1. Here are a few of our frustrations:Our current timetable isconfusing, with rotating blockson rotating days. In May,students are still confusedabout which day it is and whatthe block order is on thatparticular day.Some students have simplygiven up and just look forclassmates to follow.

2. Secondary time-tablemodel does not work the way our minds work.Excerpt from college and universitystudent papers 3. Does not work for middle school minds:Secondary timetable model does not really workfor Middle School. Subjects are separate andprovide no context. With no reason to remembercontent, other than for a test or specificassignment, content is easily forgotten andbecomes of no use to students. Another example of what happens wheninformation has no context or importance to astudent: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p0wk4qG2mIg 4. What happens when there is nocontext or reason to understand. 5. Circles Are you one of the very few people whowould know howto figure out howmuch cement youwill need for acircularfoundation for this structure? 6. In school, you were Circles taught (severaltimes over a fewyears) how to figureout the area of acircle and thevolume of a sphere.Do you remember?Is it important toremember? Across = 4 m Depth = 10 cm 7. Separating general topics into subject areas hasadvantages, in that it allows one to go deep into atopic without the distraction of context and iseasier to teach. (Example: Solving an equation for x iscomplex enough, with all sorts of rules, to confuse the issuewith why one would do this and when.) However, Providing context, personalization, meaning, andusefulness to the concepts means they are notjust floating around the brain, un-tethered andnot useful. (Example: Create a spreadsheet thatautomatically figures out the PST and GST on the product youcreated for your business and then provides a total to thecustomer this is the same as solving for x.) 8. Little to no elective choice: Small schooltrying to run a secondary model means thatstudents get little to no choice regardingelectives. This year we had several divisionsthat were simply given an elective, such asGardening or Multi-Media, without beinggiven any choice in the matter... just becausethat worked in the timetable. A secondarymodel in a small middle school was simply notworking. 9. Inflexibility of timetable made working togethervery difficult: When teachers wanted to work together to integratetopics, which research is showing helps teachersdevelop more engaging learning environments, it wasalmost impossible to coordinate due to the inflexibilityof the timetable. Students were limited to the cohort with which theytravelled. Although this could help build deeperrelationships, it was also limiting in that it was moredifficult to find others with similar interests and goalswith which to work. In the new model we wantedboth deeper relationships and flexibility. 10. Teacher collaborative planning was near impossible tocoordinate: When teachers wanted to plan togetherand provide integrated projects for the students, itbecame more and more difficult to plan andcoordinate. Teachers were not able to schedule timesto coordinate everything that needed to becoordinated (examples: teams of teachers meetingwith the Learning Assistance teachers to discussmodifications and adaptations required for specialprojects.) Coordinating team-teaching was near impossible (like herding cats watch this video to see what it is like). 11. Herding Cats 12. Teacher collaborative planning was nearimpossible to coordinate: Coordinating team-teaching was near impossible. Wewould get started on something and realize weneeded this person or that person on board whichrequired that we find them, but they are coaching, orhave needed to go pick up their children, or... The more integrated (and therefore meaningful) theprojects we created, the more educators we neededto confer with the more difficult it became to do thebest that we could. ... 13. It has become more and more difficult to have students completehomework. Many reasons for this... Busy lives Parents working and unable to provide support for school work in addition to providing everything else that their children need Lack of motivation and engagement ... We were desperate to figure out a way to take this on for parentsand to provide time for students to complete work at school. Workcompletion means that students are developing good habits, ableto go deeper into topics, and are experiencing more success. Thecurrent timetable does not allow time for students to completework they have not finished in class, AND does not provideadditional time for challenge and enrichment for students whoneed it. 14. Students had too many teachers for theteachers to effectively monitor them and todevelop deeper relationships with them. Thiswas affecting student success, as students inmiddle school need to have stronger adultconnections and more continuousaccountability. 15. Please provideus yourquestions, concerns,comments. We need the good as well as the concerns. 16. Foundation and Structure the Pods We broke the school up into grade-specific pods,where each student would only have three coreteachers for the whole year, and where eachcore teacher is responsible for 90 students duringthe whole year. Example: The grade 9 Pod has Grant Taylor teaching Science and PE, Lance Lloyd teaching Math, Health and Careers and as the Pods learning assistance teacher, and Avi Luxenburg teaching Humanities (English and Social Studies). Most of the week is Pod time, where the separate subject areas are taught, but with teachers in constant communication regarding the needs of the students and in continuous integration of the subject areas. Next slide shows a potential example. 