Alberta
Following feedback Alberta Education to release new curriculum this fall
French and science curriculums ready for classrooms
Elementary students and teachers will benefit from updated K-6 curriculums and resources in classrooms this fall.
Alberta’s government is continuing to take a balanced and measured approach to kindergarten to Grade 6 (K-6) curriculum renewal, based on advice from the Curriculum Implementation Advisory Group. All K-3 students will learn from new French First Language and Literature, French Immersion Language Arts and Literature and Science curriculums this September. School authorities will also have the option to implement new curriculum in these three subjects for grades 4 to 6 if they choose.
Alberta’s government is delivering on its commitment to provide updated curriculum with essential knowledge and skills to better prepare students for the future.
“Curriculum renewal is essential to help prepare our students for a rapidly changing labour market, which is placing an ever- increasing premium on adaptability and transferable skills. To ensure successful implementation, we are making significant investments to provide teachers with the resources they need to support students in transitioning to the new curriculum.”
In response to feedback on the original draft, changes across the three K-6 subjects have been made to address areas of concern with content load, age appropriateness and wording clarity. Subject-specific changes include:
- Strengthening French First Language and Literature content by adding spelling rules and specifying which types of texts are studied in each grade.
- Enhancing French Immersion Language Arts and Literature content to align with the principles of learning an additional language and developing students’ creative writing skills.
- Strengthening Science content to promote understanding of agricultural practices in Alberta and align with previously implemented subjects. In the new K-6 Science curriculum, students in Grade 3 will examine how layers of Earth’s surface, including the discovery and location of dinosaur fossils, hold information about the past. In Grade 6, students will examine abstractions, coding structures and the impact of computers and technology.
Alberta’s government has listened to all feedback from classroom piloting and engagement activities to make final updates to the K-6 French First Language and Literature, French Immersion Language Arts and Literature and Science curriculums. In the 2022-23 school year, 47 school boards across the province piloted the draft curriculum, including 941 teachers and 22,000 students. The updated curriculums align with top-performing jurisdictions in Canada and globally and with new curriculum previously implemented across the province. Albertans can access the final curriculum online to see what has changed.
“For this school year, we had 60 teachers from K-6 participate in the French Immersion Language Arts and Literature (FILAL) pilot. Teachers are impressed with how condensed and clearly laid out the curriculum is as well as the consideration that has been given to age-appropriate sequencing of learning outcomes. Teachers are looking forward to implementing this curriculum next school year and to receiving a list of curated Alberta Education resources to support with implementation.”
“The FCSFA appreciates the willingness to listen and the cooperation of Alberta Education. We are committed to continue this cooperation with the province to be able to offer a French First Language and Literature curriculum which meets the needs of our francophone students.”
“The CASS board of directors appreciates the ministry’s responsiveness to feedback and supports phased implementation that provides school authorities flexibility to implement new curriculum based upon local contexts.”
Supporting successful curriculum implementation
Alberta’s government is committed to ensuring the curriculum implementation process is as successful and practical as possible for elementary teachers this September. In 2023-24, approximately $47 million is being invested in teacher professional learning as well as learning and teaching resources to make sure teachers and students are equipped for the updated K-6 curriculum in classrooms.
“Professional development and timely access to resources are essential to ensure educators and the system are fully prepared to implement new curriculum. The Alberta School Boards Association looks forward to continuing to engage with our member boards, and to collaborate with the government and education partners on required supports to ensure the success of all students.”
“The Calgary Board of Education shares the government’s goal of providing a quality curriculum that prepares students for future success. Together, we are committed to ongoing effective implementation.”
As part of this investment, Alberta Education is working with the province’s four largest school authorities to develop science resources. This collaboration will ensure resources are accessible to all school authorities to support student learning and the successful implementation of new K-6 Science curriculum.
“Through our pilot process, Edmonton Catholic Schools has worked closely with Alberta Education to provide feedback to ensure quality learning experiences for all students. An updated curriculum, including Computer Science, will help students develop skills and aptitudes for the future.”
“Edmonton Public Schools is committed to creating resources and support materials that will help K-6 teachers across the province implement the new Science curriculum.”
To help teachers across the province prepare for the upcoming school year, Alberta’s government is providing a variety of supports and resources online, including:
- the final K-6 French First Language and Literature, French Immersion Language Arts and Literature and Science curriculums
- the Provincial Resource Review Guide, with guidelines for selecting learning and teaching resources aligned with the new curriculums
- bridging resources to assist with transitioning from the current curriculums to the new curriculums
- videos and support documents with an overview and orientation to the new curriculums
- tools that support teacher planning, collaborating and sharing
- information about flexible professional learning opportunities
Alberta Education will provide school authorities with additional details to facilitate planning and implementation for September. School authorities will also continue to have flexibility to select resources to support curriculum implementation in their classrooms.
