Working with Multiple Courses

Frequently, students who are enrolled in Knowledge and Employability Social Studies 10-4 are in the same class as students who are enrolled in Social Studies 10-2. Although there are similar themes in the two courses, there are differences in the learning outcomes. This will affect decisions that you must make in order to differentiate for students in the two courses. A full comparison of the outcomes from Social Studies 10-4, 10-2 and 10-1 can be found in Programs of Study Outcome Correlations for Social Studies 10-4, 10-2 and 10-1 .

A key difference between Social Studies 10-4 and 10-2 is in the examples provided with the outcomes. In Social Studies 10-4, all examples are indicated as "e.g.'s"; this means that they are intended to be illustrative, not mandatory, and do not have to be explored. In Social Studies 10-2, the examples in parentheses must be explored to some extent. Another key difference is the presence, in Social Studies 10-4, of Guiding Questions. These are not present in Social Studies 10-2. Guiding Questions highlight the big ideas in each related issue and can be used to support exploration of outcomes.

In Related Issue 2, in the 10-2 course, students are required to consider the effects of historical globalization in Canada and one other location. A resulting activity might be to ask students to compare and contrast historical examples of residential schools in Canada with residential school experiences in Australia. Although this could become a summative assessment task for students in the 10-2 course, it cannot be used as an assessment task for students in the 10-4 course because there are no learning outcomes in that regard in 10-4.

Notwithstanding the difference in outcomes, there can be merit in having the 10-4 students participate in the learning experiences surrounding the issue of residential schools in Australia. Examining a related case study can be engaging for students and deepen their understanding of Eurocentrism and the broad impact of historical globalization and imperialism. This may broaden their understanding and their ability to demonstrate the skills for assessment, such as explaining cause and effect; however, 10-4 students cannot be assessed on the details of historical globalization in this other location.

There are similarities in the Skills and Processes outcomes for both courses; however, differences exist in the complexity of the skills that students are required to demonstrate. When designing assessment tasks, it is essential to focus on the verb of the outcome to ensure that the assessment task is true to the level of cognition embedded within the outcome. When adapting 10-4 materials for a 10-2 class, it may be necessary to increase the complexity of the assessment task to align with a higher level skill.

Samples of how this adaptation plays out in an actual classroom context are provided in the Instructional Example.