Previous Page (From Saskatchewan Education - Social Studies Curriculum - June 1995)

Suggested Approaches

UNIT ONE: IDENTITY - MODULE ONE - SASKATCHEWAN THE PROVINCE

• Have the students participate in various activities that develop map reading skills (e.g., playing Battleships, interpreting symbols, working with grid, measuring and drawing to various scales).
• Visit Virtual Saskatchewan to view maps & ecoregions - visit Expedia.com to make custom maps of areas within Saskatchewan.
• Practice the using grid, scale, direction, and colour to interpret various simple maps.
  
• Cut sections from a Saskatchewan road map. Enlarge them and make photocopies or overhead transparencies. Have students working in groups to make up questions about their section of the map. Exchange with another group to answer the questions. Return them to the original group to check answers.
  
• Have students working in groups to create large maps or a model of the province. Absolute accuracy of scale should not be a concern. The teacher may choose to have students add additional information to the map during the course of the year.
  
• Explore the weather and climate of the province. Have students interpret climate maps and graphs. Hang a thermometer outside a window on the north side of the school. Over a period of time, record the temperature at a certain time of day on a daily, weekly, or monthly basis. The students may also record other weather conditions at the same time.
  
• Identify severe weather conditions like tornadoes, blizzards, strong winds, drought, and other storms. Discuss how they affect people, animals, and the environment.
  
• Study maps of Canada. Identify other provinces and territories.
  
• Make connections between/among location, climate and landforms.
  
• Identify the various symbols that are associated with the province. Make connections with the geography and the people of the province. Discuss the appropriateness of the symbols. Have students select or design their own symbols.
  

UNIT ONE: IDENTITY - MODULE TWO - SASKATCHEWAN PLACES

• Students may research the meanings of place names (street name activity) in their community and province. Note the names that have derived from Indian languages.
  
• Have students collect information about various cities in the province. If possible, display the information along with city maps.
• Use maps and other sources to explore population distribution in Saskatchewan*. Recognize that people live in various places including reserves, cities, towns, villages, and farms. Observe population concentration in the southern half of the province.
  
• Have students graph or chart populations of various places in the province. Link population distribution to factors such as climate, landforms, and vegetation.
  
• Have students identify the various kinds of work that people do in the community.
• This may be done through a local survey within the school community. Explore other communites that have different opportunities. Make connections with population distribution.
  
• Do a survey, conduct an interview, or work with fictional scenarios* to determine reasons why people live in the community and the province. These reasons may include opportunities for making a living, resources, family ties, climate, and personal preference.
  
• Explore ways Saskatchewan people spend their leisure time. (Select the tour entitled, How Saskatchewan People Spend Their Time) Identify various local, provincial and federal parks. Explore the value of the parks to people, wildlife, and the environment.
  
  

UNIT ONE: IDENTITY - MODULE THREE - SASKATCHEWAN HEROES

• Work in groups to answer the questions, "What does it mean to be a Saskatchewan Hero. A study of heroes (Visit the following links to learn more about Saskatchewan Stars - Saskatchewan's Own 1, Saskatchewan's Own 2, Saskatchewan's Own 3) should include a cross-section of examples representing both genders, people from many cultures, and people of varying abilities. It may include high profile people or volunteers in a local organization or the school. Also view the Remember Me Movie about local war heroes and memorials.
• Learn about citizens in action from the news. Recognize citizens in action in your school and community. Make a classroom scrapbook.
• Consider with the students their personal achievements and their personal goals. Discuss ways students in the class may now or in the future be heroes.
  Establish criteria for judging heroism.
• Establish a local Hall of Fame. This may be done on a classroom, school or community basis. Involve students in the nominations, research, selections, recommendations and induction ceremony. Encourage the inclusion of local adults and children.
• Identify both women and men who work in nontraditional jobs who may be "heroes" in that they serve as role models.
• Have the students imagine they are being recognized as heroes, now or in the future. The students may write nominations either for themselves or for classmates.
  Guide students to realize that we all can be and are heroes in some respects.