Teacher(s):

Course Description:

This course emphasizes the development of literacy, communication, and critical and creative thinking skills necessary for success in academic and daily life. Students will analyse challenging literary texts from various periods, countries, and cultures, as well as a range of informational and graphic texts, and create oral, written, and media texts in a variety of forms. An important focus will be on using language with precision and clarity and incorporating stylistic devices appropriately and effectively. The course is intended to prepare students for the compulsory Grade 12 university or college preparation course.

Resources Required:

This course is entirely online and does not require nor rely on any textbook. The materials required for the course are:

• A smart phone, camera, or similar device to record video and sound,
• A copy of the novel, The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald
• Word processing software (e.g. Microsoft Word, Mac Pages, or equivalent)

Teaching and Learning Strategies:

Students are exposed to a variety of genres throughout the course and develop skills to analyze and evaluate the effectiveness of texts which may include poems, short stories, myths, novels, non-fiction texts, plays, videos, and songs or other media texts from a wide range of cultures and time periods. Students identify and use various strategies including building vocabulary, learning to understand and use features and organization of texts, and developing knowledge of conventions. Throughout the course, students develop into stronger readers, writers, and oral communicators while making connections to the workplace and international events.

Teachers differentiate instruction to meet the diverse learning needs of students. Instructors also use electronic tools, including discussion boards, to assist students in reflecting on their learning and in setting goals for improvement in key areas while developing 21st century skills. These tools facilitate and support the editing and revising process for students as they create texts for different audiences and purposes.

• Identifying and developing skills and strategies: through modeling of effective skills, students learn to choose and utilize varied techniques to become effective readers, writers, and oral communicators.
• Communicating: several opportunities are provided for students to write and communicate orally.
• Generating ideas and topics: teachers encourage students to design their own approaches to the material by maintaining frequent (often daily) online communication with students, by allowing some freedom in how students respond to topics and questions, and by encouraging students’ independent thinking through discussion posts.
• Researching: various approaches to researching are practiced. Students learn how to cite sources and provide a works cited page at the end of longer assignments using MLA formatting.
• Thinking critically: students learn to critically analyze texts and to use implied and stated evidence from texts to support their analyses. Students use their critical thinking skills to identify perspectives in texts, including biases that may be present.
• Producing published work and making presentations: students engage in the editing and revising process, including self-revision, peer revision, and teacher revision all of which strengthen texts with the aim to publish or present student work.
• Reflecting: through draft opportunities and other elements of the course, students reflect on the learning process, focus on areas for improvement, and make extensions between course content and their personal experiences.

Assessment and Evaluation Strategies of Student Performance:

Every student attending Christian Virtual School is unique. We believe each student must have the opportunities to achieve success according to their own interests, abilities, and goals. Like the Ministry of Education, we have defined high expectations and standards for graduation, while introducing a range of options that allow students to learn in ways that suit them best and enable them to earn their diplomas. Christian Virtual School’s Assessment, Evaluation, and Reporting Policy is based on seven fundamental principles, as outlined in the Growing Success: Assessment, Evaluation, and Reporting in Ontario Schools document.

When these seven principles are fully understood and observed by all teachers, they guide the collection of meaningful information that helps inform instructional decisions, promote student engagement, and improve student learning. At Christian Virtual School, teachers use practices and procedures that:

1. are fair, transparent, and equitable for all students;
2. support all students, including those with special education needs, those who are learning English, and those who are First Nation, Métis, or Inuit;
3. are carefully planned to relate to the curriculum expectations and learning goals and, as much as possible, to the interests, learning styles and preferences, needs, and experiences of all students;
4. are communicated clearly to students and parents or guardians at the beginning of the school year or course and at other appropriate points throughout the school year or course;
5. are ongoing, varied in nature, and administered over a period of time to provide multiple opportunities for students to demonstrate the full range of their learning;
6. provide ongoing descriptive feedback that is clear, specific, meaningful, and timely to support improved learning and achievement; and
7. develop students’ self-assessment skills to enable them to access their own learning, set specific goals, and plan next steps for their learning.

For more information on Christian Virtual School’s general assessment and evaluation strategies, you can refer to our Assessment, Evaluation, and Reporting Policy.

To ensure that we are meeting the principles of Growing Success, we carefully plan all the assessments within our courses.

First and foremost, they are designed as opportunities for students to improve their learning. Assessment for the purpose of improving student learning is seen as both “assessment for learning (AfL)” and “assessment as learning (AaL)” according to Growing Success. As part of assessment for learning, teachers provide students with descriptive feedback and coaching for improvement. Teachers engage in assessment as learning by helping all students develop their capacity to be independent, autonomous learners who can set individual goals, monitor their own progress, determine next steps, and reflect on their thinking and learning. Examples of these types of assessments in this course include:

Second, we focus on a balance between assessing students’ acquisition of knowledge as well as their skills of thinking, communication, and application of subject-specific material. In this course, you can expect assessment to be divided into the following balance:

Lastly, the assessments are designed so that teachers have an opportunity to gain an understanding of a student’s learning through direct observation of students, one-on-one conversations with students, and evaluating products that students submit. Examples of these methods in this course include:

For more information on our assessment and evaluation strategies, refer to Section 6, Student Achievement, in the Course Calendar.

Program Planning Considerations: