Purpose of this curriculum page is to offer relevant references, resources and support that relate to all Secondary Teachers. Specific discipline references, resources and support can be found within secondary school communities, through school based Department Heads.
Teaching Strategies
Learning is a social constructivist process where teaching students to think and talk together leads to learning that is far deeper and far more lasting. By teaching students to think and talk together they begin to own what they are constructing as opposed to just absorbing information and giving it back to us. Knowledge develops from how people interact with each other, their culture, and society at large. Students rely on others to help create their building blocks and learning from others helps them construct their own knowledge and reality. All learners should be equipped with the skills required to know how to think and talk together in ways that innovate as they look to build and sustain the types of societies, we want our children to live in. ~Building Bigger Ideas (Nichols) and Western Governors University
Check out the following resources as you explore strategies that can be applied to all secondary classrooms as you look to develop a learning environment that promotes open, honest, and informed discussions.
Setting the Tone for Productive Classroom Discussions
Creating a space for students to engage with controversial topics starts with shared norms like “assume best intentions” and “show respect and courage.” ~Edutopia
How to Set the Stage for Challenging Classroom Discussions
Forming Ground Rules (Creating Norms) 
Norms Construction (A Process of Negotiation) Getting Students Talking and Thinking Together
Sentence starters that students use to join a class discussion encourage both academic thinking and social connectedness. ~Edutopia
Encouraging Academic Conversations With Talk Moves
Checklist Goals for Productive
Discussions and Nine Talk Moves
Sample phrases to get you started
using Talk Moves in the classroom.
Productive Talk Moves 
Talk Moves 
Flip the Script: Empowering Students to Ask their Own QuestionsMake Just One Change (Dan Rothstein and Luz Santana)
Drawing on twenty years of experience, the authors present the Question Formulation Technique, a concise and powerful protocol that enables learners to produce their own questions, improve their questions, and strategize how to use them. This deceptively simple yet profoundly important practice results in students who are more curious and engaged, take greater ownership of their own education, and are learning more deeply than ever before.
To learn more, check out The Right Question Institute
Making Student Thinking Visible
Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics, Grades K-12 (Peter Liljedahl)
Building Thinking Classrooms in Mathematics, Grades K-12 helps teachers implement 14 optimal practices for thinking that create an ideal setting for deep learning to occur. This guide: provides the what, why, and how of each practice and answers teachers’ most frequently asked questions; includes firsthand accounts of how these practices foster thinking through teacher and student interviews and student work samples; offers a plethora of macro moves, micro moves, and rich tasks to get started; organizes the 14 practices into four toolkits that can be implemented in order and built on throughout the year.
Note: Despite being written from a lens of math education teachers from all disciplines will find strategies that can be directly applied to their classroom practice.
To learn more, check out 14 Practices of a Thinking Classroom.
Creating a Feedback Culture
The Ethic of Excellence (Ron Berger)
Drawing from his own remarkable experience as a veteran classroom teacher (still in the classroom), Ron Berger gives us a vision of educational reform that transcends standards, curriculum, and instructional strategies. He argues for a paradigm shift—a schoolwide embrace of an “ethic of excellence.” A master carpenter as well as a gifted teacher, Berger is guided by a craftsman’s passion for quality, describing what’s possible when teachers, students, and parents commit to nothing less than the best. But Berger’s not just idealistic, he’s realistic—he tells exactly how this can be done, from the blackboard to the blacktop to the school boardroom.
Visible Learning (John Hattie and Shirley Clarke)Feedback is arguably the most critical and powerful aspect of teaching and learning. Yet, there remains a paradox: why is feedback so powerful and why is it so variable? It is this paradox which Visible Learning: Feedback aims to unravel and resolve.
Combining research excellence, theory and vast teaching expertise, this book covers the principles and practicalities of feedback, including: the variability of feedback, the importance of surface, deep and transfer contexts, student to teacher feedback, peer to peer feedback, and the power of within lesson feedback and manageable post-lesson feedback.
