I began this school year with a desire to create greater engagement and buy-in with my Grade 7 students. I liked the vocabulary and language skills that students were taking away from our “J’achète… ou pas?” unit, but found that in the past few years students struggled to engage meaningfully with the idea of budgeting because it is not something that (largely speaking) most of them have first-hand experience with. By reframing their learning about budgets to be about supporting local food banks, students can see the value of keeping costs down and how difficult it can be to stay within a given budget. From this, my how might we… questions was born:

How might we adapt the budgeting unit for Grade 7 French so that there are greater opportunities for interdisciplinary connections and greater engagement from the students?

Updating this Grade 7 French unit has overall been a positive experience. This year my school has communicated that interdisciplinary projects and learning opportunities is a priority, and as a department, the French team has identified many ways that subjects can be connected through students’ language learning, and this unit is no exception. There are clear ties to the financial literacy curriculum in math and in the school’s community engagement curriculum.

The strand that has the best link to this project for financial literacy is:

F1.4: identify various societal and personal factors that may influence financial decision making, and describe the effects that each might have

Going into next school year, I hope to expand the rubric for the final assignment for this unit to encompass this strand of the math curriculum so that students receive a grade for both classes at the end of the project. I would also like to build on the momentum of creating this link between French and Math by creating similar opportunities in Grade 8… Perhaps the budgeting for a trip assignment?

Connecting learning across subjects is a great way to reinforce knowledge in both areas, and in a class like French where the cognitive load is so great, these connections are even more important.