GETCA 2025

Writing is the last mode of communication that humans develop. It is challenging. It is nebulous. It can feel overwhelming, even for the most experienced educators. Come join us and learn how to not only increase student engagement - the biggest hurdle in any ELA classroom - but improve the overall quality of their written work. Whether you are a novice teacher or a more seasoned educator looking to reframe how you could be teaching creative writing in your classroom, walk away from this session with a wide array of strategies that will help transform your students' writing beginning Monday!

Students learn best by regularly utilizing metacognitive strategies to help process their thinking. When students use words, pictures, and symbols to represent their understanding and to reflect on the hefty concepts that they are presented within their daily classroom spaces, they are more likely to retain ideas and apply their learning later. While a significant portion of this full-day session will focus on making various types of journals from scratch, much of our attention will be on showing how teachers can apply metacognitive journal writing strategies in the courses they teach. In the end, all attendees will be able to develop skills for utilizing metacognitive strategies in their respective classrooms, regardless of the subject area they teach.

War is a complex and emotionally difficult subject to cover deeply and effectively in class, but it can be done in a caring, engaging, and inspiring manner that promotes enduring lessons learned. During this Canadian military history education session hosted by Valour Canada, attendees will observe different strategies and tactics teachers can employ in their classroom to increase student buy-in and more effectively educate about Canada's military history. Pedagogically speaking, the audience will see how hands-on, experiential learning (using scenarios presented to the students) can be used to elicit deeper critical thought from participating students. Methods for integrating discussion about positive citizenship will also be explored during this session. At least two of the following activities will be demonstrated for the audience: The Sinking of Llandovery Castle (WW1; Gr. 4 and up), The Battle of Vimy Ridge (WW1; Gr. 4 and up), and D-Day: Operation Neptune (WW2; Gr. 8 and up). All resources referenced during this presentation are freely available online.

This session was designed to empower educators with the tools and strategies needed to effectively use Alberta’s new K-12 English as an Additional Language (EAL) Proficiency Benchmarks 2.0. This session will focus on how to intentionally plan for the academic success of EAL learners by utilizing these benchmarks to guide instruction and support language development. Objectives - Understand the Benchmarks: Gain an understanding of the new EAL proficiency benchmarks and their application in the classroom. Intentional Planning: Learn how to use benchmarks data to create targeted lesson plans that address the specific language needs of EAL students. Progress Monitoring: Discover methods for tracking and assessing the progress of EAL learners to ensure they are moving forward in their language proficiency. Best Practices: Explore best practices and practical strategies for integrating the benchmarks into your lessons to support EAL students’ academic and language development.

Propaganda! If there is one thing that most adults would agree on here in early 2025, it’s this: Never before in world history has propaganda been more ubiquitous and well-designed . . . in fact, the tools of the trade are now so advanced that increasing numbers of thoughtful people are beginning to wonder how much they really ‘know’ and how much of the past they accurately understood. And if that’s the case for adults, how can we expect students to be competent at thinking critically about what they observe, hear, or read? During this Canadian military history education session, attendees will observe how Canadian war posters from the First and Second World Wars can be used in their classroom to educate about propaganda, engage critical thinking, and further develop digital literacy skills. All resources referenced during this presentation are downloadable free-of-charge at ValourCanada.ca

Are you an additional language teacher in Alberta? Come to this session to learn about the Additional Languages and Intercultural Council (ALIC) of the ATA. Topics will include current ALIC initiatives that support access to professional development, recently developed resources to support language teaching and learning, and information about how to connect with other language teachers in Alberta.

Do your students hate reading? Do they struggle to complete tasks/assignments due to lack of engagement? Please join us for engaging ways to teach novels that will have your students asking, “Are we going to read today?” We will be going through a variety of different novels for different grade levels/abilities, as well as different approaches to novels and reading, strategies to build literacy and comprehension skills, tasks to develop academic writing, the gathering of evidence, critical analysis of the text and creative hands on projects.

Are you struggling to develop your student’s academic social studies writing skills? This is the session for you! We will be focusing on paragraph structure building towards essay writing and interpreting sources and developing critical written responses leading to the source analysis. The scope and sequence from grade 7 to high school written tasks will be examined. We will be providing powerpoint lessons, tasks, templates and exemplars for a variety of different grades and abilities.

Want to bring conflict and military history to life in your classroom? Want your students to connect to different challenges associated with people's experiences with conflict? Want your students to think critically and build skills? We will be looking at a variety of different conflicts connected to the curriculum (EG: War of 1812, Conquest of the Americas, Remembrance Day, etc.) in social studies as well as a variety of different ELA texts that have conflict as a theme (EG: The Sniper, War Poetry, songs connected to war and peace, etc.). Students get to explore and understand situations where individuals are interacting with conflict and war and the consequences individually and for society. There are many connections to be made to other times in world history to allow students to critically think about the movement of peoples. You will walk away with the complete lessons, activities, projects and resources.