Detailed Sample Task: Stage I

CLB 1 - Writing
Getting Things Done

Canada

Real-World Task

Copy a list of up to 5-10 ingredients in a recipe for a traditional Canadian dish using a template.

Planning Context

Helpful Knowledge:

Some very basic vocabulary related to dishes and ingredients.
Letter recognition skills
Formats of recipes with ingredients usually listed first and steps to make the recipe following below.

Context:

Many families pass recipes down generations.
Many people use recipes to learn about a new culture.
Canada is a very diverse country where people from around the world have come to make a home. There are many different foods in Canada including some traditional dishes which have been made in Canada for many years.

Vocabulary and Grammar

Sample Vocabulary:

recipe
traditional
ingredients
steps
tablespoon
teaspoon
cup
pinch
words related to the ingredients for a particular recipe / dish, such as for poutine, potatoes, gravy, cheese curds, salt

Sample Grammar:

Imperative voice for instructions
Very basic punctuation rules such as periods at the end of sentences.

Knowledge and Strategies

Textual and Functional Knowledge:

Recipes include ingredients and instructions for what to do.

Sociolinguistic Knowledge:

Sharing food and recipes is a good way to learn about a new culture.

Activities and Tasks

Sample Skill-Building Activities:

Discuss as a class: what food do you like to eat? Show learners photographs of foods and elicit names. Include foods from learners’ cultures if possible and ask learners to teach you how to say the name of the dish in their language.
Use vocabulary cards with words and clear photographs to practice food vocabulary. Use TPR (Total Physical Response) and have learners hold up the card of the word called out. After a number of rounds, have a learner take a turn calling out the food words.
Play games with the vocabulary such as Bingo, matching, and Memory.
Incorporate phonics activities based on vocabulary words and other vocabulary related to the topic.
Have learners sort the food cards based on different categories, such as like / don’t like.
Teach words for ingredients including steps, tablespoon, teaspoon, cup, pinch.
Read a very simple instructor-made story about making poutine with accompanying photographs: Thomas is from Quebec. He lives in Montreal. Thomas makes poutine. He cuts potatoes. He fries potatoes. He heats gravy. He puts the fries on a plate and adds a pinch of salt. He pours the gravy on the top of the fries. He adds cheese curds on top. The poutine is delicious! Read the story to learners several times. Choral read and echo read the story.
Do activities to better understand the story such as finding Quebec on a map of Canada, matching vocabulary cards to words in the story, and working with a partner to sequence pictures from the story.
Look at a photo sequence of making poutine and say words to match the photos, such as cut potatoes, heat gravy, pour, or add.
Discuss as a class that we end sentences with a period. Looking at the story about poutine above, circle all of the periods in the story.
Look at a simple recipe and add a period at the end of each sentence.
Look at a simplified recipe and circle the verbs. Notice the verb form (imperative) to give instructions.
Copy vocabulary words from the recipe underneath clear photographs: potatoes, gravy, pour, cheese curds.

Sample Skill-Using Tasks:

Copy words to complete a very short shopping list for making poutine: potatoes, gravy, cheese curds.

Sample Assessment Tasks:

Copy a list of up to 5-10 ingredients in a recipe  for a traditional Canadian dish such as poutine, using a template.

Teaching Considerations

Cultural Considerations:

Canada doesn’t have just one traditional food culture or dish. Canada has many different types of food as a result of immigration from all over the world. However, there are a few foods that are widely seen as traditional, including poutine, butter tarts, nanaimo bars and so on.

Digital Literacy Strategies:

Successful completion of some tasks may require some baseline knowledge and digital skills.

Learners may need to:

Have keyboarding and typing skills.
Locate, navigate and use websites.
Type information to appear on screen.

Instructors can:

Dedicate time to improve digital literacy for learners.
Make and/or adapt digital materials.
Introduce websites that are relevant to the task(s).
Support learners in finding, navigating and using websites.
Show learners that the size of an image on the screen can be adjusted.

Equity, Diversity, Inclusion and Indigenization Strategies:

Include examples of foods from learners’ own cultures.
Refugee learners may not have had a choice in leaving their countries and coming to Canada; recognize that some learners may have mixed feelings about being in Canada. Allow learners to have their own opinions and feelings about Canada.
Use diverse representations of people in all your learning resources and images, including people who are 2SLGBTQIA+, Indigenous, Francophone and of other cultures, and people who have disabilities or who are neurodivergent. Consider this diversity as you choose names for characters in stories you create as well.

Trauma-informed Strategies:

Possible Trauma triggers:

When teaching about Canada, you may teach about things that are triggering to learners who have experienced trauma. We can’t know what the triggers might be and what seems commonplace to us may have a triggering component for learners. Be aware of this and be prepared to support learners as needed.

Strategies:

Give learners advance warning of this topic and be aware that there may be learners who require support.
Learners who have experienced trauma often benefit from having routine. Create a safe and supportive classroom environment by establishing familiar routines, repeated activities, and model friendly and non-evaluative interactions.
Learners will benefit from positive relationships established in the classroom with the instructor and peers.
Learners who have experienced trauma benefit from having choices.
- Allow learners choice:
  - the choice to work on a different topic
  - the choice to share or not share their own experiences
  - the choice to work alone or to work with others
  - the choice to take care of themselves
  - the choice to step out of the learning environment
When learners have shared personal distressing or traumatic experiences, make space for learners to feel safe and recover from the experience of sharing their experiences. Follow the activities which may make learners feel vulnerable with routine, predictable and comforting activities.
Giving learners the knowledge, skills and language to access resources can be empowering.

Resources

Outings, Guest Speaker Suggestions, Extension Activities:

If possible, make poutine at home and bring it in to share with learners.
Visit a grocery store and elicit an LEA (Language Experience Approach) story when you are back in class.
Visit a farmers market if in season
Bring in a few samples of food from each other’s cultures and share.
Have learners say their favourite food from their culture. Find an image of this food online, print it, and create a food wall collage.
Have learners copy words to complete very simple descriptions of their favourite foods.

Realia:

Measuring cups and spoons
Pictures of foods popular in Canada
Food packaging, such as cans

Units and Modules:

Tutela (CCLB): Grocery Shopping CLB 1/2
Tutela: Shop for Food Unit: CLB 1/ 2
Tutela: Shopping and Grocery Stores CLB 1/ 2
Tutela: Going Grocery Shopping: CLB 1L (Not the right level but can be adapted)
The Literacy Centre of Expertise at TIES: Eating Fruit CLB FL/1L (Not the right level but can be adapted)
The Literacy Centre of Expertise at TIES: Making Fruit Salad Module: CLB FL/1L (Not the right level but can be adapted)

Lessons and Activities:

LINC 1 Classroom Activities: How much is? (p. 206)
Tutela (Archway): Personal Information: Numeric Focus: CLB 1L/2L (Not the right level but can be adapted)
Tutela (Archway): Personal Information: Alphabetic Focus: CLB 1L/2L (Not the right level but can be adapted)
A search of NLCG (nlcg.achev.ca) may provide additional tasks that can be adapted.

Multimedia:

Mad English TV: Shopping in Canada: Going to a Supermarket
Unite for Literacy: Our Good Food
Unite for Literacy: Fruits
Unite for Literacy: Let’s Eat Fruits and Veggies
Unite for Literacy: Fresh from the Farm