Program Development Assistance Fund (PDAF)
Successful Project Profiles
Elementary & Junior High Level
School Year |
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2025-2026 |
2024-2025 |
2023-2024 |
2022-2023 |
2021-2022 |
2020-2021 |
2019-2020 |
2018-2019 |
2017-2018 |
2016-2017 |
2015-2016 |
2014-2015 |
2013-2014 |
2012-2011 |
2010-2011 |
2022-2023
Equity: Creating a Positive School Culture 22-23/51/EJ
School: Oxford School
Grade: P-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Angela Gillis
As educators, we talk about the importance of accepting others – regardless of whether their beliefs/values align with our own. We are using this project as a way to promote a positive school culture, by allowing students to express their personal beliefs/values/culture and promote allyship. Students will be able to access different mediums, as a way to represent their race, culture, values, gender identity, etc. This project will provide our students with a safe, fun, and creative outlet where they can express themselves, while promoting inclusive values and ideals.
2021-2022
Something For Everyone: Leisure Time Skills for Students with Exceptionalities 21-22/21/EJ
School: Oxford School
Grade: P-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Cathy Baillie
Project Team Members: Alex Purdy & Mari Gay
While most students easily fill their leisure time with a variety of games, hobbies and activities, individuals with exceptionalities do not always have the skills nor opportunities for such experiences. Something For Everyone: Leisure Time Skills for Students with Exceptionalities aims to teach leisure skills to students with exceptionalities and assist them in practicing these skills alongside their typically developing classmates. Students will have chances to interact socially with other students of all abilities. This project will foster inclusion and positively influence the social and emotional development of all students.
Universal Design for Learning Lab 21-22/15/EJ
School: Northeast Kings Education Centre
Grade: P-9
Employer: AVRCE
Project Coordinator: Adam Conner
Thanks to the support of the NSTU and the PDAF grant, we at Northeast Kings Education Centre have been able to expand our Universal Design for Learning Lab. This lab allows us to provide opportunities for students to engage in the product design cycle with meaningful prototypes or final products that can be sale ready. With the combination of additional 3D printing technology and Vinyl cutting technology our students can design and create custom products and prototypes of their ideas right in the classroom! We will be implementing these new tools into the lab this year and are excited for what it will mean for our students.
Think Pause and Reflect Space 21-22/65/EJ
School: Riverside School
Grade: P-8
Employer: CBRCE
Project Coordinator: Jill Vallis
Project Team Members: Bernadette Romeo, Kim Ferguson & Tanya Boone
Riverside School is the home of Riverside's Knowledge Path in Albert Bridge, CBVRCE, located directly behind the school-on-school property. We were recently able to develop and create the Think, Pause and Reflect Space that boosts 15 writing stands and a covered draw erase board.
These writing stands were made to be adjustable to four different heights. This flexible seating allows the students to choose to sit or stand while doing their writing, drawing or reflection pieces outside. Having students engaged in the writing process outdoors allows for a more productive piece of writing and a calm and safe space.
Thank you to the Program Development Assistance Fund for providing us the opportunity to extend our classroom practices outdoors.
2020-2021
A.G. Baillie Learning Centre Enhancement 20-21/03/EJ
School: A.G. Baillie Learning Centre
Grade: P-6
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Jennifer MacMillan
Project Team Members: Kelley MacDonald
The PDAF grant is helping to provide a sensory based environment which allows our growing, diverse learners in the Learning Centre at AG Baillie the opportunity to learn the fundamental skills of self-regulation and coping skills for their personal well-being. Our Learning Centre serves students who require support in a variety of areas including self- regulation, sensory awareness, emotional, social, and physical well-being. It is imperative, more now than ever, as we navigate through this global pandemic, to provide ample opportunities for our most vulnerable students to develop individualized programming to meet their specific needs.
As a Learning Centre team, we work closely with classroom teachers to support all students. With funding, we continue to enhance our current programming in the LC to accommodate our students requiring daily support. During our September start up, it became very apparent just how impactful covid has been on many of our AG Baillie families. Many students are dealing with heightened anxiety, due to both separation and fear of covid related sickness, which is directly affecting their ability to learn and participate positively in their school day.
