of the overall expectations
in the Understanding Structures and Mechanisms strand is, “Assess
the personal, social, and/or environmental impacts of a system, and evaluate improvements
to a system and/or alternative ways of meeting the same needs” (2007, pg. 143).
Moreover, renewable energy can be easily integrated with the Math curriculum
through investigation of word problems based on power generation, wind speeds
etc. The most important aspect of Sustainability, however, is its relevancy.
Students from all over the province should be able to relate to this topic in
one way or another, whether they have seen a renewable resource, or they use
alternative modes of travel that are better for the environment, i.e. a bicycle.
Moreover, environmental education is becoming more and more popular in the
school systems, and students are becoming more aware of their geological
footprints and the implications pollution has on the environment. Sustainability
is a topic students will learn about and built on for the rest of their lives.
National Geographic has great articles and videos that outline the importance of
creating a sustainable community.
(Photo from: http://www.fermeng.ie/services/renewable-energy/)
