April

Come learn about the rich and vibrant history of the Indigenous peoples of Interior British Colombia. This tour largely focuses on the Indigenous Nation on whose land we reside, the Sinixt. We will consider Sinixt artifacts and culture while also examining the effects of colonization through our internal program titled "Sinixt & Colonial Contact: A Campaign of Extinction". Our tour will also guide students through activities examining stone artifacts while thinking critically about what we can learn through examination and what information has been lost through time.

This web-based Holocaust educational resource creates opportunities for students to interact with Holocaust survivor’s accounts of persecution, loss and survival. Educators and students can engage with Holocaust testimony in a lesson, within a larger unit, or as part of an independent research project.

• Recommended for students in grades 8 through 12, with adaptations possible for intermediate grades
• Includes excerpts of digitized audio-visual testimonies from the VHEC’s survivor testimony collection
• Contains lesson plans, student worksheets and classroom activities

Visit: https://vhec.org/primaryvoices/

Ahh! The great outdoors! With 144 acres of ocean-front property, lush rainforest and quiet creeks, YMCA Camp Elphinstone is an ideal location for learning in the great outdoors. Located on British Columbia's beautiful Sunshine Coast, YMCA Camp Elphinstone is just two kilometres north of the Langdale Ferry Terminal and a 40-minute ferry ride from Horseshoe Bay in West Vancouver.

Through meaningful outdoor experiential learning, kids develop strong and healthy minds and bodies while they learn and grow with their classmates. Students are challenged outside the traditional classroom and benefit from hands-on learning as they explore the serene forests and rocky shoreline of beautiful YMCA Camp Elphinstone.

Programming is customized for each group and designed to fulfill BC Ministry of Education prescribed learning outcomes. Participants benefit from:

• Structured activities like our discovery hike or marine beach study that teach about marine wildlife or the ecosystem.
• Programming that focuses on skill development such as archery, orienteering or outdoor living skills.
• Activities like our high or low ropes courses that encourage leadership and team building.
• Water-based programming such as kayaking, canoeing and swimming.
• Games and sports with an emphasis on physical activitiy, strategy and teamwork.
• Interactive leadership sessions that focus on conflict resolution, group dynamics, public speaking and more.

It took thousands of years for the sea stacks and tidepools of Brady's Beach to form, creating a unique topography allowing for some incredible exploration! We will visit your classroom live from the beach and dive into the distinctive habitat found within tidepools.

By putting our two most popular programs online in a live, interactive session, Bears of North America and Owls of Grouse Mountain, we’ve made it easy for you to enjoy the field trips you’ve come to know, and the wildlife ambassador owls that your students love, all from the comfort of your school.  And best of all, as the teacher, you get to take a moment and let us drive - our engaging Educators offer fun, interactive learning, brought right to your students.  No bussing to coordinate, no permission forms to collect, no chaperones to organize.  We’ll have live chat to answer questions in real time, worksheets, videos, and webcams.  While we can’t bring you to the mountain, we want to bring the mountain to you!  The first 50 teachers to book an online program will receive a $150 credit towards their next onsite field trip.

Written to support distance learning but also useful for physically distanced teaching, a Tech-Up Learning Kit contains resources for both synchronous and/or asynchronous lessons. The teacher guide walks you through leading student activities over a series of sessions of approximately 30-45 minutes. Student activities are handouts for students to work through on their own as assigned, according to your own timeline and discretion.

In these activities, learners in Grades 4-6 will explore how parts of speech can be used to strengthen their understanding of variables.

Students will work towards writing their own Mad Lib Stories before using Scratch to code a Mad Lib story generator.

There is also an optional extension activity if you would like to build further on the coding concepts explored in these lessons.

This kit contains resources for both synchronous and asynchronous lessons.

Tech-Up Learning Specialists are available to support you with these kits.

Find out more and request Variable Stories Learning Kit