This funding is helping us achieve our goal of providing a safe, positive school climate and culture which focuses on students' social emotional well-being while promoting student success.
Outdoor Classroom 20-21/18/EJ
School: Redcliff Middle School
Grade: 5-7
Employer: CBVRCE
Project Coordinator: Amanda Reid
Project Team Members: Mike Fougere & Dave Hazelton
We indent to use the PDAF funding to blend nature and mindfulness with the seventh-grade curriculum. An outdoor classroom will provide students with a safe place to learn and engage with nature around them. Whether they are writing poetry about their surrounds, learning about the science behind the environment around them or the history of the land they are setting foot on, an outdoor classroom will allow students to be outdoors while achieving their learning targets.
Outdoor Pursuits Project 20-21/45/EJ
School: Park West School
Grade: P-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Kelsie Boyd
Project Team Members: Jeff Piercey, Jude D'Entremont & Ellen Taggart
With the onset of the Covid19 virus, the physical education staff at Park West School have rediscovered outdoor physical education classes. To keep our students safe from the virus and to follow safe protocols, we have been creating enjoyable ways to meet our Primary-Grade 9 outcomes with outdoor activities. Teaching our students outside has allowed us to socially distance our normally overcrowded classrooms. It is important to our physical education staff that we can embrace the approaching winter weather and that it doesn't keep us indoors. By creating the Outdoor Pursuits Project, made possible by the PDAF Grant, our students are able to discover passions for lifelong pursuits such as snowshoeing, Nordic skiing and snow sledding.
Making a Growth Mindset 20-21/64/EJ
School: École St. Catherine's School
Grade: P-6
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Becky Thakkar
This project will use the creativity of the Circuit Maker and all the accompanying tools to have students explore mental health and mindfulness strategies and create products that promote positive mental health habits and positive self-worth by:
- Having students create affirmations for themselves (in French) which can then be transferred to clothing that they can wear as reminder of this affirmation.
- Having students throughout the school create positive affirmations which will be printed and posted throughout the school.
- Having students research social change and current events to create various posters, clothing articles, and other products which can then be sold as a fundraiser for the purchase of more consumable materials.
- Having students explore textiles and reusable materials to promote sustainability and care for the environment when creating products.
2019-2020
Culturally Responsive Walls, Halls and Stalls 19-20/44/EJ
School: Whycocomagh Education Centre
Grade: 4-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Lauren MacKinnon
Project Team Members: Maylou MacKenzie, Daniel Timmons & Iisha Parsons
When people walk into a school, they immediately feel the culture. At Whycocomagh Education Centre, we want the common spaces of our school (entrance way, hallways, restrooms, and locker rooms) to be reflective of our dedication to our students and their learning. Our project aims to rejuvenate these spaces with inspirational and educational visuals emphasizing cultural diversity, empowerment, positivity, and kindness. Our project is innovative in that it uses the physical space of the building as daily reminders of these messages. As students are involved in all aspects of the project, they will no doubt see themselves as they walk through the hallways.
Skate Pass for Regulation 19-20/48/EJ
School: Bayview and Bluenose Academy
Grade: P-9
Employer: SSCE
Project Coordinator: Nicole Wambolt
Project Team Members: Kajtetan Jaskowiak, Bev Langley, Angela Stewart & Selena Davidson Eno
Bluenose Academy and Bayview Community School have developed a skateboarding program between the two schools. We have been working together to target students who would benefit through self-regulation through a skateboard program. The learning centre and the physical education programs of both schools have been working on this initiative since January. Our goals of the program include the following:
- Develop a skateboard program collaborative between the two schools.
- Make use of the local skateboard community park in Lunenburg.
- Use the skateboard program to help with regulating students in the Learning Centre and other areas of the school.
- Skateboarding is a great activity to connect with students that do not enjoy the traditional sports that are in the schools.
