Exploring Our Society Through Interdisciplinary Studies

History and Social Sciences teachers are always looking to develop new approaches to engage and meet the needs of students, while also connecting them in unique ways to the challenging world around them. The Grade 12 IDC4U Interdisciplinary Studies course, which was new this year, offered students an opportunity to explore themes of First Nations reconciliation, Gender and Diversity, and International Human Rights and Genocide.

According to Mr. Jennings, who developed and taught the course, “We've always wanted to offer a thesis course, giving the students complete autonomy to think deeply about a specific subject that requires considerable and sustained academic investigation. We've also wanted to offer courses that deal specifically with the challenges of the day - especially in the areas of studying First Nations Reconciliation, Gender, Diversity, Human Rights and Genocide. Entire university courses are devoted to each of these topics, while at the high school level they sometimes don't get the full attention they deserve.”

The course was also built to allow students considerable choice in how they approach their study of these themes. After an introductory survey unit, each student selected one of these themes as their major, which became their lens through which to focus their approach to each subsequent unit. The result was a highly personalized approach in which the students had considerable input into the direction of the course and of their studies.

Throughout the course, students worked to develop skills that are broadly applicable across academic disciplines, especially within social sciences: problem solving, decision-making, creating personal meaning, and presenting findings beyond the scope of a single subject or discipline. They learned how to use a broad variety of research sources effectively. All of these skills culminated in the course’s final project: a major research paper, which simulated a thesis project.

Students developed a specific angle within their chosen topic stream to develop their research paper around, drawing on a variety of sources. They had to sit a thesis defense, where they presented and fielded questions about their work. Students examined topics including “Systematic Racism in Canada and America,” “The International Human Right to Healthcare,” “The Causes of Genocide,” and  “Is Reconciliation Possible?”

The papers were thoughtful and well-written, coming at difficult and complicated topics from focused angles. According to Mr. Jennings, “Students made some wonderful connections to the disciplines they will be studying further in their post secondary careers.”

These final papers will be bound and keep on record as the first set of Major Research Papers from the IDC4U class. Students in the future will be able to learn from and build on this work.

Mr. Jennings is excited to see what next year’s class adds to this course. “The challenge of creating a new course that does not exist elsewhere, while also allowing for considerable student input and direction was certainly a big one,” he said. “However, the work at the end of the year was some of the best I have seen from students, and was well worth the challenge!”