Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies

Goals and Rationale


The Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies curriculum builds on students’ natural curiosity, inventiveness, and desire to create and work in practical ways. It harnesses the power of learning by doing, and provides the challenging fun that inspires students to dig deeper, work with big ideas, and adapt to a changing world. It provides learning opportunities through which students can discover their interests in practical and purposeful ways.

Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies curriculum includes skills and concepts from the disciplines of Business Education, Home Economics and Culinary Arts, Information and Communications Technology, and Technology Education, as well as rich opportunities for cross-curricular work and space for new and emerging areas.

Business Education builds an understanding of business skills and concepts in the context of current technology, ethical standards, and an increasingly global economy, empowering students with economic, financial, consumer, and communication skills for lifelong participation in local and global contexts.

Home Economics and Culinary Arts focuses on fundamental needs and practical concerns of individuals, families, communities, and society in a changing and challenging world. It integrates knowledge, processes, and practical skills from multiple areas, including food studies, culinary arts, textiles, and family studies, and provides opportunities for service learning, creative applications and critical examination from global citizenship perspectives.

Information and Communications Technology encompasses the evolving processes, systems, and tools for creating, communicating, storing, retrieving, and modifying information. As students design, share, and adapt knowledge in critical, ethical, purposeful, and innovative ways, they gain perspective on the long-term implications of life in a digital, connected world and develop skills to responsibly take ownership of these technologies to augment learning and benefit society.

Technology Education involves students in the design and fabrication of products and/or repair and maintenance services using a variety of materials, methods, technologies, and tools in order to develop their ability to shape and change materials in the physical world to meet human needs. Offerings may include woodwork, metalwork, electronics, drafting, automotive technology, robotics, and engineering.

Using creative and critical thinking, students have the opportunity to work collaboratively to address real-world challenges by exploring materials, using tools and equipment, designing and building, developing processes, and communicating the merits of their work. They learn to critically evaluate the appropriateness of the products and/or services they develop and those developed by others. As they explore the role of culture, including local First Peoples cultures, in the development of practical and innovative solutions to human needs, they develop a sense of personal and social responsibility for the products and/or services they develop and use, and their effects on individuals, communities, and the environment, now and in the future.

Learning in Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies provides firm foundations for lifelong learning and, for some, specialized study and a diverse range of career opportunities. The Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies curriculum develops well-rounded citizens who are informed creators and consumers. It fosters the development of future problem solvers, innovators, service providers, and skilled citizens who can contribute to addressing challenges in our world not yet anticipated with processes and technologies not yet imagined in order to improve their lives, the lives of others, and the environment.


The BC Applied Design, Skills, and Technologies curriculum contributes to students’ development as educated citizens through the achievement of the following goals. Students are expected to:

  • acquire practical skills and knowledge that they can use to bring their ideas from conception to fruition
  • develop a sense of efficacy and personal agency about their ability to participate as inventors, innovators, and agents of change to address practical challenges in a rapidly changing world
  • explore how the values and beliefs of cultures, including local First Peoples cultures, affect the development of products, services, and processes
  • understand the environmental implications of the products and services they are designing and applying
  • investigate and actively explore a variety of areas, including aspects of Business Education, Home Economics and Culinary Arts, Information and Communications Technology, and Technology Education, and new and emerging fields, in order to develop practical hands-on skills and make informed decisions about pursuing specialized interests for personal enjoyment or careers
  • develop a lifelong interest in designing, creating, making, and evaluating products, services, and processes, and contributing through informed citizenship, volunteer work, and career opportunities, to finding and addressing practical challenges.

Goals and Rationale











Arts Education

Goals and Rationale

A strong arts education benefits all students, communities, and societies by contributing to the development of well-rounded, educated citizens. The arts connect students with history, heritage, culture, and community, fostering an understanding of the diverse values and perspectives of global, Indigenous, and Canadian societies. Arts education also stimulates students’ imaginations, innovation, creativity, and sense of well-being while developing competencies useful to their education and careers.