We would be teaching the program in the curriculum timeframe but also have after school opportunities for these students. It is a chance for students to experience a club or group that adds to the belonging and culture of the schools.
Sule ‘Katike’l (Out on the Mira) Sound Garden 19-20/51/EJ
School: Riverside School
Grade: P-8
Employer: CBVRCE
Project Coordinator: Janice Graham
Project Team Members: Geraldine Vallis-Beaver, Donna Lee Parker, Bernadette Romeo & Lesa MacPhee
Riverside School, located in Albert Bridge Nova Scotia, sits on the unceded Mikmaq territory spanning 32 acres of natural Acadian Forest. The Knowledge Keepers’ Path will be a 2 km interactive path behind the school, inclusive of Mi’kmaq culture and teachings. It will be a distinctive experience for everyone to learn traditional Mi’kmaq skills, language, and medicinal connections to the land. The Knowledge Keepers’ Path has been approved for funding from the ReconcilliACTION Grant and the Network Schools Grant. These grants will offset the costs for initial path construction. Excavation of the path has already begun on May 28, 2020. As part of our Knowledge Keepers’ Path, we are requesting funding for creation of Sule’katike’l (Out on the Mira) Sound Garden. This will be a musical center within The Knowledge Keepers’ Path. Currently items for the sound garden have arrived on site. The installation will happen in July and August. Hoping path will be ready for visitors in early Fall 2020.
2018-2019
Etauptmumk 18-19/62/EJ
School: Dartmouth South Academy
Grade: 6-8
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Kelly Slades
Project Team Members: Lindsay Payne & Derrick Hennessey
This project will engage students in two-eyed seeing through the building of Mi'kmaq hand drums and their subsequent use in learning the songs and stories of this land. Mi'kmak'i is the traditional name for the land upon which we dwell. Through the development of music and social studies curriculum in partnership with our Mi'kmaq knowledge keepers’ students will learn news ways of thinking about geography, history, environment and story such that the best of both western knowledges and traditional knowledges is combined for the betterment of all people.
2017-2018
Girl Empowerment in STEAM with Coding 17-18/20/EJ
School: Park West School
Grade: 5-7
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Tracy Langille-MacKinnon
Project Team Members: Christy Allen & Lisa Gibbs
Our project will provide more opportunity for students to experience STEAM activities in the classroom. As well we will set up a club that will support young women in exploring opportunities in STEAM careers. We believe that all learners will benefit from exposure and opportunity to create and build STEAM projects inside and outside our current curriculum. We believe that this project will provide learners with an opportunity to think about STEAM careers and enhance their hands-on understanding of science. Our plan is to expose young women to science and engineering careers earlier and have them meet and be mentored by women in the fields of Science, Arts, and Engineering.
Loose Parts Outdoor Play 17-18/37/EJ
School: North Queens Community School
Grade: P-9
Employer: SSRCE
Project Coordinator: Mya Uhlman
Project Team Members: Lydia Skoreyko & Judy Frail
The behavior lead team is creating a “Loose Parts” playground, a place with safe opportunities that will encourage students to use their imaginations and have more autonomy and self-direction in their style of play. Students will create their own play with a multitude of everyday items such as pipes, sticks, tarps, steering wheels, bowls, and spoons, etc. They will create forts, vehicles, stores, explore dramatic play and have fun! Students will enhance their organization, long-term planning, self-regulation, and task initiation skills and be able to switch between activities. With minimal guidance, students will problem solve independently.
Breakout EDU 17-18/42/EJ
School: Sydney Mines Middle School
Grade: 6-8
Employer: CBVRCE
Project Coordinator: Peter Day
Project Team Members: Lisa Jenkins
The Breakout EDU kit turns your classroom into an academically focused escape room and facilitates activities where students use teamwork and problem-solving skills to solve a series of challenging puzzles that utilize critical thinking in order to open the locked box. Each Breakout EDU kit can be used for hundreds of different activities. Breakout EDU activities are designed for small groups and can be used to cover any curricular outcome for all subjects and grade levels. The Breakout EDU activities engage student learning in an interactive environment that has a clear goal for students to achieve.
