Five Mind-Sets to Ease the Middle School Transition

The middle years are crucial to high school success, when students develop skills for navigating the larger world and discover the direction they want their lives to take. So why, asks noted middle school educator Rick Wormeli, would anyone leave the transition into this phase to chance? Five mind-sets can help educators guide their students on the path from elementary to middle school:

• Understanding students' concern about belonging
• Empathizing with students
• Understanding the characteristics of the age group
• Focusing on the positive
• Building hope

Wormeli's article is full of strategies for easing students' transition from elementary school to middle school. One of the strategies that students say is most helpful: 

If your middle school asks students to use lockers, take a locker door with a combination lock to feeder elementary schools in the last few months of school. Let students practice opening and closing the lock as much as they want for at least a week.

How are you helping students successfully navigate the move up to middle school?

Does Your School Have Good PR?

Do you have a public relations team at your school? If you have teachers, staff, students, and parents, then you do. In the Sunday Annual Conference session, "Marketing Your School: Strategies That Promote Communication, Collaboration, and Consistency," Russ Claus and Liz Dunham, of the Department of Defense Education Activity Schools, shared the importance of using this public relations team.

Claus talked about how first impressions are everything. When someone walks into the main office what do they see, hear, and feel? The tone should be inviting. The presenters gave the following suggestions:

• Living room lighting
• Plasma screen TV to display kids' work
• Seating area with comfy chairs and books to read
• Teachers and staff who are trained to be welcoming

Dunham also said that PR moves out into the hallways and around the school. Having children's work on display, visible and approachable administrators, positive gossip, and regular team-building activities were a few suggestions.

Taking the time to build connections outside school is another way to sell your school. Make phone calls home that are optimistic and encouraging. Share exciting events and learning experiences when you have conversations with people in the community. When someone asks you about your school, share its awesomeness instead of its challenges. Make a lasting impression.

I think every school strives to emulate a positive aura. In my school, the children's artwork is hanging in the office, and there are murals in the hallway. The principal is visible, cheerfully interacting with the students and other guests. The PTA parents involve the community in our events and advertise on Facebook. While there is room for improvement, I think our school is a welcoming place.

How are you marketing your school?

Post submitted by Alina Davis, an ESOL K–8 resource teacher in Orlando, Fla., and a 2010 ASCD Emerging Leader.

The Power of Positive Routines

Think about the amount of time that you spend on autopilot each day. Do you drive to work along the same route? Do you tend to park in the same spot when you get there? Once you enter the building, I bet you follow a predictable path. You might hang up your coat, put your lunch in the fridge, turn on your computer, and start to check e-mail. Most of this time, you're probably not even thinking about what you're doing. You're simply following your daily routines.

I think this is a good thing. As long as our routines are healthy and productive, they can be a great asset. Having predictable rhythms and routines allows us to focus our energy on the harder and more complex tasks of the day.

Our students also develop routines, which can either help or hinder their learning. I recently visited a couple of 5th grade classes. I watched a group of students enter one room for science class. They came into the room quietly and immediately sat down at their seats. They took out their science books and journals, made sure they had pencils, and started chatting pleasantly with their classmates as the teacher got ready for her lesson. Forty-five minutes later, I saw this same class head into a different room for their math lesson. They burst through the door, pushing, shoving, and talking loudly. They dropped books on the floor, wandered the room, and had to be reminded multiple times to get out their math materials. In each room, these students had a routine that they followed. And in each room, this was a direct result of the time the teacher had taken to directly teach students expected behaviors and then follow through to enforce those expectations.

One of the most important things we can do for our students is help them establish positive routines so that their "autopilot" is respectful of themselves and others, allows them to feel safe and supported, and helps them be ready for learning throughout the day. In my article in the April 2011 edition of Educational Leadership, "The Leap into 4th Grade," I describe a process for teaching routines to students called interactive modeling.

What routines do you teach to your students? How do you help students set positive and productive rhythms and routines in your classroom?

Post submitted by Mike Anderson, professional development specialist for the Northeast Foundation for Children, Inc.

How Can We Help Students Take Ownership of Learning?

Many students struggle with the concept of individual responsibility. What techniques have you found to be particularly helpful in encouraging your students to take ownership of their own learning?