Encouraging a sense of wonder, curiosity, and engagement with the arts is an integral part of becoming an educated citizen. Through the arts, students’ interests and talents are fostered in a variety of ways of knowing, understanding, and doing. Students learn to co-operate, overcome challenges, find innovative approaches, appreciate differences, and negotiate with others. Such exploration allows students to be creative, gain competency with materials, and develop high-level thinking skills.

The B.C. Arts Education curriculum is designed to enable students to explore the world through an artistic lens and to express their ideas, opinions, beliefs, and emotions. The curriculum also connects strongly with the values expressed in the First Peoples Principles of Learning. Students are guided in developing artistic abilities in four core disciplines: dance, drama, music, and visual arts. While each is unique and of equal importance, the four disciplines naturally work together to enhance students’ intellectual, social, emotional, and physical growth. All students have the capability and potential to create and engage in the arts and to develop individual strengths and capacities.

The Arts Education curriculum is founded on the artistic habits of mind – explore and create, reason and reflect, communicate and document, and connect and expand. All are lifelong and transferable knowledge and skills. Students investigate artistic elements, processes, and techniques using a range of materials, tools, and environments, and they learn to honour and respect cultural protocols. Students also develop creative ways to communicate emotions, thoughts, meanings, and concepts through the arts, and they learn to respond to knowledge and perspectives that are embedded in language, movement, memory, image, symbol, and story.

Each of the four core art disciplines offers students opportunities to deepen their understanding of self, community, cultures (their own and others’), and the world. And, through exposure to all of the arts, students build a greater understanding in all areas of learning and have the chance to apply their knowledge and worldviews in different contexts. The Arts Education curriculum provides an essential way for all students to express and understand meaning, while also challenging them to engage in dynamic ways of creating, thinking, and problem solving.


The B.C. Arts Education curriculum contributes to students’ development as educated citizens through the achievement of the following goals. Students are expected to:

  • develop aesthetically through the core disciplines of dance, drama, music, and visual arts, as well as through interdisciplinary forms
  • investigate artistic elements and processes through the artistic habits of mind – explore and create, reason and reflect, communicate and document, and connect and expand – to understand connections between the arts and human experience
  • create and respond to works of art using inquiry, critical thinking, and problem-solving skills to deepen their awareness of self, others, and the world
  • recognize the value of a variety of cultural perspectives and explore contemporary and historical art forms from their own identity and cultural heritage, as well as those of others
  • pursue a lifelong interest in the arts and gain the confidence to create and contribute to the local/national/global art community as an individual and/or group

Goals and Rationale


Language is a communication and learning tool through which students create their identity and shape their perception of reality. Language influences how students think, reflect, and reason. Acquiring a new language helps students to develop intellectual tools, enabling them to face reality and the unknown, and to gain a different perspective of the world.

British Columbia’s French Immersion Language Arts (FILA) curriculum is at the core of the immersion program. Its objective is to place students in learning situations in a Francophone context. Through these situations, students acquire the competencies, knowledge, and strategies needed to effectively and confidently communicate and interact in French. Students are guided to develop their French-language competencies and discover the richness and diversity of Francophone cultures and French-language writings. Throughout the program, students follow a continuous-progress approach, a continuum that enables them to benefit from the learning acquired in previous years.

The cultural dimension plays an important role in learning because it offers students the opportunity to explore and better understand the realities of their culture and those of the French-speaking world. By interpreting and analyzing French-language text of different genres written by Francophones in British Columbia, the rest of Canada and the world, students practice critical thinking and reflect on how language and culture influence personal perceptions and values. By self-identifying as students in a bilingual learning environment, they become aware of how acquiring a new language helps to develop their Canadian identity and contributes to their personal and social development.

The First Peoples Principles of Learning and perspectives are embedded in the French Immersion Language Arts curriculum, recognizing that learning is a holistic process of self-discovery by students. Integrating these principles encourages students to understand and respect the traditional cultures and values of First Peoples, as well as the role that community plays in learning and personal development.

This curriculum seeks to awaken the curiosity of students by encouraging them to look critically at the world around them. It is designed to enable students to use the French language as a cognitive development tool to build their knowledge through observation, exploration, inquiry, and the integration of newly acquired knowledge about the world. French Immersion Language Arts is a core program that provides students with the language and literacy competencies they will need to succeed at school, in the community, and in their personal and work life.