Creating Cultural Storytellers 17-18/53/EJ
School: Whycocomagh Education Centre
Grade: P-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Shelly MacLean
Project Team Members: Shelly Campbell, Miranda Gould & Betsy Jardine
The purpose of this project is to encourage young authors to write in English, French, Mi’kmaq and Gaelic. By publishing young authors work and using it within the school and library, we hope that students will become engaged with writing for a purpose. Having the digital tools to produce illustrations for these books will help students to have an opportunity to see that ideas can be represented through digital images. These creative processes are expected to engage students, be culturally relevant and encourage students in future careers, creativity and collaboration, all competencies that 21st century students are expected to develop.
2016-2017
Learning With Motion 16-17/64/EJ
School: Inverness Education Centre Academy
Grade: 2,3,5,7-9
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Iisha Parsons
Project Team Members: Ann LeLievre, Lorna MacDonald & Angie Walker
Strong evidence supports the connection between movement and learning. In an effort to incorporate movement into learning for students with special needs who have not responded to traditional fidget intervention, the Hovr will support movement at a traditional desk by allowing for multi-directional leg movements and leg swinging that mimic walking, with the added benefit of not being mentally distracting. This movement promotes alertness and focus, while reducing restlessness. It also has the added benefit of not being distracting to other students. This outlet for movement is the cutting edge of fidget tools.
Two PEERs & a PODD 16-17/82/EJ
School: Rockingstone Heights School
Grade: P-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Kerry Clancey, HRSB itinerant Speech Language Pathologist (SLP)
This project promotes the inclusion of students who use Augmentative and Alternative Communication (AAC) tools and strategies to support their communication. Elementary and junior high school AAC users will be included with their classmates as well as school staff PEERs. The PEERs will model the use of a Pragmatic Organization Dynamic Display (PODD) communication book in natural contexts throughout the day. This modeling will facilitate opportunities for socialization, interaction, and learning. The PEERs will be able to ‘talk’ with the AAC users and like “Two Peas in a Pod” may recognize their similarities rather than their challenges and differences.
2015-2016
Newcomers Club 15-16/63/EJ
School: New Glasgow Academy
Grade: P-8
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Katie Hale
New Glasgow Academy’s “Newcomers Club” will provide Newcomer students a chance to socialize with peers and to improve language skills in a safe and welcoming environment. The “Newcomers Club” will provide new students to Canada with a sense of belonging, which is crucial in eliminating both culture shock and isolation often felt by Newcomers. The club will provide an invaluable opportunity for both Immigrant and Canadian students to explore and learn about each other’s cultures. The Newcomer club is a lunchtime club where students will play games, sports, make crafts, share their countries cuisine, and become familiar with our local community. It will be a place where friendships are formed.
Taking it Outside 15-16/64/EJ
School: Donkin Gowrie Complex
Grade: 6-8
Employer: CBVRCE
Project Coordinator: Dave Fraser
My plan is to set up an extracurricular outdoor education program at my school, for students grade 6-8 who attend Donkin Middle School. The program will run for most of the school year and offer a variety of structured outdoor experiences for students. Weekly after-school sessions will take place within the school grounds. The focus will be hands-on learning sessions, where new outdoor related skills will be taught. Once a month, students will participate in a Saturday outing where they will put their newly acquired skills to practical use.
With funds made available through this grant, a “snowtrekker tent” and related equipment will be purchased. This style of tent is large enough to accommodate 20 students and offers year-round shelter from the elements. The tent is equipped with a stove and offers a warm, safe haven for students regardless of the elements. The tent will be setup prior to each outing and will help make each trip safer and more enjoyable for students. These tents are durable and should last many years.
Here, There and Everywhere 15-16/71/EJ
School: Multiple Schools
Grade: 4-9
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Louise Haycocks
Project Team Members: Sally Steeves & Don Hill
This project looks at using a Telepresence Robot to increase access to professional development opportunities and class visitations. It allows teachers more flexibility in the schools and cause less disruption to teachers and students class time. It can also be used to go into environments that cannot easily accommodate students or where transportation costs could prohibit students visits or limit the time on location. In addition to engaging student with new ideas and technology, the Telepresence Robot will enable schools to visit different places and allow interactions controlled directly by students and teachers.
