Learning Resources bulletin - April 2008

Dear teachers: This regular bulletin presents free information and teaching materials available on Statistics Canada's Learning Resources website.

In this issue:

• Spring is in the air! (elementary-secondary)
• Canada Year Book Historical Collection 1867 to 1967 (elementary-secondary)
• Census at School update (elementary-secondary)
• New from 2006 Census (intermediate-secondary)
• For Earth Day – our resources on the Environment (elementary-secondary)
• Canadian Social Trends: Canadians abroad (secondary)
• Study: Drop-outs returning to school
• New in E-STAT (intermediate-secondary)
• Regional support

---

Spring is in the air! (elementary-secondary)

Get ideas from the Spring feature… facts and figures about spring products, a secondary lesson on maple syrup production and even, for math class, a dataset showing births over time (they increase in spring!) which can be modelled as a quadratic function. Check the top right-hand corner of the Teachers page.

---

Canada Year Book Historical Collection 1867 to 1967 (elementary-secondary)

Newly released! This digital collection covers 100 years of Canadian history, from 1867 to 1967, as recorded in the original editions of Statistics Canada's Canada Year Book. Each book is digitized in PDF format and the collection is fully searchable by key word. You can also access charts and tables converted to HTML for easier viewing, as well as photos, maps and multimedia extras, such as video clips and posters. The Teacher's tool box offers lesson plans for intermediate and secondary levels that help students interpret the original source documents related to historical themes such as immigration or Canada at war. Some of the early photos (for example, of immigrants, occupations, communications and technology) will be valuable in elementary social studies.

A free poster is available, English/French back to back, 17" x 22", folded to letter size. To order, please send your complete mailing address to your regional Statistics Canada education representative.

---

Census at School update (elementary-secondary)

So far this year, almost 27,000 students have participated in the Census at school online survey. Have your students join in before June 20^th, then investigate their own class data using learning activities on the site.

Click on 'Student projects' to see what some students did with the lesson called "You are the researcher" and let us know what your class is doing!

---

New from 2006 Census (intermediate-secondary)

In Census of Canada resources, under Key resources tab, these 2006 topics are now available:

Ethnic origins and visible minorities
More than 200 different ethnic origins were reported in 2006, compared to over a century ago in 1901, when only about 25 different ethnic groups were recorded. The South Asians became Canada's largest visible minority group in 2006, surpassing Chinese for the first time.

Read more in the 2006 article listed under the topic 'Ethnic origins'. See also the slide presentation of major findings (in PDF format).

Commuting: the proportion of drivers is decreasing
In 2006, the percentage of Canadian workers who drove to work was 72.3 per cent, down from 73.8 per cent in 2001, which is a departure from a century-long trend of increasing automobile use. The numbers also show gains for public transit, carpooling and cycling.

Read more details in the 2006 article listed under the topic 'Commuting and Places of Work'. It includes tables and graphs that tell the story for each province. Maps of major cities are also available, showing commuting patterns at a glance!

Labour and Education: information now fully accessible
Available last month in PDF format only, the articles on Labour and Education are now fully accessible in HTML. See the interactive maps on education: one shows levels of education across Canada, another shows levels of education of immigrants to Canada from different areas of the world.

Click on the Data tab for statistical tables on all the 2006 census topics released so far. These tables have been added to data products such as:

• 'Community Profiles' that provides census data for your community, or
• 'Census tracts profiles' that provides data for neighbourhoods in major cities or
• 'E-STAT', that lets you graph and map census data (see point 8 below.)

---

For Earth Day – all our resources on the Environment (elementary-secondary)

For Earth Day projects, check out Statistics Canada's authoritative information in our recently updated Environment page, found under 'Resources by school subject'.

In the 'Key resources' tab you'll find several insightful articles and great maps.

For example:

• The "2007 Canada Year Book" article on the environment gives an easy-to-read overview of current indicators of air and water quality and greenhouse gas emissions.
• For more detail, you can consult the actual "Canadian Environmental Sustainability Indicators" annual publication.
• "Human Activity and the Environment" offers an in-depth feature article each year as well as the latest environmental information.
• Reports on household composting and disposal of toxic wastes are presented in the most recent "EnviroStats" of Spring 2008.
• Click on "The Daily articles" for summaries of these and other recent studies.
• Several maps are listed, illustrating land cover, climate regions, energy resources and more…

In the 'Data' tab, you'll find statistical tables on many aspects of the environment.

---

Canadian Social Trends: Canadians Abroad (secondary)

While Canada is a choice destination of immigrants from other countries, many Canadians also choose to emigrate. This article recently published in "Canadian Social Trends" deals with the emigration of Canadians to five countries: the US, the UK, Australia, Italy and Poland. Among these, the top destination of Canadian emigrants was the United States, followed by the UK. Between 2000 and 2004, more people emigrated from Canada to these countries than came to Canada from them, except for Poland.

Canadian Social Trends > By date > Released March 13, 2008

---

Study: Drop-outs returning to school

Fewer young women than men quit high school and female dropouts are also more likely than men to return to class to finish their high school education, according to a new study. A significant number of high school dropouts take advantage of the "second chance" system that offers them another opportunity to get their diploma. Read more in The Daily of April 9, 2008.

---

New in E-STAT (intermediate-secondary)

See What's new in E-STAT: 2006 Census data for ethnic origins, visible minorities, place of work and mode of transportation.

E-STAT is an interactive research tool free to schools.

To see if your school is registered and allowed access, click on "Educational institutions registered with E-STAT".

If you are assigning homework that requires students to use E-STAT, remember to give them your school's username and password.

---

Regional support

For help using our resources in the classroom, contact the Statistics Canada education representative in your region.