The French Immersion Language Arts (FILA) curriculum aims to ensure that students are able to:

  • communicate effectively and independently, both orally and in writing
  • develop linguistic competencies through observation, inquiry, critical and creative thinking, and problem solving
  • understand and appreciate a variety of French-language texts that reflect Francophone and First Peoples perspectives
  • understand and appreciate Francophone cultures as well as their own culture and those of others
  • acquire an openness toward interculturality, by belonging to a minority community in a multicultural context
  • deepen their knowledge of themselves and others in a changing world
  • forge their identity as Francophiles and integrate French into their personal and work life

Career Education K-12


Today’s graduates must be able to adapt to ongoing change in many aspects of their lives. For most people, career-life planning will not be a matter of making one major decision and living with it for a lifetime. Instead, purposeful career-life development, where students learn how to set personally meaningful goals, recognize and cultivate relevant opportunities and supportive relationships, and continually re-evaluate and revise their plans, is a requirement for educated citizens in an ever-changing world.

Educated citizens are lifelong learners who continually build on their self-awareness about evolving interests and strengths, and who are able to use this personal knowledge to inform their career-life choices with flexibility as opportunities and challenges arise. Career Education fosters development of the confidence, knowledge, and competencies necessary to succeed in personal, educational, and workplace contexts throughout life.

From Kindergarten to graduation, the Career Education curriculum offers students many opportunities to explore and develop personal interests, strengths, and competencies while making connections with experiential learning, career-life possibilities, and preferred post-graduation opportunities. Under the guidance of their teachers, students discover that career-life development with intent is not simply figuring out what they want to be when they grow up, but a lifelong journey of being and becoming who they want to be in the world and how they can make meaningful contributions in their communities.

Career Education includes reflection on learning experiences both in school and out of school, and facilitates connections with communities and networks to support personal career-life interests and goals. The Career Education curriculum aligns with the First Peoples Principles of Learning, highlighting a holistic view of students placed at the centre of their learning, and recognizing the importance of experiential learning, guidance from mentors, and community involvement.



  • recognize the need to be adaptable, resilient, and flexible in order to meet the ever-changing opportunities and challenges of today’s world
  • understand how ongoing purposeful career-life development contributes to the success and well-being of individuals, communities, and society
  • build personal career-life development capacity to effectively learn and grow new interests, knowledge, skills, and competencies throughout their lives
  • develop awareness of their personal strengths, competencies, values, and passions, and use this self-knowledge to inform career-life choices
  • communicate and interact collaboratively with others, valuing diversity of people, perspectives, worldviews, ideas, and opportunities
  • explore a range of experiences, roles, and opportunities in personal, educational, and workplace contexts to advance their personal career-life journeys

English Language Arts









  • challenges historical and contemporary stereotypical portrayals of First Peoples





Goals and Rationale


The main purpose of the Social Studies curriculum is to develop graduates who have the knowledge, skills, and competencies to be active, informed citizens.

An informed citizen understands key historical, geographical, political, economic, and societal concepts, and how these different factors relate to and interact with each other. Students cannot gain this understanding passively through a broad survey of topics and or by receiving knowledge from authoritative sources. Students must build deep understandings and create their own knowledge through investigations into interesting, open-ended questions, debating and discussing historical and contemporary issues, and developing and supporting their own hypotheses, solutions, and conclusions.

Social Studies offers students the opportunities to build those understandings and knowledge. It draws on topics from disciplines within the humanities and social sciences, primarily history, geography, political science, and economics, with contributions from other disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and anthropology. Uniting these disciplines is their focus on human activities, behaviours, and interactions with both other humans and the environment.

While Social Studies draws on topics from many different disciplines, the curriculum places greater emphasis on developing disciplinary thinking skills through six major thinking concepts: significance, evidence, continuity and change, cause and consequence, perspective, and ethical judgment. These thinking concepts were originally developed to outline historical thinking, but have been adapted to include some of the ways that geographers, economists, and political scientists think about topics.

Students can apply these concepts in today’s world of easy access to information about virtually any topic from sources around the globe. This access to information of uncertain quality and accuracy makes it more important than ever to teach students the skills needed to gather, assess, analyze, and synthesize information and ideas from multiple sources. Once students have gathered and analyzed information, they will use it to solve problems, make decisions, and communicate their ideas effectively.