Minds in Motion 15-16/79/EJ
School: Whycocomagh Education Centre
Grade: 5-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Lynette Rankin
There is strong evidence supporting the connection between movement and learning. Moderate exercise enhances cognitive processing, increases the number of brain cells, and can reduce childhood obesity. The goals of this project are to make activity and movement an expected part of the learning environment and to enhance student concentration and comfort. Alternate seating options will be offered to the students, including desk-cycles, stand-up desks, café tables, balance boards, and exercise balls. The use of these alternatives to traditional seating will provide opportunities for movement in the classroom. Students will be taught to examine their own seating and learning preferences to maximize learning.
2014-2015
Growth Mindset School 14-15/14/EJ
School: Bridgeport School
Grade: P-9
Employer: CBVRCE
Project Coordinator: Francine Burke
Project Team Members: Angela Hull & Firman McCormick
Brainology© and the Mindset Works Schoolkit© will be employed to promote a growth mindset within Bridgeport School. With a growth mindset, students think of intelligence as malleable – something that grows through studying and learning. Such a mindset has been found to increases sense of self-efficacy, motivation to learn an academic performance. Each teacher in the school will have access to online modules, interactive tools and resources to be used within the classroom. In addition, each junior high student will have opportunity to engage with a research-based program designed to instill a growth mindset. Pre-treatment and post-treatment data will be compared.
In Search of our Racial Identity: Art and Social Justice 14-15/21/EJ
School: Madeline Symonds Middle School
Grade: 6-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Mary Beth Osburn
Project Team Members: Cathy Munroe, Mary Hill & Stephen Hare
This project is a socially interactive and community building installation that uses textiles and fabrics to generate self-expressed identity and personal statements. The materials to be purchased for this project are: Cheticamp Frame, hoops, hooks, and a fabric cutter.
Students from Grades 6-9 will be hooking primitive rug designs, which will communicate various social messages and personal statements of identity to record our own personal history, shape school culture, build community and motivate individuals to foment change. This will be an "open art piece" meaning the equipment is always out and available for students to work on evolving pieces of art. It also means that parents and community figures who are visiting the school, can also participate in this art making. This space will be the hub of the school; an area of awareness, citizenship, activism and identity and the primitive rug hook installation will be part of this space.
Primitive rug hooking is a meta-cognitive activity whereby students are "crafting their opinions" and communicating personal statements which allows them to express ideas, perceptions and self-expressed identity concepts creatively. The materials used for these projects will all be repurposed materials to encourage student's ability to find value in what others discard (i.e. used clothing, used fabrics)
Focusing on and nurturing creative ways to approach social justice issues help our students to make appropriate decisions and to reflect on ideas from differing viewpoints. Language is a tool and so is rug hooking! Together we are all the threads of a much larger tapestry...
2013-2014
A Song in Every Heart… and Hand 13-14/17/EJ
School: Whycocomagh Education Centre
Grade: P-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Eryn Sinclair
Project Team Members: Alasdair Lanyon, Shelly Campbell, Kimberly Kaulback & Ann Whalley
Whycocomagh Education Centre’s project entitled ‘A Song in Every Heart…and Hand’ involves the opportunity for 180 young people to ignite the spark of instrumental music learning. It addresses a need within the school for quality instruments that are well-suited to each grade level. The instruments will allow students to learn skills, develop musicality and gain cultural understanding through music creation and study. The instruments that will be explored span important cultural groups within Nova Scotia and allow for inspiring understanding. The project opens the doors to allow connections between musicians in the community and students who may gain a new mentor or role model. It also opens the door wide to a future of music-making for students.