Next steps for implementation, piloting and engagement
Alberta’s government is continuing to take a balanced, phased approach to K-6 curriculum renewal based on advice from the Curriculum Implementation Advisory Group.
More information on curriculum implementation, further piloting opportunities and engagement will be shared online as details become available.
Quick facts
- More than 240,000 students will be learning from the new K-3 French First Language and Literature, French Immersion Language Arts and Literature and Science curriculums during the 2023-24 school year.
- As announced in March 2022, school authorities will also implement grades 4 to 6 English Language Arts and Literature and Mathematics curriculums this fall.
- In 2023-24, approximately $47 million has been allocated for the K-6 implementation process. This includes funding for school authorities:
- $45 on a per-student basis to purchase additional curriculum resources to support implementation of new K-6 curriculum in three subject areas.
- $800 on a per-teacher basis to support professional learning.
- In addition, Alberta Education will retain funding to purchase, license and develop high-quality learning and teaching resources aligned with the new curriculum.
- Between March 2021 and February 2023, Alberta’s government provided many opportunities for Albertans to share feedback on the draft K-6 curriculum:
- More than 34,000 online surveys were completed.
- More than 1,100 attendees participated in virtual information sessions hosted by Alberta Education.
- Nearly 600 Albertans shared diverse viewpoints on each subject area at 31 virtual engagement sessions.
- Twelve partner organizations were provided $800,000 in grants to help them engage with their communities and report their unique perspectives.
- In the 2021-22 school year, about 360 teachers piloted draft K-6 Mathematics, English Language Arts and Literature, Science, Physical Education and Wellness, Social Studies and Fine Arts curriculums with about 7,800 students.
- In the 2022-23 school year, 941 teachers are piloting draft K-6 French First Language and Literature, French Immersion Language Arts and Literature and Science curriculums with 22,000 students in 47 school authorities across the province.
- The 12-member Curriculum Implementation Advisory Group had balanced representation from across the education system to help ensure the best interests of the entire education system inform the group’s advice and recommendations.
From the Fraser Institute
By Matthew Lau
To understand Ottawa’s negative impact on Alberta’s economy and living standards, juxtapose two recent pieces of data.
First, in July the Trudeau government made three separate “economic development” spending announcements in Alberta, totalling more than $80 million and affecting 37 different projects related to the “green economy,” clean technology and agriculture. And second, as noted in a new essay by Fraser Institute senior fellow Kenneth Green, inflation-adjusted business investment (excluding residential structures) in Canada’s extraction sector (mining, quarrying, oil and gas) fell 51.2 per cent from 2014 to 2022.
The productivity gains that raise living standards and improve economic conditions rely on business investment. But business investment in Canada has declined over the past decade and total economic growth per person (inflation-adjusted) from Q3-2015 through to Q1-2024 has been less than 1 per cent versus robust growth of nearly 16 per cent in the United States over the same period.
For Canada’s extraction sector, as Green documents, federal policies—new fuel regulations, extended review processes on major infrastructure projects, an effective ban on oil shipments on British Columbia’s northern coast, a hard greenhouse gas emissions cap targeting oil and gas, and other regulatory initiatives—are largely to blame for the massive decline in investment.
Meanwhile, as Ottawa impedes private investment, its latest bundle of economic development announcements underscores its strategy to have government take the lead in allocating economic resources, whether for infrastructure and public institutions or for corporate welfare to private companies.
Consider these federally-subsidized projects.
A gas cloud imaging company received $4.1 million from taxpayers to expand marketing, operations and product development. The Battery Metals Association of Canada received $850,000 to “support growth of the battery metals sector in Western Canada by enhancing collaboration and education stakeholders.” A food manufacturer in Lethbridge received $5.2 million to increase production of plant-based protein products. Ermineskin Cree Nation received nearly $400,000 for a feasibility study for a new solar farm. The Town of Coronation received almost $900,000 to renovate and retrofit two buildings into a business incubator. The Petroleum Technology Alliance Canada received $400,000 for marketing and other support to help boost clean technology product exports. And so on.