Student can apply the skills they learn in Social Studies to a wide range of post-secondary programs or in future careers. The disciplines within Social Studies develop students’ abilities to think analytically and solve problems. Students will have opportunities to conduct quantitative and qualitative research and learn how to collect and interpret data. They will learn to communicate their findings through a variety of methods such as written reports, oral presentations, graphics, and statistics. Studying human interactions and the relationship between humans and the environment can lead to a variety of different careers, such as ones in research, marketing, law, and public service.

Through the Social Studies curriculum, students will have opportunities to explore and better understand their own identity, perspectives, and values as well as develop the competencies that encourage active, informed citizenship. They will develop the ability to think critically, consider different perspectives and ideas with an open mind, and disagree respectfully with those who have different opinions or points of view. They will be empowered to stay informed about public policy and take action on issues important to them. 

The knowledge, skills, and competencies developed throughout the Social Studies curriculum will prepare students to participate in society as responsible citizens.


The BC Social Studies curriculum contributes to students’ development as educated citizens through the achievement of the following goals.

Students are expected to 

  • develop the competencies needed for participation in a democratic society: considering multiple perspectives, respecting different values and points of view, gathering and critically analyzing information, making informed decisions, and effectively communicating their views
  • develop an understanding of the connections between the past, present, and future and the people, events, and trends that have shaped the development and evolution of societies, especially our own. A complete understanding of Canada’s past and present includes developing an understanding of the history and culture of Canada’s Indigenous peoples.
  • develop an understanding of the interaction between humans and the environment, the impact of the physical environment on the development of human societies and cultures, and the impact of humans on the environment — understanding these interactions involves developing spatial awareness about geophysical features and human impacts
  • develop an understanding of the rights and responsibilities of citizenship and the democratic system of government, including how decisions are made at the individual, group, local, provincial, and national levels, and how to get involved in the political process and express their opinions effectively
  • develop an understanding of how economic systems work and their place in an interconnected global economy so they are aware of the interactions between political, environmental, and economic decisions, and the trade-offs involved in balancing different interests.

Mathematics K–12 – Rationale

The British Columbia Mathematics curriculum aims to ensure that citizens are numerate and have mathematical habits of mind. The curriculum develops skills and processes that citizens can use to critically analyze information and provides the fundamentals on which mathematical specialties and professional applications of mathematics are built.

The Mathematics curriculum has been designed to develop deep mathematical understanding and fluency, logical reasoning, analytical thought, and creative thinking. There is a focus on concepts related to number sense, patterns and relations, spatial sense, and statistics and probability. Students actively investigate problems and find solutions. Throughout the K-12 Mathematics curriculum, students will develop a willingness to take risks, experiment, and make logical guesses. They will learn through both their successes and their failures, developing perseverance, competence, and confidence in mathematics.

Through the study of mathematics, students learn how to make accurate, informed, and ethical choices relating to the collection, analysis, and presentation of data. They learn how to make sound inferences and decisions through their experiences with problem solving in situational contexts. Throughout the Mathematics curriculum, students foster a strong numeracy foundation that is applicable in all areas of their lives.


The B.C. Mathematics curriculum contributes to students’ development as educated citizens through the achievement of the following goals. Students are expected to:

  • develop a deep understanding of both factual (Content) and processed-based (Curricular Competencies) information, needed to solve complex problems
  • reason mathematically, using their understanding of number, pattern, and spatial relationships and analyzing data in order to solve problems
  • become financially literate, which supports and underpins sound financial decision making
  • use flexible, effective, and personalized strategies to analyze and solve increasingly complex problems in situational contexts
  • explore the connections between mathematics and other ways of knowing, such as First Peoples knowledge and other worldviews
  • develop the perseverance and confidence to apply mathematical thinking in various abstract and concrete contexts
  • view and navigate their world with a mathematical perspective
  • develop a capacity for abstract thinking, which includes the critical thinking skills necessary for understanding global issues in society


The voice carries, and words carry us away.

Polysemous by nature, language draws its richness from words and expressions that have multiple, co-constructed meanings. Language inevitably varies according to the context.