17. Grade 9 Student Schedule ExampleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective 18. Foundation and Structure the PodsBenefits of the Pod: There is immense flexibility in how things are handled. Since there are only three teachers, it is mucheasier to coordinate integrated studies and projects. The Pod has its own Learning Assistance Teacher (Lance), who is responsible for 90 students, not 270. The teachers have fewer students whose progress needs to be monitored, and so there is going to be farmore accountability with the students. Much easier for teachers to get to know the students; and therefore, provide more personalizedinstruction and support. Much easier for teachers to adapt to a need. Example: if the teachers find there is a math concept that isabsolutely necessary and that students simply are not getting, the pod teachers can swarm the problem,providing different contexts to the issue. For instance, while the math teacher is developing formulas forCartesian coordinate systems, the Science teacher and the Humanities teacher (who is also the computerteacher) can provide context for Cartesian coordinate systems (Video game development, archeology....)The teachers can more easily get together to discuss the needs of the group and adjust to themtogether. The flexibility allows the pod teachers to adjust the timetable for special work. For example, the grade 9pod teachers have decided to have two mixed blocks a week. In these blocks, Grant Taylor will pull theleadership students for leadership work, Lance Lloyd will pull small groups of students who need learningassistance support in specific areas, and Avi Luxenburg would work with the rest of the Pod in areas thatthe teachers have determined there is a need. Perhaps we have decided to have students create stop-motion animations that teach younger students math concepts, such as how to find the area of a circle,how to find the volume of a sphere, how to solve for x... During four blocks in the week, an Art Specialist and an Education Technology Specialist will join the pod tohelp with integration of subject areas. ... 19. Grade 9 Student ScheduleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective 20. PLC (Professional Learning Communities) - The Mortar More and more schools have solved the near impossible problems around school coordination of planning, integrating, providing powerful and engaging projects together, and student personal engagement and accountability with the implementation of PLCs. We now have an elementary school and a secondary school in the valley that have embraced this model and are finding it to be quite effective in improving student engagement and success. One afternoon a week we will be building and coordinating the programs for students. For a good portion of the students, this will be a time for completion of school work and of projects (at school). For another portion of the students, this will be a time for enrichment, with activities that include theatre arts, physical activity, community service and much more (at school). For some students, where the parent concurs, this will be an early dismissal time (if they have earned it and are already experiencing enrichment outside of school time). 21. Grade 9 Student ScheduleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective 22. Inquiry The Inspiration and Design There is simply too much research on the power of Inquiry-based learning to be ignored. Context seems best created by starting with a question rather than content; by having students take ownership and control of their learning. Example: Humanities 9 next year has an overarching umbrella question: What makes a good life? Student exploration of the Social Studies and English topics will have that question as a filter with which to experience the content. So Social Studies learning outcomes around exploration of the new world, aboriginal lives and issues, and revolutions (industrial, political...) will be handled through questions that choreograph student engagement back to the main essential question. For example, when looking at revolutions, students will be asked questions like: How has the industrial revolution improved our lives? How has it ruined our lives? What matters to us? In this model, students build their own context for the material, and their own understanding. All topics are personalized. Another example of Inquiry is the I-CAN project. Video. The new timetable formalizes time for student inquiry. 23. Grade 9 Student ScheduleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective 24. In our new timetable model, inquiry is offered two blocks a week, with mixed agegroups. For the first year, we have broken down the inquiry projects into fourdifferent projects, all followed by presentation of the material to the school orcommunity in an expo. The four areas are: I AM When teachers were asked which skills, abilities and traits they felt wereimportant for students to have when they leave Lake Trail, one of the mostprevalent wish was that students know themselves better: how they learn,personality, goals... and more. The I AM project has students engage in activitiesthat generate deeper self understanding and create a presentation aboutthemselves. Science Fair Students will generate a Science Inquiry question, research,experiment, and present to the school and community. Heritage Fair Students will generate a question around a heritage topic (family,history, provincial, national...) and prepare a presentation for the school HeritageFair. This Heritage Fair will lead to the district Heritage Fair and, for some students,beyond. Self-Chosen Inquiry project. Students will now be ready to select their own inquirytopic based on their own interest. Teachers will act as consultants and support the student processes. As these aremulti-grade groupings, Grade 9 students will also provide leadership and supportfor younger students. 25. Electives Variety of Interest Not only will students have real choice withregard to electives, we will be offering multi-grade electives every Friday, with variety that isonly limited by the imagination. Teachers willprovide electives in areas of their expertise (Art,Theatre, Photography, Gardening, Animation,Video, Basketball, Video Production... and the listgoes on). This is the time in which communitymembers will also be able to provide electives tostudents (with teacher support). 26. Grade 9 Student ScheduleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective 27. We need your comments Please let us know what you like. What concerns do you have? What comments do you have? We will collect your comments and questionsand take them to the timetable team. We willput together a document that shares yourquestions and our answers. 28. Grade 9 Student Schedule ExampleBlockMonday TuesdayWednesday ThursdayFridayScience / 1 PEMixed HCE/ScienceHumanities Math / Humanities 2Math HumanitiesInquiryMixed Inquiry Multi-Age 3 Elective Science MathElective PLC Multi-Age 4HumanitiesPE ElectivesElective