Printing, Bandwidth and Materials North of Sixty

Quick answer: Download once, print in batches, and design lessons that survive a week without a connection. Schools north of sixty plan materials around supply runs and bandwidth rather than around a catalogue, so the workable rule is simple: everything you need in a term should already be on your laptop and in the paper cupboard by October.

What should I download, and when?

Treat the first week of term as your download window. Pull every file you will need, keep it in one local folder organized by month, and copy that folder onto a memory stick that lives in your desk. Anything that streams, syncs or checks a licence in the moment is a lesson waiting to fail on the morning the link drops.

Small printable activities are the most reliable thing in a northern classroom. Funny Fish Art – Printable SEL Drawing Activity for Grades K–4 is a drawing-based SEL activity for K-4 that needs paper, pencils and nothing else, which makes it the lesson you keep in reserve for the day the network is down and the photocopier is waiting for parts. Every teacher north of sixty needs three of those.

How much should I print, and when?

Print the term in one run while the toner is in the building. Paper and cartridges arrive by air or on the winter road, so the constraint is not your budget but the delivery schedule, and a machine waiting on parts in February can stay down for weeks. Count the pages a unit needs before you commit to it.

Laminate one class set of anything you will use again and store it flat. Reusable card sets cost a single print run and last several years; worksheets that go home cost the same paper every time. Where a unit offers both, print the reusable half and keep the consumable half for the work you intend to assess.

What has to change about the lesson itself?

Assume no video and no live search. SEL and ethics teaching survives that better than most subjects, because the material is talk, text and paper. Build each lesson so the core works with a printed page and a whiteboard, then treat any online element as the version you run when the connection is good rather than the version you depend on.

Text-based units travel best. Prejudice, Discrimination and Moral Courage – Ethics Unit: Worksheets, Projects & Slides (Grades 6–9) gives grades six to nine a prejudice, discrimination and moral courage unit of worksheets, projects and slides that print cleanly. Labelling is the local work, since Yukon and the Northwest Territories both use British Columbia's curricular competencies and content while Nunavut's program is guided by Inuit Qaujimajatuqangit. Northern & Remote School Teaching Resources (Canada) gathers the northern material by grade band.

How do I plan a whole year around one supply run?

Order once and choose material with reach. A bundle that spans several grades is worth more in a school with four teachers than three single lessons pitched at one age group, because whatever arrives will be shared, borrowed and taught by somebody else next year. Write the year's paper needs on one list before anything is ordered.

One purchase should outlast one teacher. XXL Ethics Bundle: Values, Responsibility & Society | 10 Complete Units · 30 Lessons | Grades 7–10 holds ten units across thirty lessons for grades seven to ten, which is the kind of purchase that survives a staff change and covers more than one classroom. Schools working from the Yukon version of the curriculum can start from Yukon Curriculum Teaching Resources (K–12), which lists that territory's material by grade band and subject.

Frequently asked questions

Are these resources endorsed by any territorial department of education?

No. They are independent classroom resources, not affiliated with or endorsed by any territorial department of education or curriculum authority. Matching them to Yukon, Northwest Territories or Nunavut requirements is your own work: read the unit objectives beside the competencies or outcomes your grade currently uses.

Do the files work offline?

Downloads are files you keep, so once they sit on your machine they open without a connection. Save them somewhere local rather than in a folder that syncs, keep a second copy on a memory stick, and print the pages a unit needs while the printer is actually working.

What if the photocopier is down for the term?

Project what you can and move the rest to the board and the exercise book. Most ethics and SEL work needs the text in front of students only once, so a single class set read in pairs covers a lesson. Keep one laminated set per unit for exactly this situation.

Related reading

• Teaching in a Fly-In School: Planning Around Supply and Weather
• One Teacher, Several Grades: Northern Classroom Planning
• Northern & Remote School Teaching Resources (Canada)