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Take your lesson plans to the next level with these eight free digital resources that will lead you to your best year yet! En route, explore endless classroom ideas, swap effective approaches with your colleagues and discover strategies to keep everything organized. Get planning and enjoy the ride!
By Melissa Campeau
Planboard
Take the BIY (Build-It-Yourself) approach and map out your academic year with this online lesson plan organizer. Assemble quizzes, research links and assessments, integrate standards from Ontario curricula and create custom templates. Plus: access and edit remotely, on any device.
Visit: planboardapp.com
Share My Lesson
It’s like Yelp but for teachers. You can upload plans, search for new ones, then offer comments and suggestions on colleagues’ ideas. The site has partnered with PBS (among others) to deliver a new resource called “Today’s News, Tomorrow’s Lesson” where you can zero in on lessons that relate to current events. Visit: sharemylesson.com
If keeping things in order gives you a thrill, then you’ll appreciate this intuitive tool that sorts your plans in a snap. Prompts that include “goals” and “materials needed,” guide you through the process. There’s even a “reflections” section where you can add reference notes for the next year!
Visit: learnboost.com
Infusing Indigenous Perspectives
What does the design and shape of a teepee represent? How does traditional Blackfoot governance compare to parliament? This Ontario Institute for Studies in Education page links to lesson plans that will help you and your students explore the history, traditions and perspectives of First Nations, Métis and Inuit people.
Visit: oct-oeeo.ca/IndigenousPerspectives
Ontario Educational Resource Bank
The lessons on this provincially created site align with the Ontario curriculum, and are useful in public and Catholic school systems. Although some content is outdated, there is still value to browsing the bank. Filter plans by grade, course, learning style and more. Contact your school board for login information.
Visit: oct-oeeo.ca/OERB
Historica Canada
Introduce students to the first female Canadian police officer, or have them imagine that cold December day in 1909 when the first Grey Cup was played. From the makers of the beloved Heritage Minutes shorts comes a creative collection of lesson plans, searchable by grade, time period and themes.
Visit: oct-oeeo.ca/HistoricaCanada
MediaSmarts
How do TV shows create heroes and sheroes? How do real families compare to screen families? And how do companies use sports-fan loyalty to sell products and influence customers? You’ll find an abundance of media-related lesson plans and curriculum outcome charts on this searchable site.
Visit: mediasmarts.ca
The Royal Canadian Geographical Society
Where does our country’s energy come from and how do we use it? What is life like in Canada’s North? These and plenty of other questions about our world are explored in curriculum-aligned lesson plans — written by qualified Can Geo Education teachers — all searchable by theme and instruction level.
Visit: oct-oeeo.ca/RCGS
For effective practices in technology, consult the College’s professional advisory Use of Electronic Communication and Social Media oct-oeeo.ca/socialmedia.