New Canadian Olympic School Program Launches with Beijing 2008 Olympic Games Curriculum
The Canadian Olympic Committee (COC) today celebrated the official launch of its 22nd annual Canadian Olympic School Program. Students from Richmond’s Lord Byng Elementary School were introduced to the newly-themed curriculum surrounding the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
With the generous support of long-time sponsor RBC, the COC expanded the program to include learning resources for Grades 2-12, and has created a new website for teachers and students, focusing on lesson plans, athlete videos, polls, puzzles and information surrounding the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.
The new elementary curriculum features a series of Olympian stories that focus on the Olympic Values of excellence, fairness, personal growth, respect and leadership. Each story is written at three different reading levels (Grades 2-3, 4-5, and 6-7), and includes language arts focused learning activities for each level.
The secondary curriculum is comprised of cross-curricular project packs where students solve real life Olympic Games problems. Each project pack contains background articles, handouts, teaching tips, an evaluation rubric and a list of links to provincial learning outcomes.
Olympians featured in this year’s program include: Jennifer Botterill (hockey), Alexandre Despatie (diving), Daniel Igali (wrestling), Silken Laumann (rowing), Lawrence Lemieux (sailing), Gary Reed (athletics) and Beckie Scott (cross country skiing).
The Canadian Olympic School Program has been providing teachers with free bilingual classroom resources since 1988. It provides top quality learning resources designed to meet provincial learning outcomes, while engaging students in the excitement of the Olympic Movement.
More information and downloadable lesson plans are available at http://www.olympicschool.ca.