—Misty M. LaCour, Assistant Professor of Education, Southern Arkansas University, Magnolia

 

Help Students Practice Responsibility and Leadership

Although many of our students come to us ready, willing, and able to take ownership of their own learning, we must take responsibility for teaching students what that actually means and how to practice it on a day-to-day basis. Stephen Covey's book The Leader in Me (Free Press, 2008) is a prime example of an educational resource that can pay great dividends when used as a teaching tool for students. As a principal and district-level leader, I am a strong advocate of student-led conferences, student-led mastery tracking tools, and student-led organizations as ways to get students to take ownership of their learning experiences. It’s up to schools create educational environments where students feel empowered to be involved.

—S. Dallas Dance, Chief Middle Schools Officer, Houston Independent School District, Tex.

 

Provide Opportunities for Self-Management

When I hear teachers talk about students taking individual responsibility, I always wonder what opportunities there are in the school and the classroom for students to exercise responsibility. In my cooperative literacy model (described in Building Literacy in Social Studies, ASCD, 2007), the class is organized into interdependent, heterogeneous learning teams in which students hold one another accountable for everything from arriving to class on time to participating productively during the class period. Students learn to self-manage and establish a greater role in how the class functions. The teacher provides feedback that gives students data on how they are performing.

After-school clubs, teams, and intraschool organizations can also help students learn self-management. Like any other activity that requires a degree of fluency, responsibility requires practice. To get them on their way, we have to give students the opportunity to learn and practice responsible roles.

—Ron Klemp, Professor, Santa Monica College and California State University, Northridge

 

Involve English Language Learners in Setting Learning Goals

For English language learners, taking responsibility for demonstrating competence includes English language proficiency. I suggest talking with students individually about their level of English proficiency and setting goals to reflect where they need to focus in the areas of speaking, writing, reading, or listening in English. Often, English learners acquire conversational English faster than academic language. This can mask their level of language proficiency so that they appear higher than they actually are. By including students in setting their own academic goals, we help them become active, instead of passive, participants in the learning and assessment process.

—Ayanna Cooper, ESL Site Director, Boston Teacher Residency

Got a question? Each month in Educational Leadership's "Among Colleagues" column, practicing educators draw from their own experience to share advice about challenges their colleagues face. Send your question, along with a 100-word description to elsubmissions@ascd.org, with the subject line "Teaching Dilemma."

How to End the Homework Wars

Want to know how to end the battles between teachers and parents over homework?

Cathy Vatterott, an associate professor of education at the University of Missouri-St. Louis and author of the ASCD book Rethinking Homework, says ending tensions over homework requires teachers to assign reasonable amounts of homework, and not just busy work. It should enhance learning and students should be able to do it on their own.

"Parents should not have to help students with homework," she said during a session at the ASCD Annual Conference.

She offered five tips for engaging parents in the homework process.

1. Establish homework guidelines for your classroom or school. Vatterott suggests determining how long homework should take to complete and ensuring that students are able to do it on their own. She also suggests that incomplete homework not jeopardize a student's grade and that no homework be assigned during weekends and breaks.

2. Work with parents to create guidelines--rather than expectations or demands--for parental support.

3. Establish methods of parent-teacher communication. Tell parents how you prefer to be contacted and ask what methods work best for them. Allow for feedback from parents about homework.

4. Teach parents what they need to know about homework, including explaining why certain assignments are needed and why it's acceptable to not have homework.

5. Give parents options. Differentiate homework. Allow opt-outs for parents who want less homework and optional challenge activities for parents who want more homework.

Vatterott also suggested some parent-friendly homework practices, including the following:

• Limit the number of subjects in which homework is assigned each night.

• Give out weekly homework packets instead of daily homework.

• Go bookless.

• Kill the reading log.

• Leave projects at school.

The handouts from Vatterott's session will be available on her website in the coming days.

Post submitted by SmartBrief education editor Amy Dominello.

Reducing the Overhead

How are some school districts managing instructional improvement? According to professor and management guru William Ouchi in his session "The Secret of Total Student Load," they're doing it by putting their principals in charge of the school budget and hiring more teachers.