By playing with and exploring language, students learn to grasp meanings and read between the lines. By understanding the specific features of a wide range of texts, they develop their own style. They learn to grasp both form and content through the works of authors and poets, as well as blogs and images.

Culture nourishes students’ identities, inviting them to travel through ideas and concepts that broaden their horizons. Art and literature transcend meaning and further students’ thinking, as well as making it possible to navigate through time and space. Collective memory shapes students’ Francophone identity as well as their multiple identities, and tells them where they are from and where they are going.

Informed and educated students become aware and engaged citizens who have a positive influence on society.


The Français langue première curriculum aims to ensure that students are able to:

  • develop advanced literacy skills
  • communicate effectively and clearly, both orally and in writing
  • use a metacognitive approach that will improve their strategies and practices
  • broaden their horizons by taking an analytical look at the world through the study of Francophone and First Peoples texts
  • assert their cultural identity as Francophone students in a minority context
  • acquire specific knowledge in the field of literature and an awareness of Francophone world literature
  • develop their imagination and creativity by exploring a wide variety of texts from different contexts and cultures

Science K-12 – Rationale


Science provides opportunities for us to better understand the natural world. Through science, we ask questions and seek answers to grow our collective scientific knowledge. We continually revise and refine our knowledge as we acquire new evidence. While maintaining our respect for evidence, we are aware that our scientific knowledge is provisional and is influenced by our culture, values, and ethics. Linking traditional and contemporary First Peoples understandings and current scientific knowledge enables us to make meaningful connections with our everyday lives and the world beyond.

The Science curriculum takes a place-based approach to science learning. Students will develop place-based knowledge about the area in which they live, learning about and building on First Peoples knowledge and other traditional ecological knowledge of the area. This provides the basis for an intuitive relationship with and respect for the natural world, connections with ecosystems and community, and a sense of relatedness that encourages lifelong harmony with nature.

The Science curriculum includes content from biology, chemistry, physics, and earth and space sciences at the K-9 level. In Grades 10-12, the content expands to include anatomy and physiology, environmental science, geology, and specialized science. The curriculum gives students the opportunity to develop the skills, processes, attitudes, and scientific habits of mind that allow them to pursue their own inquiries using scientific methods. Using critical thinking, creative insight, and their current scientific knowledge, students collaborate, investigate, solve problems, communicate, innovate, discover, and increase their understanding of science through hands-on experience. Students have opportunities to develop personal and social awareness of their roles and responsibilities with respect to the environment. By cultivating an appreciation for the field of science, students can recognize opportunities to apply their knowledge in their everyday lives or contribute to science in their future careers.

The intent of the curriculum is to develop scientifically literate citizens who have a critical awareness of the role of science in society, combined with a caring and responsible disposition and an understanding of the social, health, ethical, and environmental dimensions of issues. Scientifically literate citizens are able to use scientific evidence, as well as their knowledge from other areas of learning, to develop their own views, discuss and debate, and make informed decisions in their daily lives and about broader issues, while maintaining their curiosity and wonder about the natural world.


The B.C. Science curriculum contributes to students’ development as educated citizens through the achievement of the following goals. Students are expected to: 
  • develop an understanding and appreciation of the nature of science as an evidence-based way of knowing the natural world that yields descriptions and explanations, which are in turn continually being improved within the context of our cultural values and ethics
  • develop place-based knowledge of the natural world and experience the local area in which they live by accessing and building on existing understandings, including those of First Peoples
  • develop a solid foundation of conceptual and procedural knowledge in science that they can use to interpret the natural world and apply to new problems, issues, and events; to further learning; and to their lives
  • develop the habits of mind associated with science – a sustained curiosity; a valuing of questions; an openness to new ideas and consideration of alternatives; an appreciation of evidence; an awareness of assumptions and a questioning of given information; a healthy, informed skepticism; a seeking of patterns, connections, and understanding; and a consideration of social, ethical, and environmental implications
  • develop a lifelong interest in science and the attitudes that will make them scientifically literate citizens who bring a scientific perspective, as appropriate, to social, moral, and ethical decisions and actions in their own lives, culture, and the environment