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New math curriculum a hot topic for teachers' union

'It’s very frustrating for everyone in education right now,' says president of the Simcoe County Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario
2019-05-28 Education town hall RB 3
Janet Bigham, president of Simcoe County's Elementary Teachers’ Federation of Ontario (ETFO) local, speaks at a meeting in the Barrie City Hall Rotunda in this file photo. Raymond Bowe/BarrieToday

The timing just doesn’t add up.

On Wednesday, the provincial government announced an overhaul to the elementary math curriculum, which will see lessons in financial literacy and coding added in grades 1 through 8.

However, the announcement that it will rolled out in September has some local teachers concerned.

Janet Bigham, president of the Simcoe County Elementary Teachers' Federation of Ontario (ETFO), wasn’t able to speak to specifics of the curriculum when reached for comment by BarrieToday on Thursday, because she hadn’t yet had a chance to look at it.

“We are learning about government initiatives through these announcements, which means there hasn’t been public consultations,” said Bigham. “Right now, we’re focused on finishing the school year and doing tentative planning for the reopening of schools in September.”

Bigham said the ETFO did not receive the curriculum until about a half-hour before the public announcement.

“It’s very frustrating for everyone in education right now,” she said.

Bigham said teachers are currently focused on finishing out this school year and preparing for other education changes announced by the Ford government last week, such as how schools will reopen in September. Adding another major change to be implemented within the same time frame is too much, she says.

“The timing is an issue. A year from now would be excellent,” she added.

According to the announcement, the new curriculum will help students build understanding of the value and use of money through mandatory financial literacy concepts, teach coding or computer programming skills starting in Grade 1 to improve problem solving and fluency with technology and use relevant, current and practical examples so students can connect math to everyday life.

During Wednesday night’s Simcoe Muskoka Catholic District School Board meeting, Barrie trustee Maria Hardie also shared concerns about timing.

“I’m very pleased they’re going to have financial literacy as part of the new curriculum. My concern is, if it’s going to be adopted for September, how in the world, with all that’s going on, how are we going to be able to do that? How are the teachers going to be trained in the new curriculum considering the times we’re experiencing at the moment?” asked Hardie.

Director of education Brian Beal said the board was shocked to see the new math curriculum released.

“I think you’ve asked the question of the century,” Beal said with a laugh.

Beal said the board was contacted on Thursday by the province and invited to participate in an hour-long math training session to take place next week, and another one-hour webinar in August in preparation.

“It’s going to be very, very difficult, and it’s going to have to be staged,” he said. “We will have to go at this slowly and steadily to see what the new curriculum and the supports look like, and recognize that the professional development of this is going to take time.

“It’s untenable to have an expectation that we’ll have teachers ready to implement (by the fall). It would usually take a year of preparation,” he added.

According to the provincial announcement, the curriculum was developed over two years in consultation with parents, math educators, academics and math education experts, and is designed to reverse a decade of declining math scores.

"For over a decade, too many students were lacking everyday math, financial literacy, and numeracy skills," said Minister of Education Stephen Lecce.

The Ministry of Education is also changing how it makes the curriculum available. The new math curriculum will be the first uploaded to the new Curriculum and Resources website, a digital space where anyone can access curriculum and learning resources.

The platform is aimed to help parents, students, and teachers see connections between learning in different grades and subjects.


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Jessica Owen

About the Author: Jessica Owen

Jessica Owen is an experienced journalist working for Village Media since 2018, primarily covering Collingwood and education.
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