When the Trudeau government announced all this corporate welfare and spending, it naturally claimed it create economic growth and good jobs. But corporate welfare doesn’t create growth and good jobs, it only directs resources (including labour) to subsidized sectors and businesses and away from sectors and businesses that must be more heavily taxed to support the subsidies. The effect of government initiatives that reduce private investment and replace it with government spending is a net economic loss.
As 20th-century business and economics journalist Henry Hazlitt put it, the case for government directing investment (instead of the private sector) relies on politicians and bureaucrats—who did not earn the money and to whom the money does not belong—investing that money wisely and with almost perfect foresight. Of course, that’s preposterous.
Alas, this replacement of private-sector investment with public spending is happening not only in Alberta but across Canada today due to the Trudeau government’s fiscal policies. Lower productivity and lower living standards, the data show, are the unhappy results.
Author:
From the Frontier Centre for Public Policy
By Ray McGinnis
Anthony Olienick and Chris Carbert are on trial for conspiracy to commit murder and firearms charges in relation to the Coutts Blockade into mid-February 2022. In opening her case before a Lethbridge, AB, jury on July 11, Olienick’s lawyer, Marilyn Burns stated “This is a political, criminal trial that is un Canadian.” She told the jury, “You will be shocked, and at the very least, disappointed with how Canada’s own RCMP conducted themselves during and after the Coutts protest,” as she summarized officers’ testimony during presentation of the Crown’s case. Burns also contended that “the conduct of Alberta’s provincial government and Canada’s federal government are entwined with the RCMP.” The arrests of the Coutts Four on the night of February 13 and noon hour of February 14, were key events in a decision by the Clerk of the Privy Council, Janice Charette, and the National Security Advisor to the Prime Minister, Jody Thomas, to advise Prime Minister Justin Trudeau to invoke the Emergencies Act. Chief Justice Paul Rouleau, in submitting his Public Order Emergency Commission Report to Parliament on February 17, 2023, also cited events at the Coutts Blockade as key to his conclusion that the government was justified in invoking the Emergencies Act.
Justice David Labrenz cautioned attorney Burns regarding her language, after Crown prosecutor Stephen Johnson objected to some of the language in the opening statement of Olienick’s counsel. Futher discussion about the appropriateness of attorney Burns’ statement to the jury is behind a publication ban, as discussions occurred without the jury present.
Justice Labrenz told the jury on July 12, “I would remind you that the presumption of innocence means that both the accused are cloaked with that presumption, unless the Crown proves beyond a reasonable doubt the essential elements of the charge(s).” He further clarified what should result if the jurors were uncertain about which narrative to believe: the account by the Crown, or the account from the accused lawyers. Labrenz stated that such ambivalence must lead to an acquittal; As such a degree of uncertainty regarding which case to trust in does not meet the “beyond a reasonable doubt” threshold for a conviction.”
On July 15, 2024, a Lethbridge jury heard evidence from a former employer of Olienicks’ named Brian Lambert. He stated that he had tasked Olienick run his sandstone quarry and mining business. He was a business partner with Olienick. In that capacity, Olienick made use of what Lambert referred to as “little firecrackers,” to quarry the sandstone and reduce it in size. Reducing the size of the stone renders it manageable to get refined and repurposed so it could be sold to buyers of stone for other uses (building construction, patio stones, etc.) Lambert explained that the “firecrackers” were “explosive devices” packaged within tubing and pipes that could also be used for plumbing. He detailed how “You make them out of ordinary plumbing pipe and use some kind of propellant like shotgun powder…” Lambert explained that the length of the pipe “…depended on how big a hole or how large a piece of stone you were going to crack. The one I saw was about six inches long … maybe an inch in diameter.”
One of Olienick’s charges is “unlawful possession of an explosive device for a dangerous purpose.” The principal evidence offered up by RCMP to the Crown is what the officers depicted as “pipe bombs” which they obtained at the residence of Anthony Olienick in Claresholm, Alberta, about a two-hour drive from Coutts. Officers entered his home after he was arrested the night of February 13, 2022. Lambert’s testimony offers a plausible common use for the “firecrackers” the RCMP referred to as “pipe bombs.” Lambert added, these “firecrackers” have a firecracker fuse, and in the world of “explosive” they are “no big deal.”
Fellow accused, Chris Carbert, is does not face the additional charge of unlawful possession of explosives for a dangerous purpose. This is the first full week of the case for the defence. The trial began on June 6 when the Crown began presenting its case.
Ray McGinnis is a Senior Fellow with the Frontier Centre for Public Policy who recently attended several days of testimony at the Coutts Two trial.
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