A middle school community intentionally creates opportunities and experiences for all students to develop a love for reading. Only two remain. The girl and boy glance earnestly about as the votes are cast. One by one, the members present their decision to their leader. Once the elder finalizes the count, the group roars as the
Read More… from Joy in Reading: A Middle School Literacy Enrichment Program
Using popular culture resources to engage learners. Middle level teachers can make learning engaging by using popular culture texts. When faced with the challenge of engaging students, many teachers often struggle to create relevant learning experiences while also meeting the needs of each learner. Four teachers at an Atlanta area school learned to integrate various
Read More… from Effective Instructional Practices for Diverse Learners
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What’s best for students? I hear this question repeatedly in schools, yet day-to-day responsibilities often seems to get in the way of answering and fulfilling this promise. Best practices tell us that the more involved students are in their learning, the more they will grow. For this reason, we spend countless hours in professional development
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Helping students articulate questions and uncertainties. I have never been in a train wreck, but I have been in chaos created during a class discussion when a student sullenly mumbles, “I don’t know.” Lesson derailment! Disastrous emotional derailment! Let’s investigate the crash site. What? Why? How? What? As the lesson collapses like a house of cards,
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A teacher’s ability to facilitate self-assessment and student reflection on (independent of you) is essential during the middle grades years. Self-assessment is a student’s ability to check and understand his or her own progress toward a learning outcome. Students who self-assess are involved in personal check-ins, checkpoints, and goal reflections that are student centered, student
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Using project-based learning to develop relationships and establish relevance. Project-Based Learning (PBL) has changed my life, but the changes I have seen in young people is the reason I am spreading the love. Skyler was the student that you knew was able to succeed academically and pass tests, but chose not to. We would get
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