With numerous case-studies, examples and engaging anecdotes woven throughout, the authors also shed light on what creates an effective feedback culture and provide the teaching and learning structures which give the best possible framework for feedback.
To learn more, check out Visible Learning.
Types and Purposes of Feedback
Indigenous Education
Indigenous Graduation Requirement Information
Ministry Information about the Indigenous Graduation Requirement (edited June 2022)
District Information, Initiatives & Resources
District Aboriginal Department
District Aboriginal Language Program
EFP 10-12 Curriculum Support Document here
- This EFP 10 -12 curriculum support, is an ongoing and evolving document from Instructional Services to support school-based communities in their designing of EFP 10-12 courses. This document organizes a district inventory of provincially and locally vetted resources, thematic units from the FNESC teachings guides and hyperlinked resources like podcasts into suggested grade levels. This is not a prescriptive document and likely will evolve within each school community. (edited May 2022)
Graphic Novel Literature Kits – Getting Story Ready
- This document outlines what is in the District created Graphic Novel Literature Kits as well as ready to use teacher resources and classroom resources. These kits can be found in every Langley high-school. (edited January 2023)
Indigenous Perspectives through Graphic Novel Supplementary Resources here
- This document includes curated supplementary texts (teacher resources, poems, short stories, etc.) that connect to the Graphic Novel Literature Kits. Organized by theme, these resources could be used in classrooms to engage students on a class wide on a theme, while having them read individually the graphic novel of their choice. (edited January 2023)
Book List Appendix here
- Attached is a list for teacher use, when seeking authentic Indigenous resources for the classroom .This list, alongside the Aboriginal Department’s curated SORA resources, should be a reference tool for staff. Each resource should be evaluated for classroom use depending on scale of usage(reference, class wide novel etc.) and classroom grade level. This is not a prescriptive document. (edited May 2022)
Distance Learning Course Development here
- Langley School District Instructional Services, alongside the Burnaby School District and the Coast Metro Consortium have been working on developing a unique online course. For more information, please read the attached course description and outline. For more information contact Director Of Instruction George Kozlovic (gkozlovic@sd35.bc.ca) (edited January 2023)
Barren Grounds Teacher Resource Guide here
- This SD35 teacher created resource guide is a resource that supports the reading and exploration of The Barren Grounds by David Robertson through strategies and activities rooted in Indigenous pedagogies. This guide captures an ongoing understanding and attempt to learn alongside learners to teach and incorporate Indigenous worldviews and perspectives. Though this guide is specific to The Barren Grounds, it uses many Indigenous teaching strategies that can be utilized across subject areas, in many classrooms. (edited June 2021)
High School Teacher Indigenous Education Professional Learning Community
- The Langley School District has an ongoing Professional Learning Community (PLC) that meets outside of class time for high school teachers who are a part of or are hoping to be a part of the Indigenous Graduation Requirement courses (EFP 10-12, BCFP12, CIS12). This group is a teacher specific space that strives to collaborate, support and tackle field specific need when teaching and learning alongside students. For more information on this community, please contact Lesley Gunning (lgunning@sd35.bc.ca). (edited May 2022)
SORA- Instructions for login here
- This robust online library gives access to e-books and audiobooks for all Langley School District staff and students. Through a partnership with the District Aboriginal Program, this online library includes a vast array of authentic Indigenous authors and resources. Whether you are looking for professional development resources, picture books to introduce a complex topic in an interesting manner, class sets of Plays or audiobooks to play aloud in class – this app is a valuable tool for any classroom teacher and learner. (edited June 2022)
- Where to get started? Here are a few suggested Indigenous Pedagogy Resources for all High School Teachers to access on Sora today:
Regional Curriculum & Resources:
Stó:lō Reconciliation here
- This website provides a framework of reconciliation and provides examples of student engagement with this framework. The display of student work and thinking can support all high school classrooms. (edited June 2022)
Stó:lō Stories here
- This rich and layered website teaches and shares knowledge with all who visit. Through learning about the difference between Origin Stories and News Stories, being invited to watch and listen to story, and hearing from community members – these local Indigenous voices root us in land and place and can be brought into all school classrooms. (edited June 2022)
Sharing, Revitalizing, and Reconnecting the Stó:lō Sitel Curriculum: here
- This website includes stories and lesson ideas on the use of story in all classes. The working group involved in this project shares their thinking and ideas as a model for all educators. (edited June 2022)
Indigenous Storywork: Educating Heart, Mind, Body & Sprit here
- Stó:lō educator Dr. Jo-ann Archibald’s website includes videos, resources and connections to her text Storywork. This invaluable website includes topics like: how to get story ready, how Indigenous pedagogies broaden our understanding of story and ultimately how to teach and use story in our classrooms. (edited June 2022)
Provincial Curriculum Supports & Resources:
FNESC Teaching Guides & Resources
- The following listed resources are meant to support all Langley staff and students when building and relating to Indigenous historical and cultural context. Use the following links to support content understanding and resource selection:
- The following listed resources below are subject specific resources for Langley Staff to support Indigenous curriculum across all subject areas.
