Collaborative Learning Teams

Teaching Grade 9 Geography Through a Sustainability Lens

Through a joint project of the York Region District School Board (YRDSB) and Learning for a Sustainable Future (LSF), a team of geography teachers  and an LSF learning program facilitator  createed learning experiences  from a sustainability perspective that would help students to examine ministry-mandated concepts in grade nine geography. To guide the project, the team identified student relevant 'big questions' that would support students becoming responsible citizens. The five questions that shape all of the learning in this resource included:

1. How is everything interconnected?
2. Should you care about others and/or your place?
3. Are the current ‘relationships’ (between humans, between humans and the ‘environment’, etc.) ‘continue-able’? ie. able to persist?
4. Are the ‘relationships’ fair?
5. Can you change the ‘relationships’?

The following guide was the result:

Teaching Geography Through a Sustainability Lens: Classroom Ready Activities (2009) 

Multi-Credit Integrated Programs

The Multi-Credit Integrated program model involving 2, 3 and 4 credits has over 25 years of history in Ontario. LSF, in collaboration with the Educational Alliance for a Sustainable Ontario (EASO http://www.sustainable-ontario.org/), a network of organizations that includes the Ontario Teachers’ Federation, Ontario Ministry of Education, Council or Outdoor Educators of Ontario, the Gosling Foundation and others, created a survey to determine the current use of this model in Ontario schools and identify those teachers currently using or intending to use it in order to support them.

This information was collected to obtain an accurate understanding of where and how the multi-credit integrated program model is being used, as well as the benefits and challenges of its implementation.

For the past  two years, LSF has supported the delivery of collaborative professional development for multi credit program educators through the OTF Go Green program.  One result is an ongoing online forum for these teachers allowing them  to work collaboratively on multi-credit program design and implementation.