Research reveals that the best professional learning opportunities are active, collaborative, role-specific, and build in time for ongoing support during implementation.

With this aim, day two of the Edvance Annual Gathering provided interactive, role-specific specialist conferences led by experts in a variety of topics. Read on for information about the specialist conferences offered.

Conference Topics

Choose from one of the following specialist conferences, facilitated by expert educators:

• Great math tasks, effective instructional strategies, and the new math curriculum – let’s put it all together!!
• Student Support Services (Resource & Special Education)
• Shared Agency and Classroom Culture: Equipping Students to Speak Into Their Own and Others' Learning
• Physical Education Workshops
• God’s Great Story: Reading the Bible with Hope and Wonder
• Introduction to Critical Pedagogy      

Please note that the agenda and schedule may vary between sessions. See below for details.

Great math tasks, effective instructional strategies, and the new math curriculum – let’s put it all together!!

This session will focus on some fundamental mathematical ideas and provide sample tasks for all grades that are engaging and provide multiple entry points for all students. We will incorporate a discussion of effective instructional and assessment strategies to provide students opportunities to develop deep understanding when engaged in these tasks. All of this work will make connections to the new math curriculum for students in K – 9! Teachers will walk away with ideas and materials to use in their classrooms.

Agenda:

9:00 am – 10:15 am        Session 1

10:15 am – 10:30 am      Break

10:30 am – 11:45 pm       Session 2

11:45 pm – 12:15 pm     Break for Lunch

12:15 pm – 1:10 pm        Session 3

1:10 pm – 1:15 pm          Break

1:15 pm – 2:00 pm          Session 4

Student Support Services (Resource & Special Education)

Join us Friday, October 29 for a morning of Check-in, Challenge, and Cheer. Connect and learn from other student support educators and learn from visiting experts. Whether you are a seasoned staff person or new to your role, this will be time well spent to offer your own wisdom and glean new ideas from others. Our time together will include an opening address, breakout rooms with specific topics, and presentations on assessment and specific student support tips. Registered attendees will be encouraged to submit questions ahead of time to help shape the presentations and breakout room topics. We want this time to be helpful and encouraging.

Agenda:

9:00 am – 10:15 am        Session 1: After Assessment: What’s the Next Step? Dr. Kimberly Maich and Dr. Carmen Hall

When a student is assessed, the recommendations and insight offered may be overwhelming to both the school and family. Dr. Kimberly Maich and Dr. Carmen Hall will share next steps on how to implement assessments into the learning environment. They welcome questions, and there will be time built into their presentation for engagement and discussion.  

10:15 am – 10:30 am      Break

10:30 am– 11:45 pm       Session 2: Paraeducator Training: Guidelines and Recommendations All Belong Centre for Inclusive Education

Providing support for our students through paraeducators (includes EAs and PSWs) is a wonderful way to build connection between students, their learning and their peers. All Belong Centre for Inclusive Education will provide a mini-training session for paraeducators and student support services staff. This will also include time for schools to share best practices with each other.  

11:45 pm – 12:30 pm     Break for Lunch

12:30 pm – 1:45 pm        Session 3: Round Table: How Can We Help Each Other? Tips, Tools and Suggestions

We invite all student support services staff to a virtual round table with the intention of both offering and asking for insight & ideas. Whether you are a seasoned educator or brand-new to your position, this will be a time to connect and learn from each other. When we collaborate, our students are the ones who ultimately benefit – and it is our collective desire to see our students flourish according to their capacity and capability.

Shared Agency and Classroom Culture: Equipping Students to Speak Into Their Own and Others' Learning

Teachers want their students to feel a sense of belonging and empowerment in their classes. How do we foster a collective commitment to engagement and empathy? What does a "we" classroom look like? What are some classroom practices that can equip students with a shared language so that all students are able to offer meaningful, kind, helpful, specific feedback? This workshop will offer teachers an experience with a mini project that will serve as a model for how to use strategies like learning teams, success criteria, and exemplars to foster a classroom culture of care.

Agenda: 9:00 am - 2:00 pm, with breaks

Audience: Grades 4-12 teachers

Physical Education Workshops

Agenda: 9:00 am - 12:00 pm

Workshop 1: Physical Literacy: Physical Education classes are important places for students to develop the physical competence, so they feel competent to move in life, and with that confidence develop the motivation to further develop their physical competence... We will be using videos and explanation to demonstrate activities that help develop skills involving manipulative sending, manipulative receiving, and manipulative retention skills.

Workshop 2: Teaching Games for Understanding: Recent approaches to TGfU have advocated for a thematic approach to teaching games. Rather than teaching sport-specific units (e.g., volleyball unit, soccer unit), children and youth gain skills and knowledge to apply to different sports by playing a variety of games associated with 4 game categories. We will be using videos and explanations to demonstrate activities in the four TGfU areas:

• Target Games in which the participant propels an object, preferably with a high degree of accuracy, at a target.
• Net/Wall Games in which the participant propels an object into space trying to make it difficult for an opponent to return it.
• Striking/Fielding Games in which the participant strikes an object so it is placed away from defenders in the field.
• Territory Games in which participants invade an opponent's territory to score.

Workshop 3: Integrating Other Subject Areas in Physical Education: Physical Education has its own curricular expectations. However, some of these expectations can be met or reinforced through other curricular areas, and other curricular areas can have some of their expectations met or reinforced in Physical Education Classes. We will be using videos and explanations to demonstrate some of these activities, with a significant emphasis on mathematics.

God’s Great Story: Reading the Bible with Hope and Wonder

This conference aims to support teachers in the unique challenges and opportunities to Bible instruction. How do we share the Bible with a diverse student population? How do we engage students who feel they have heard it all? How can we invite students into a vibrant understanding of the grand narrative of scripture? What skills will my students need to continue their learning when they leave my classroom?

Join us as we discuss the theory and practices of teaching the Bible as literature, developing curiosity, close reading, and connecting the diverse stories in the Bible into the big story that leads to Jesus. There will be a lot to think about AND protocols and activities that you can do with your Bible students right away.

Agenda: 9:00 am - 2:00 pm, with breaks

Introduction to Critical Pedagogy

Events in the last few years have brought difficult, polarizing issues to the forefront of the news media. We hear about atrocities committed at Residential schools, police brutality, and hate crimes. As educators, what do we do? Together, we will take a hard journey to examine ourselves and learn more about critical pedagogy. We will learn ways to work towards restorative justice by representing our students, representing others, and having hard discussions. As Christian educators seeking to prepare our students to be neighbours to all, critical pedagogy can help us reach that goal.

Agenda: 9:00 am - 12:30 pm, with breaks