- FNESC First Peoples Principles of Learning here
- Math First Peoples here
- Science First Peoples here
- Career Journeys First Nations Career Role Model Program here
- English First Peoples 10 – 12 Teacher Resource Guide here
- BC First Nation Land & Governance Teacher Guide here
- BC First Peoples Teacher Resource Guide here
- Indian Residential School Teacher Guides: Grade 10 here, Grade 11/12 here
- BCTF Teaching Guides and Resources:
- The following listed resources and much more are accessible through the BCTF website:
National and International Curriculum & Resources:
National Inquiry Into Murdered and Missing Indigenous Women and Girls: Teacher Guide here
- This thoughtfully created Teacher Resource Guide: Their Voices Will Guide Us spans a K-12 lens, with curated resources and curriculum to support Staff and Student learning. (edited June 2022)
Reference and Core Documents for All Staff:
Langley School District Enhancement Agreement here
Truth & Reconciliation
- Calls to Action here
- Calls to Action in Child Friendly language: Spirit Bear’s Guide to the Truth and Reconciliation Commission of Canada here
- UNDRIP here
- UNDRIP for Indigenous adolescents here
Health & Wellbeing
Careers
Numeracy
Literacy
ADST
Expert Designers
Big Ideas
- Product can be designed for lifecycle.
- Personal design interests require the evaluation and refinement of skills.
- Tools and technologies can e adapted for a specific purpose.
Curricular Competencies
Research and empathetic observation.
Applies skills:
- Demonstrate an awareness of precautionary and emergency safety procedures in both physical and digital environments.
- Identify and evaluate the skills and skill levels needed–individually or as a group–in relation to a specific task, and develop them as needed.
- Select, and as needed learn about, appropriate tools and technologies to extend their capability to complete a task.
Applied technologies:
- Choose, adapt, and if necessary learn about appropriate tools and technologies to use for tasks.
- Evaluate the personal, social, and environmental impacts, including unintended negative consequences, of the choices they make about technology use.
- Evaluate how the land, natural resources, and culture influence the development and use of tools and technologies.
Content
- Drafting
- Entrepreneurship and marketing
- Information and communication technologies
- Metalwork
- Textiles
- Electronics and robotics
- Food studies
- Media arts
- Power technology
- Woodwork
By the end of Grade 12, your students should be expert designers within the area of study in:
- Using and talking about:
- Research and empathy
- Defining
- Ideating
- Prototyping
- Testing (iterations)
- Making
- Sharing
- Using a designer’s mindset, including:
- Working in a collaborative team
- Giving and receiving critical feedback (culture of critique)
- Impact of a design lifecycle
Questions about ADST in the Intermediate/Middle Years?
ADST/Digital Literacy K-12
Sandra Averill
saverill@sd35.bc.caResources to support ADST and its components can be found at: https://k12adst.weebly.com
Approved BAA Courses