Enhancement of Student Achievement, Focus and Engagement through Active Seating 13-14/34/EJ
School: Bluenose Academy
Grade: P-9
Employer: SSRCE
Project Coordinator: Jennifer Langford
Project Team Members: Denise Dodge Baker, Marily Sarty & Darren Haley
Seating and positioning for many students has always been challenging in traditional classroom chairs. Students are seen slumping over their desks, slouching in seats, inattentive and disengaged. Posture is compromised and health deteriorates. The Hokki stool introduces active seating to classrooms. Safe and reliable, endorsed by Occupational Therapists and Physical Therapists, their use has the potential to replace static seating that the human body was not designed to do. According to Hokki designers, research shows that active seating (given the opportunity to move) helps us concentrate better and longer as it promotes blood flow which increases oxygen and supplies more nutrients to the brain.
This project will introduce Hokki stools to a grade 5 classroom in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. We will monitor student uptake of the new type of seating, and possible increases in concentration, engagement, and productivity. We will monitor student response, teacher observations and generate a report at the conclusion of the project and share via website, twitter, email, listservs, and newsletters.
2012-2013
Connecting Near and Far (Electronic Cultural Exchange) 12-13/17/EJ
School: North Queens Community School
Grade: 3,4,7
Employer: SSRCE
Project Coordinator: Julie Ramey
Project Team Members: Kim van Dyk, Judy Frail & Christine Ford
This electronic cultural exchange aims to support our grades 7, 8 and 9 Inquiry Based Learning classes while supplementing the ELA Curriculum. This exchange will enable grade 7 students to mentor grade 3/4 students in the use of iPad technology while advancing their own technological competencies. The exchange will take place between the students at our school and the Hugs for Kids School in Cangrejo, Dominican Republic. Connecting with students in another country will provide our students with an opportunity to expand their world view while building tolerance and cultural understanding. This project will further afford our students the opportunity to use and develop critical thinking skills as they reflect upon their own community and culture. Finally, this exchange will engage our students in learning for the 21st century with emphasis upon developing technology and communication skills.
Mobile Art Gallery Display Towers 12-13/76/EJ
School: Madeline Symonds Middle School
Grade: 6-9
Employer: HRCE
Project Coordinator: Mary Beth Osburn
Project Team Members: Dina Bartt, Karen Mahoney, Cathy Munroe, Leanne Carter, Jane Keeping, Ellen Phillips, Mona MacNeil, Stephen Hare & Mike Comeau
The Mobile Art Gallery Display is a collapsible art gallery that allows for teachers to display student art anywhere in the school (or outside in the local community) in a professional gallery like setting. At the end of the day this Gallery simply folds, and collapse together and then wheeled into any convenient location. With this system, teachers have the potential to display a tremendous amount of student material without compromising the 20% paper restriction mandated by the Fire Department.
The mobile art gallery is a physical example and reminder of the connection between seeing and remembering. Visual communication is everywhere and “Western civilization has become more dependent than ever on visual culture, visual artefacts, and visual communication as a mode of discourse and a means of developing a social and cultural identity.” [1]
Visual influences saturate our daily life; people not only communicate visually more than ever, but they also communicate better when they communicate visually. The mobile art gallery is a perfect opportunity to facilitate this dialogue further as it combines both visual and non-visual content. The mobile gallery is not a static device – it is an active agent of dialogue and brings engagement to a higher level. Students are proud of their work and want to talk about their art and about their understandings. The mobile art gallery is not just a means to an end it is a forum for discussion.
Develop First Nations’ Literacy Success and Cultural Proficiency in WEC Staff and Students 12-13/18/EJ
School: Whycocomagh Education Centre
Grade: P-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Ann Whalley
Project Team Members: Betsey Jardine, Mary Humphrey
This project proposes to provide cultural experiences for Mi’kmaq and non-Mi’kmaq learners at the Whycocomagh Education Centre, including the development of a play based on the story, “How the Cougar Came to be known as the Ghost Cat,” by Mike Isaac. As we build cultural proficiency among out staff and students, we will be building literacy and numeracy skills. As we recognize and embrace our differences, we will give opportunity for culturally relevant learning and increased success in school. We hope to reduce the achievement gap by improving phonological awareness and numeracy skills, better meeting the needs of more students.
