The SHIFT Blog

 In this episode of the Shift Show EDU, the Shift Team sits down with Muhammad Zia , acting program lead of Science at the Virtual Secondary School in the Halton District School Board to talk about experimenting with new methods of teaching and learning in a virtual class.  Muhammad worked with Shift Coach Rachel Johnson to experiment with the implementation of the Thinking Classroom, a classroom learning model developed by Dr. Peter Liljedahl , professor of education at Simon Fraser University.  Incidentally, Liljedahl has recently released a book on Building Thinking Classrooms and Nicole Jarvis , Instructional Program Lead for Mathematics in HDSB is leading educators through the implementation of this model of teaching. Continuing our #thinkingclassroom journey with @pgliljedahl and @MsBriggsHDSB . Manipulative, white boards and lots of thinking! @HDSBSecProgram @HaltonDSB @HDSBMath @irhs1 pic.twitter.com/CjDpDNBBxo — Nicole Jarvis (@NicoleJarvis18) Novembe...

  SHIFT Coaching Have you ever learned to play a musical instrument, or a sport, or a new dance step, or a new pedagogical approach?   Did you learn it alone? How long did that take? Do you think it would have been slower and more difficult, or easier and faster, if you had had someone to learn it with? Someone to plan with, someone to bounce ideas back and forth with, someone to try with, celebrate with, fail with, reflect with, and move forward with?  As SHIFT coaches, one of our main goals is to collaborate with people who would like the opportunity to SHIFT their practice, and innovate.   Innovation, as we define it here in Halton, is “an improvement to a product, process or understanding.”  So whether it is innovating a learning process - like flipped lessons or writers’ workshop, an understanding of something - like inquiry-based learning or mastery-based assessment, or a product - such as a communication tool used to better connect us with the ...