Some numbers first. In many traditional schools—that is, centralized schools in which the principal has little power over staffing and budgeting—the total number of students that a teacher must interact with is dizzying. For example, a teacher who teaches five classes of 30 students each has a total student load of 150. In some school districts, like Los Angeles, the total student load is as high as 250. How can a teacher possibly address the needs of so many students all at the same time?

And here's another provocative number: 44. That’s the percentage, in traditional schools, of non-classroom-based staff. As Ouchi pointed out, no business could function with that kind of administrative overhead.

Some school districts in the United States and Canada have found a way to kill two birds with one stone. They've decentralized their schools, empowering individual principals to make those hard decisions about staffing, budgeting, curriculum, and scheduling. These principals reduced the size of the administrative staff and hired more fully credentialed teachers. By doing so, they were able to reduce total student load to 80, which now enables their teachers to interact meaningfully with individual students. It's no surprise that student achievement dramatically improved as a result.

Post submitted by Educational Leadership senior associate editor Amy Azzam.

From Jaime Escalante to KIPP

During his presentation today, Washington Post education journalist Jay Mathews drew a line, and a distinction, between the work of lauded math educator Jaime Escalante and the KIPP charter school program founders Dave Levin and Mike Feinberg.

Escalante, whose unconventional teaching style was made famous in the movie Stand and Deliver, believed that anyone willing to work hard could succeed in advanced-placement classes. During his tenure at Garfield High, the troubled east L.A. school was a beacon for math achievement for Mexican Americans. In 1987, 26 percent of all Mexican Americans passing the AP Calculus test in the entire United States were Garfield High students. But although Escalante changed the lives of his students, he wasn't able to change the system.

Twenty-five years later, Mathews believes Levin and Feinberg are changing the system through KIPP charters. Adapting some of Escalante's methods, as well as the motivational style of mentor Harriet Bell, Mathews says the KIPP founders have mobilized a new generation of teachers, as well as reinvigorated established teachers, with their mission of education equity.

Mathews believes the system is changing because more people than ever before are acting on the belief that ability to learn is not limited by income or ethnicity. Do you see these systemic changes, too?

Creating a Culture of Redemption

What is one thing that teachers who achieved the greatest amount of student growth in an Alabama school district have in common?

They created a culture in the classroom that allowed for failure and mistakes to be a part of the learning process, according to Betty Winches, an assistant superintendent of Homewood City Schools, and Jodi Newton, an associate dean of education at Samford University in Birmingham, Ala.

The two collaborated on an analysis of what top teachers in the Homewood schools did to cultivate success. They found a culture of redemption was key and offered tips during a session at the ASCD Annual Conference for educators to replicate a similar culture in their schools.

Creating a culture of redemption incorporates five aspects:

• Combining rigorous standards with multiple ways for students to succeed. "[Teachers] were negotiable about how you got to the end goal, but not negotiable about the end goal," Winches said.
• Provide encouragement to students, but also accountability.
• Offer specific feedback. "Great teachers are clear about what needs to be accomplished next in order to be successful," Winches said.
• Share progress with students visually and in kid-friendly terms. Winches said students don't always know what their grades mean. "These teachers strive to eliminate confusion about performance," she said.
• Partner with students for success. Homewood City Schools establishes specific learning targets for each grade and sends home booklets at the beginning of the school year outlining what students will be expected to know by the end of the year.

Learn more about the district's learning targets.

Post submitted by SmartBrief education editor Amy Dominello.

Extreme Homeroom Makeover

Little things mean a lot when it comes to designing school spaces that can enhance student learning.

There are lots of little touches that can be done at little cost to improve learning environments, said Beth Hebert, the now-retired principal of Crow Island School in Winnetka, Ill. But it's also about making sure that classroom spaces are designed for little people, she said.

Hebert, who served as principal of the elementary school for 21 years, led an ASCD Annual Conference session on how school and classroom design can energize, support, and inspire learning. Architects frequently visited her school—a National Historic Landmark built in 1940—because of its unique design, which incorporated work rooms and access to outdoor spaces in the classrooms.

The interest in the school piqued her interest in the connections between the use of space and how well-designed spaces can improve learning for children. She stressed that doing so doesn't always cost money or require major renovations, citing the calming effect of softer lighting as one example.

