Alberta’s Ministry of Education keeps getting a failing grade in social studies.
In 2021, the Ministry was criticized for a draft new kindergarten-to-grade six curriculum that was age inappropriate and lacked adequate Indigenous content.
Social studies was particularly weak, according to critics.
So, the Ministry went back to the drawing board and released a draft social studies curriculum this past March.
So far, it’s getting torched again.
The provincial government invited a panel of eight education experts to review the curriculum, and the experts were not impressed.
Kids Deserve Better
In a letter to the government, the panel said, “Alberta students deserve better.”
The panel outlined huge flaws in the proposed curriculum. They claim it doesn’t encourage critical thinking, gives minimal attention to Indigenous history, and paints a false picture of modern Alberta.
The panel urged the ministry to halt plans to start piloting the curriculum in schools. Instead, they suggested scrapping the proposal and reopening the process.
Jason Schilling, President of the Alberta Teachers Association (ATA), said in a news release:
“Once again, we find ourselves talking about the social studies curriculum, as on March.14, the government released its newest version of the disaster that was originally released in 2021. The latest draft is better than the “history-of-the-world-starting-at-kindergarten-with-the-Greeks-and-Romans” version; however, it still needs a lot of work. The bottom line is that teachers need to be more involved in curriculum development to ensure it reflects the best interests of our students.”
In an interview with The Tyee, former ATA president Larry Booi was less kind.
He called the latest curriculum “misguided, unsophisticated, and actually embarrassing.”
He also called it an “unrelenting look backwards” focused primarily on history and only gives passing mention to geography, economics and civics.
In other words, for most educators, it’s a joke.
Speaking of History
This curriculum-creation process began during Jason Kenney’s time in the Premier’s office, and Danielle Smith’s government took up the torch.
What’s taught in social studies classes should prepare our kids for the future they will inherit, not a reflection of the world their parents and grandparents left behind.
The watering down and simplification of public school curricula is terrible news for the future of our democracy.
With the proliferation of ‘fake news’ and deep fakes on social media, critical thinking skills are more necessary than ever.
Booi told The Tyee that rather than equipping students to become engaged in public affairs, the curriculum is rigidly focused on knowledge of the past without providing tools for using this knowledge to make a better future.
“There should be no piloting of this draft curriculum,” Booi said. “We cannot inflict it on students.”
Our kids deserve an engaging curriculum that challenges them to consider where Alberta came from, where it is today, and where it could be tomorrow.
Education Minister Demetrios Nicolaides needs to get teachers in the room to design the curriculum from the ground up.
The two failed attempts confirm that asking educators to give feedback after the curriculum is drafted doesn’t work. It simply wastes time and resources.
It may be third time lucky.
Or have we learned nothing from history?
