Gaps and issues remain with K-6 social studies curriculum

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As a instructor, I’ve been eagerly anticipating the brand new Okay-6 social research curriculum draft, as it’ll have a profound impact on our college students for many years to come back. I wish to clarify my perspective on the curriculum, and I encourage you to share your ideas by going to the province’s on-line suggestions survey titled, “Okay-6 Social Research Curriculum Suggestions Kind.”

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One of many largest limitations of the curriculum is that educators have nonetheless not been straight concerned in its creation. “An open letter from eight educators and researchers who had been a part of the Okay-6 curriculum improvement specialist group claims their enter was ‘largely ignored.’ ” (Mertz, March 15, 2024).

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This implies there’s nonetheless an enormous emphasis on memorizing info, versus creating expertise to place info in context, because the curriculum refers to itself as a “knowledge-based curriculum.”

This draft fastened a number of the issues with the final one — the content material is healthier matched to youngsters’s mind improvement — however there are nonetheless gaps in creating a number of views and demanding pondering.

I used ChatGPT to assist me analyze the curriculum. Out of 227 verbs within the expertise and procedures part (the principle information for lecturers as they plan classes), the highest 5 expertise talked about are: talk about (44 instances), discover (26 instances), describe (23 instances), determine (14 instances) and evaluate (13 instances).

Vital pondering expertise are talked about, however expertise that really replicate essential pondering comparable to analyze (2), consider (6), synthesize (0), query (0) and infer (1) had been hardly ever recognized. This exhibits additional refinement is warranted.

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In truth, it nearly appears as if a instructor might simply put the curriculum’s “information” part right into a PowerPoint to ship it — it’s not written to encourage a lot time for dialogue or utility based mostly on the sheer quantity of content material required to be coated.

College students may be overwhelmed by the quantity of memorization required. As an illustration, Grade 5 college students are anticipated to find out about 23 separate empires and civilizations as examples of “historic civilizations.”

Whereas the curriculum draft does talk about numerous teams comparable to First Nations, Métis, Inuit and francophones all through, often these cultures are taught individually from their interactions with different teams or are explored in odd methods.

For instance, in Grade 4, college students are requested to: “Hypothesize completely different views on colonization,” somewhat than having college students discover, examine or talk about what the assorted views had been. In Grade 3, there’s a massive part on settlers coming to Alberta, with none point out of interactions between the First Nations and settlers.

Primarily based on the content material proposed in grades 3 and 4, this might be a superb time to provide an acceptable introduction to residential colleges, as this might be rather more consistent with the Reality and Reconciliation Fee‘s calls to motion, versus first mentioning this in Grade 9.

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Whereas the content material matters are rather more acceptable, there are some sections which have both odd or doubtlessly complicated ideas for the designated grade stage.

In Grade 1, college students are speculated to find out about “people demonstrating belonging to Canada by following traditions . . . singing God Save the King.’ ” They’re requested to “follow nationwide traditions.”

Singing O Canada, which is referenced, appears acceptable, however God Save the King appears misplaced.

In Grade 2, college students are anticipated to know ideas comparable to exporting, importing the Supreme Court docket of Canada and “on the federal stage . . . chief of the Opposition,” which appear extra acceptable at larger ranges.

In Grade 3, it explains: “Colonists introduced perception methods and methods of organizing society to the colonies, together with . . . management.” This phrasing appears to suggest there have been no present beliefs, methods of organizing or management already right here.

The province has given a brief timeline to supply suggestions on the curriculum draft, till March 29. I’d encourage Albertans to supply additional ideas to higher refine this draft so Alberta can proceed our legacy as one of many main training methods on the earth.

Brett Dibble is a highschool social research instructor in Calgary.

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