Before embarking on a makeover, Hebert recommends understanding the strengths and weaknesses of your current space and getting multiple perspectives, including those of students and parents.

She also advocates that educators think about classroom design from the student's perspective: painting doors different colors so young students who can't read yet know where to go; making sure seats are the right size for the youngest students; and having wide hallways so students aren't bumping into one another.

Hebert also urged educators to look at the wide variety of resources available to make a case for change, including DesignShare, the Council of Educational Facility Planners International, and the National Clearinghouse for Educational Facilities.

Post submitted by SmartBrief education editor Amy Dominello.

Can Educators Have a Work/Life Balance?

Does work make you stressed? Are you in so deep that you forget to eat, sleep, reflect, exercise, collaborate, and have fun? Then you need some advice from Mike Anderson. His Saturday session, "The Well-Balanced Teacher: How to Work Smarter and Stay Sane Inside the Classroom and Out" was dynamic and full of energy. (Find Well-Balanced Teacher resources here.)

As a 3rd and 4th grade classroom teacher, Anderson spent endless hours at school working on lesson plans, grading papers, and reviewing data. If you are a classroom teacher, this may sound familiar. All the time and energy that went into his classroom was removed from his personal life. So he asked himself and other teachers: "How do you balance being a really good teacher and a really good parent or spouse?"

Balance starts by looking at your needs in five key areas, said Anderson:

• Basic needs
• Belonging
• Significance
• Competence
• Fun 

We have to be healthy if we expect to have healthy students. Emotional, physical, and mental wellness are just as important for us as it is for our students. Are you taking care of yourself? How do you find balance? 

Post submitted by Alina Davis, an ESOL K–8 resource teacher in Orlando, Fla., and a 2010 ASCD Emerging Leader.

Should Public Schools Do More to Protect Themselves from Privatization?

Are public schools doing a good job of defending themselves during a time when critics are gaining momentum on voucher and charter-school efforts?

Not at all, said members of an ASCD annual conference panel presented by the Horace Mann League, a group that advocates for public education as one of the cornerstones of American democracy. "I think this is the biggest threat to education we've ever had," said Evelyn Blose-Holman, the superintendent of Bay Shore Schools in New York.

The panelists, all members of the group's board of directors, sought to discuss ways to protect schools from privatization and arm public education advocates with information to counter arguments for charters and vouchers. However, they also acknowledged that there needs to be tough discussions among educators about what public schools are doing right and wrong.

Gary Marx, president of the Center for Public Outreach, said educators must take the lead in the discussion, but they also need to listen to determine the areas in which public schools need to make improvements. "Today public education is too often illustrated by what we're against," he said.

James Harvey, the executive director of the National Superintendents Roundtable, offered three strategies for educators to respond to threats: do some hard thinking about the profession, effectively and proactively rebut lies about public schools, and develop a coherent political strategy.

He urged those in attendance to get involved in political campaigns and become proactive in sharing the positive aspects of public schools.

While some in the audience questioned how that was possible in a time when teachers are seen as having better pay and benefits than many of the parents of the children they teach, Harvey said surveys show that communities back public schools.

"No system is perfect, but public support is one of our greatest assets," he said.

Post submitted by SmartBrief education editor Amy Dominello.

Why Top-Down School Systems Don't Work

In the past 80 years, the number of school districts has shrunk from 127,000 to 16,000, but the number of students has grown from 25 million to 50 million.

That has created top-down systems that must be decentralized to allow for decision-making by principals, said UCLA professor William Ouchi, speaking during his Cawelti Leadership Lecture at the ASCD conference.

"Instead of serving schools, the central office tells them what to do," Ouchi said.

Schools, he argues, should be empowered and allowed to control their budgets, curriculum, staffing and schedule. "If you don't control any of these things, how can you be the instructional leader?" he asked. He cited several school districts that have done this successfully, including New York City and Edmonton, Alberta. In the Canadian city, 97% of education dollars are controlled by principals.

Ouchi argues that one key component schools must be able to control is total student load, or how many students a teacher has to get to know. The number of students a teacher has in their classroom over a course of the day affects how they teach, and a higher student load overburdens teachers.