African Culture Through the Arts 12-13/23/EJ
School: Mulgrave Memorial Education Centre
Grade: P-8
Employer: SRCE
Project Coordinator: Julie McVicar
Project Team Members: Kathy Rohodes Langille, Tiffany Hayne & Sonya Sauve
When our students get to experience other cultures, they gain an understanding of the culture’s unique characteristics. Learning about other cultures helps us value the diversity in all people and discover the unity there as well. We plan to actively engage our students by using traditional African dance, music, art, and story to encourage students to learn more about the positive contributions African cultures have made in society. With this project we hope to value the diversity of our students as learners by allowing for a range of learning preferences, teaching styles, instructional strategies, and learning resources.
Designing, Developing, Publishing Accessible, Enhanced Books 12-13/46/EJ
School: Chester Area Middle School
Grade: 6-9
Employer: SSRCE
Project Coordinator: Michelle Longley & Tanya Veinotte Frowd
Project Team Members: Teri Cochrane, Barb Welsford & Janet Dornan
Four hundred students in the South Shore Regional School Board are diagnosed with Learning Disabilities. Many of these students have great difficulties interacting with and/or accessing fixed print. The typical classroom continues to focus on paper-based materials and fixed print, and written output is primarily with pen and paper. Students with vision impairments, students on the autism spectrum, and those with physical disabilities also face print barriers. In Nova Scotia we practice inclusive education. Students of all abilities learn together in the same classrooms; however, the textbooks, handouts, novels, storybooks that are primarily used are not accessible to all learners and students are expected to communicate their learning through handwritten responses. To truly embrace inclusion, we need to be innovative.
This project will introduce new innovative technology that will provide inclusive learning opportunities for all learners. Middle School students at Chester Area Middle School (CAMS) will have the opportunity to design, develop and publish fully accessible and enhanced books including read aloud text, images, video, interactive presentations embedded in the books, quizzes, fully accessible features that allow easy access by students who are blind, have Learning Disabilities, autism, etc. Students will even design and develop trailers to promote and/or introduce the books. Students will engage in the process of planning class libraries, choosing from personal interest themes, class related themes and/or course related themes (i.e. science projects, novel summaries etc.). Students will learn how to utilize a variety of eBook development Apps and iBook Author on the Apple laptop to develop and publish their eBooks to their iBook Library. The libraries or even individual books will be published as an eBook or ePub document to share on various devices. These books can be accessed from anywhere, anytime 24/7.
Accessibility features built into the iPads coupled with the capability of the devices to offer interactivity and engagement ensure the books will be able to be easily accessed by any student. In addition, the project ties nicely into the Inquiry Based Learning environment that is being implemented at CAMS this school year.
2011-2012
Fast ForWord: Using Flex Learning Environments 11-12/17/EJ
School: Redcliff Middle School
Grade: 5-7
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Glenda MacKinnon
Project Team Members: Lauchie MacKinnon & Tammy Chitty
Our project intends to explore the use of meta-cognitive strategies to support the literacy needs of students, who have been unsuccessful with other remediation strategies. We intend to incorporate the online nature of the software to increase the opportunity for students to get intense practice over a short period of time, thus decreasing the amount of class time lost to direct instruction in alternative settings. Our plan requires the training of parents and teachers to deliver a part of the program Fast ForWord at home and in the classroom, assisting Program Support for the students. We plan to explore this delivery method to determine if it supports the Response to Intervention (RTI) model and if Fast ForWord is an appropriate level III support for RTI (a proposal of the CCRSB Student Services Department.)
2010-2011
Spinning
School: Central Colchester Junior High
Grade: 6-9
Employer: CCRCE
Project Coordinator: Lisa Aucoin
The four spin bikes that I have purchase will be placed in the school's fitness room which is located off the gymnasium. Prior to applying for this grant, I received funding from the Health Promoting Schools grant in order to purchase stability balls, yoga mats, body bars and stretch cords. With all of the equipment, I will be leading sessions with girls to promote health, active living through cardiovascular fitness, and strength training.