Page 39 - THE ONTARIO CURRICULUM, GRADES 9 to 12 | First Nations, Métis, and Inuit Studies

INSTRUCTIONAL APPROACHES
Effective instruction is key to student success. To provide effective instruction, teachers need to consider what they want students to learn, how they will know whether students have learned it, how they will design instruction to promote the learning, and how they will respond to students who are not making progress.
When planning what students will learn, teachers identify the main concepts and skills described in the curriculum expectations, consider the contexts in which students will apply the learning, and determine students’ learning goals.
Instructional approaches should be informed by the findings of current research on instructional practices that have proved effective in the classroom. For example, research has provided compelling evidence about the benefits of the explicit teaching of strategies that can help students develop a deeper understanding of concepts. Strategies such as “compare and contrast” (e.g., through Venn diagrams and comparison matrices) and the use of analogy give students opportunities to examine concepts in ways that help them see what the concepts are and what they are not. Although such strategies are simple to use, teaching them explicitly is important in order to ensure that all students use them effectively.
A well-planned instructional program should always be at the student’s level, but it should also push them student towards their optimal level of challenge for learning, while providing the support and anticipating and directly teaching the skills that are required for success.
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SOME CONSIDERATIONS FOR PROGRAM PLANNING IN FIRST NATIONS, MÉTIS, AND INUIT STUDIES