One strategy Ouchi said that he's seen work is the blocking and coring of subjects to bring down the total student load. At Vanguard High School in New York City, English and history are taught in a block by one teacher, while math and science are taught in a block as well. That brings student load down dramatically and improves instruction, he said.

"Students know their teacher is available to talk to them one-on-one," Ouchi said.

Another key is allowing districts to focus on the development of effective principals, citing the New York City Leadership Academy for aspiring principals as an example.

Ouchi also advocates for a weighted student formula, which acknowledges that the cost of education can vary depending upon the student. Doing so creates equity and encourages schools to include a diverse array of students and classes, he said.

Post submitted by SmartBrief education editor Amy Dominello. Read more about Ouchi's work in this previous blog post.

Getting Everyone to Graduation (Parents, Too)

If you hand a high school transcript to a parent who's never had it explained to them, you're making a big leap that they're going to know why their kid's not on track to graduate, principal Ben Shuldiner said in his Saturday session "How to Get All Students to Graduate."

He and guidance counselor Sarah Kornhauser discussed the High School for Public Service's extensive outreach plan to the families of its 400 students. Founded in 2003, the school, where 90 percent of students are on free and reduced lunch, was recently named the number-one Title I school in New York State.

The school organizes several informative and fun parent outreach sessions throughout the four years of high school—from 8th grade orientation to 12th grade sessions on navigating FAFSA and other financial aid forms.

It's important to bring parents in early, give them the tools to navigate and decipher school-speak and processes, and make sure that parents and teachers are on the same page. Show respect for parents by bringing them in to the graduation goal as partners. We can't be successful without spelling out each and every part of the process to parents, Kornhauser said.

But what happens when, despite an entrenched college-going culture at the school, parents don't show up to 12th grade college-planning night or 10th and 11th grade on-track-to-graduate night?

"We love parents, we want them to be there, but don't wait for them," said Shuldiner. Parents shouldn't be an excuse for giving up on a kid. If parents can't be there, the kids should still be there.

What Can Schools Learn from One-Click Shopping?

Too often, when we think of what we want to change, we focus on people, not the situation, said Chip Heath in his ASCD Annual Conference Opening General Session. Changing people is hard, often impossible, but changing the environment is an easy way to influence and change people's behavior.

Heath illustrated his point by mentioning Amazon.com's very successful one-click buying option. Streamlining online purchases is an obvious win-win, yet Internet shopping existed for years before Amazon pioneered this approach.

"Have you one-clicked the processes in your school or classroom?," Heath asked. For example, math classes with established "Do Now" routines (students come to class and immediately work for three-to-five minutes on a problem on the board) save four minutes of class time a day, which adds up to about two-and-a-half extra weeks per year.

What fundamental routines could be streamlined at your school?

Give Boys Reading Role Models

What's with boys and reading?

In "The Boy Factor in Special Education: Overrepresented or Misguided Pedagogy?," one of the early sessions at ASCD's Annual Conference in San Francisco, presenters talked about ways to make instruction more accessible to boys. And really, the strategies discussed—more active learning environments, less emphasis on conformity, more student choice—are tools that work with all genders and are about the overall goal to make learning more engaging.

The strategy that really stood out relates to the question above: how can we hook more boys into reading? Presenter Gail Choice observed that we need to provide boys with male reading role models.

"Boys don't see reading as a masculine activity," Choice said. She suggested getting male volunteers to come into school to read to or with classes and individual boys, providing boys with reading role models.

Along with male literacy role models, let all students self-select some of their reading, choose nonfiction, participate in readers theater, have time to practice before reading aloud, and joyfully experiment with the writing process with topics they are comfortable writing about (in other words, let kids be gross, weird, and funny).

To read more about gender and learning, check out previous blog posts: Stop Pseudoscience of Gender Differences in Learning and Science and Education Need to Work Together for Boys & Girls.

In Case You Missed It

With Annual Conference happeing now, here are a few things  happening at conference and at ASCD:

• Were you unable to make Annual Conference this year? Not to worry because you can check out live-streaming video of select sessions.
• Make sure you catch up on all the major stories from conference by reading Conference Daily.
• Our  members and other education experts have been posting about a variety of topics over on ASCD EDge. Read what educators have to say about all areas of education.
• Follow ASCD on Twitter and see what people are talking about at conference. #ascd11

Add your own highlights in the comments, and check this spot for our regular weekly digest of ASCD activities.

