A curriculum map is a working document that illustrates exactly what is taking place in classrooms. Maps reveal what is being taught over the course of a year, within a unit of study, and even down to a specific lesson. Often, a map for a lesson will include essential questions, the content that will be covered, skills students will demonstrate if they understand the content, assessments and activities.
“Curriculum mapping can be the vehicle for opening up the lines of communication among all educators within a school system. Encouraging teachers and school leaders to have conversations within their own [department] [...] will lead to a greater sense of collegiality. Such conversations will help educators focus on more than what takes place in their own individual classrooms” (ASCD, 2006).
“Collaborative inquiry holds potential for deep and significant change in education. Bringing educators together in inquiry sustains attention to goals over time, fosters teachers’ learning and practice development, and results in gains for students” (Canadian Education Association, 2014).
Curriculum mapping will require time to collaborate and communicate both as a department and as the teacher of the focus courses to ensure that the content is differentiated, age appropriate and authentic for the students.
Before beginning this mapping process, departments should be aware of the school/department data from previous years or use information students provide at the beginning of a course to determine:
- the number of students who are taking two courses at the same grade level simultaneously; and,
- the students who have previously taken courses at the same grade level or a focus course that utilizes similar activities.
During the mapping process, departments seek to answer the following questions:
- How will we ensure differentiation of the learning within focus courses at different grades (e.g., PAF2O/PAF3O/PA4O)?
- How will we ensure that all the curriculum expectations in a course are being addressed (i.e., Human Development and Sexual Health) and content is differentiated within grades?
As part of the mapping process, consider using Ophea’s All About H&PE resources as a way to frame the collaboration and support professional discussions related to the five Fundamental Principles in Health & Physical Education. The following may be beneficial tools to use as conversation starters within departments and with teaching teams related to focus course development:
- All About H&PE is a free online resource developed to support educators in implementing the 2015 H&PE Curriculum (1-12). All About H&PE provides you with the tools needed to strengthen your understanding and knowledge of the five Fundamental Principles that underpin the H&PE Curriculum. The tools encourage reflection and conversation to help you apply these principles in practice.
For more information about the five Fundamental Principles in Health & Physical Education and focus courses please see Section 2: Focus Courses and the Five Fundamental Principles in H&PE.
Example Curriculum Mapping Process: Using a single expectation at various grade levels for planning a variety of focus courses
The examples on the following pages provide an entry point to start the process of curriculum mapping and begin the necessary professional conversations related to planning courses. As the choice of which focus course a school might select is dependent on any number of factors, these samples examples should only be considered as an entry point for departments and teacher teams to begin the curriculum mapping process.
These samples examples are meant to guide educators’ thinking as they begin the curriculum mapping process for the development of a focus course within the H&PE curriculum expectations. They are not meant to be fully developed, comprehensive plans.
- Curriculum mapping occurs both vertically and horizontally for all courses being offered at each grade level.
- Create a matrix using only the courses offered.
- Use the curriculum expectations that share common language and provide an appropriate sequence from Grades 9-12 (Note: this is more challenging in the Healthy Living strand and it may be necessary to consider a more thematic approach to the content delivery).
- Use the examples from the curriculum expectations to begin the planning process (if possible).
- In cases where the curriculum expectation does not provide an explicit example it will be important to consider the desired outcome for the focus course and what activities have been utilized in the past.
- Continue the process of looking at each curriculum expectation and identifying the key concepts or content pieces that can be utilized to meet the expectation through the focus of the course and ensure differentiation between all courses at all grades.
Step-by-step Process
- Create an 8 column by 5 row chart.
- Place the Grades (9-12) in the first column, one Grade per row.
- Identify the focus courses being offered and place them as the heading of the other columns.
- This sample example is designed to develop the following focus courses:
- Grade 11 – HALE plus PAF and PAQ;
- Grade 12 – HALE plus PAF.
- The cells representing all other focus courses that are not offered are shaded in the template.
- Begin to explore the curriculum expectations at the Grade 11 level where there are examples of activities provided.
