Why we're building Fieldbook

Alberta’s new science curriculum for Grades 4 to 6 became mandatory in the 2024–25 school year. There’s no shortage of help with planning it: outcome maps, implementation toolkits, sample year plans and long lists of links.

What’s harder to find is a complete lesson. One with a question kids actually care about, an experiment that works with things you already have, and an ending that makes the science stick. In a 2023 study, the Alberta Teachers’ Association found that two of three elementary teachers felt they didn’t have the planning time they needed for the new curriculum.

That’s the gap we want to fill. Every Fieldbook lesson starts with a question, asks kids to make a bet, gets their hands on something real, and ends with them using what they found.

How we’ll build it

• Free lessons. Every lesson is free for teachers and home educators.
• Tested in real classrooms. A lesson stays marked “Pilot” or “Coming” until a practising Alberta teacher has taught it.
• The curriculum, quoted. Each unit quotes the outcome it covers. Alberta doesn’t publish outcome codes, so we don’t make them up.
• No student data. Students never sign up for anything.

Our first unit, Hot and Cold: Particles on the Move for Grade 6, goes to pilot teachers in January 2027. If you teach Grade 6 in Alberta, we’d love your help.