These Changes Helped (1950)

"What changes in your school within the last three years have been most helpful to you for doing a better job of teaching?"

In April 1950, Educational Leadership published "These Changes Helped," which discussed the result of asking 850 teachers in six school systems this question. The big shocker (or not, depending on your point of view): A full 44 percent could not name a single change that had been helpful.

Read the article: These Changes Helped (PDF)

Tellingly, these nonresponses were mostly clustered together in certain schools; other schools had 100 percent response rates, the teachers eager to relate useful changes. Most commonly cited among those changes were new leadership or "better understanding" between staff and existing leadership, professional development opportunities, and curriculum improvement—including opportunities to work in teacher groups. The authors summarize these top items as "related to staff relations."

Interestingly, the staff in schools that responded with examples of positive changes also described a broad range of staff recognition taking place, while largely unresponsive staffs reported very narrow recognition.

The article is packed with fascinating findings like this and provides solid food for thought for all involved in present-day school improvement initiatives.

In for Good

In her blog In For Good, ASCD Conference Scholar Meredith Stewart gives readers a glimpse into a 1:1 tablet school via her 6th grade Language Arts and World Cultures classroom. The blog is full of instructive examples of technology as a facilitator of learning and communication in schools, delivered in a friendly and reflective voice.

One recent post recalls a spontaneous, improvised lesson plan that unfolded from the basis of a discussion of the previous night's assigned reading. She begins with students discussing questions they have about the text with a neighbor, then writing them on index cards—a decidedly old-school, analog exercise. Stewart then collects the best questions via e-mail from the students' tablets, culls the best ones into a shared Google Doc, and lets the students loose to simultaneously write responses ("the room was silent other than the furious clicking of keys.") Finally, she collects feedback on the process using a Google form.

Stewart's reflective voice really shines in this post. Although positive about the outcome of the lesson, she admits the index cards and e-mails were probably redundant and advises not to improvise all the time, lest total exhaustion ensue. It's writing that educators can learn from and relate to. Read more.

Are You Headed for a Spring Breakdown?

Spring time is here, and so is burnout.

In the past few weeks, I have heard (and said on many, many occasions), "I'm so glad that spring break is just a few weeks away." While the statement is true—I am looking forward to some much needed relaxation and some sun—I am always amazed at how burned out and stressed I tend to get at this time of year.

It's completely understandable that educators become a bit irritable around the end of March. Standardized testing, planning for proms, graduations, field trips, end-of-year events, and so forth all take a toll on us. We often forget how much we need a work-life balance to continue positively affecting the lives of our students. If I'm not effective in my own personal life, how can I possibly be effective for my students?

With that said, I am aiming to do something for my students by doing something for myself. I am headed to Oregon for spring break to spend some time with good friends, enjoy some time outdoors, and just relax! I can't believe I'm going to say it, but I plan on reading a book that has nothing to do with teaching and learning.

What excites me the most is that I will be able to get away and think more clearly without the pressing demands of work. I plan on leaving behind my laptop, work, and maybe even my iPad—maybe! Nonetheless, I am going to spend time with my loved ones and enjoy our time together so that when I return to school the Monday after spring break, I am more rejuvenated and energized to finish the year with a bang.

Of course, this is my first spring break as an administrator, so I could be oversimplifying matters. What do those of you seasoned administrators do on spring break to prepare yourself for the short weeks ahead? Do you find that refocusing on your personal relationships has a direct impact on your performance at work? What are some good strategies to recharge?

How Are You Teaching What's Happening in Japan?

A parent asks:

How many of your kids discussed the physics behind a nuclear reactor in their science classes? Or the relevance of a Japanese monarch addressing the nation for the first time in their history classes? Or just the magnitude of the tragedy? Or are NCLB mandates crowding out teachable moments?

The New York Times delivers tips for planning a lesson on the earthquake in Japan.

Eric Brunsell at Edutopia adds resources for helping students to understand what's happening in Japan.

How are you teaching about what's happening in Japan? Do you have time to deeply consider world events in the classroom?