Why the Transition Process Matters for Students of All Ages

There is a wide range of transition plans from elementary school to middle school and from middle school to high school that can be seen in every school district. However, these plans have varying levels of success in regards to supporting every need that a student may have. Throughout my time as an Education major I have had the opportunity to view a diverse assortment of transition plans and have heard from the teachers involved how the students have done in transitioning into their new schools.

Research Says...

Moving is a stressful time for anybody, regardless of their age, so it is no surprise that middle school students also have a difficult time coping with changing schools. Some students experience a strong overwhelming feeling when in a new environment, therefore, it is helpful to provide students as many opportunities to become familiar with the new school as possible. The Shoffner and Williamson article provide a plethora of examples of things schools could do in order to support students such as: opportunities for incoming students to interact with current students and staff, multiple chances to tour the school, attempt their locker, and meet with their faculty advisor, if they have one.

Another aspect of support that schools should offer during the transition period, according to Koppang, is social and emotional support. In one scenario, a survey was distributed among all incoming middle school students where they were asked to determine how concerned they were about various middle school related topics. At the first orientation, students were split into small groups and the items that were deemed most concerning from the survey were discussed with students by both adults and current middle school students. During these small group sessions, students were separated from their parents and it was clear that students felt much more comfortable asking questions about the topics that were giving them anxiety.

How do Positive (or Negative) Transition Experiences Affect Students: A Personal Example 

Ensuring that the transition process is simple and supportive for students should be at the top of a school’s priority list. In my experience, a well down transition program can promote a student's success in ways that they could not receive from elsewhere. The reason I feel so strongly about the transition process is because through my personal participation in a variety of schools transition programs either as an active participant or an observer I have come to the conclusion that students at both the elementary and middle school level need a high level of support during times of transitioning between schools. The transition situations that I have experienced are similar to those found in the Shoffner and Williamson article. During my transition from eighth grade to high school my school hosted a picnic complete with some of our future teachers as well as “peer helpers” that were juniors or seniors. For me, this was a beneficial experience because on my first day in the high school there were multiple smiling faces that were there to welcome the new ninth graders and assist them with whatever they needed. My school district recently removed this picnic and changed the way in which fifth graders begin middle school.

During my senior year of high school I was provided the opportunity to intern in our middle school where I had the experience of watching students transition. The eighth graders had very little support in preparing for their move to the high school and the incoming sixth graders struggled to acclimate to their new environment that was much different than their previous elementary school. In terms of grades, I watched sixth graders struggle for the first few months and once the sixth graders had adjusted, the anxiety of moving to high school began to affect the eighth graders and their grades began to plummet along with their attitudes and outlook on their futures. While I know I cannot make any changes alone, I strongly believe that there are a host of programs and activities that schools could implement to help create more positive experiences for students.

What do Positive Transition Programs look like in Action?

Transition plans can look very different in action depending on the school a student is attending. Shoffner and Williamson have created a three part plan to help ease transitions for students which includes a prior to transition, during the summer, and during the school year stage.

Prior to the Transition:

1. Conduct a study group including a variety of teams and/or teachers to evaluate and potentially redesign the program.
2. Utilize school counselors and administrators talents by having them visit the incoming students to provide them with information about their new school.
1. Counselors can also spend time meeting with each student to answer any questions or concerns while also developing a personal relationship with each student.
3. Collaborate with students and teachers to develop an “Introduction to Middle and/or High School” program.
4. Plan meeting with parents of the incoming students.
1. Work to build relationships with these parents through informational mailings and phone calls.
5. Work to ensure that both students and parents are comfortable in their new environment.
6. Hold a spring open house for incoming students and parents.
7. Build connections between incoming students and current students. This can be done through the use of pen pals and student shadow days.

During the Summer:

1. Provide information for the upcoming school year early.
2. Inform students of their teacher/team assignments prior to the end of the previous school year.
3. Create a buddy system with older students. Allow eighth graders to act as “big brothers” or “big sisters.” The younger students benefit from knowing someone while the older students feel a sense of pride of being a mentor.
4. Provide time for students and parents to meet building faculty and teachers at a summer open house.

During the School Year:

1. Provide students time to become aquainted with their new building, locker, and class schedule. Request that for the first few weeks older students act as guides for the incoming students.
2. Design parent education programs to aid parents in continuing to support their child throughout their time in education.
3. Provide classroom advisory lessons on topics such as peer pressure, study skills, and bullying to help teachers in combating these common issues in middle and high school.
4. Include opportunities for school counselors to work with first-year students to address any problems they may have during and after the transition period. Ensure that counselors and administrators visit first-year classrooms during the first few weeks of school to interact with students.
5. Repeat the process by requesting feedback from teachers and students on the transition program and make necessary adjustments.

Below is a video that highlights some common issues in transitioning from middle to high school and how students in Boston Public Schools worked to smooth the process.

Conclusion:

Creating a successful transition program will require the involvement of all faculty and staff within both the student's current school and their future school. However, the benefit that the students, teachers, and families will receive will be well worth it. As stated above, a student's success in their new school can be determined by how positive of an experience their transition into their new school was.

The link to my Annotated Bibliography that includes all of the sources I used for this post can be found here.

Epstein's Framework

This week in Middle Grades Organization we were challenged to think critically about Epstein's Framework of Family Involvement. The two that I have chosen to take an in-depth look at are communication and volunteering.

The communication tier of Epstein's framework involves both school to home and home to school communication. It is so important to have a fluid line of communication between teachers and families because that is one way to ensure student success. Communication can be seen through parent-teacher conferences, report cards, sending portfolios of student work home, and providing information about various programs and topics that relate to a child's school experience. Of course these are not the only ways in which teachers should be communicating with parents, but it is a few examples that move away from the typical phone calls, emails, or letters home. The benefits of ensuring an open line of communication between teachers and families is that families will become more aware of what is occurring within the school and they will be capable of better understanding the policies in place.

Like many things, communication is not always perfect. One of the major challenges with communication is simply having the time to carve out of one's daily schedule to communicate with families. Many teachers have between twenty and thirty students so it can be difficult ensuring that you make contact with each family on a regular basis. However, that is a place where something like a weekly newsletter may come in handy because you will be able to briefly update families on the happenings within the classroom, saving your time to be used for calling or writing to parents about their child's success, or struggles.

In my future classroom, I would ideally like to have a weekly newsletter to send home with parents, as well as a set time each week to make phone calls or send emails to update parents on anything significant that happened for their student. I would like to make contact with every family at least once every two weeks, but I know it may be a difficult task within my first few years of teaching. I would also like to implement student run parent-teacher conferences because involving students in their future is the only way to set them up for success.

The other tier of Epstein's framework that I feel is important is encouraging families to volunteer whenever possible. Volunteering can be done in many ways. A few examples are allowing parents to participate in coaching a sport, leading a club, speaking on career day, providing contacts/networking opportunities (for students or other parents), or helping within the classroom or school. Allowing parents to volunteer their time or abilities is an important well to help ensure that parents feel welcome within the school building. It is also important to remember that not every parent or guardian will be able donate their time, but they may still want to volunteer in some form - it is crucial that they know that we, as educators, are willing to work with them and that we try to find a way to involve them, however that way may be!

In the future, it may be difficult to welcome parents into my classroom frequently, but I would like to think of ways to involve them throughout the year. I do envision working in a school that has a "bring your parent to school day" or something of the nature, which is beneficial for parents to see what their students are learning. Students can also benefit from volunteer parents because it provides them with the opportunity to practice socializing with adults that they may not typically come in contact with. Teachers also benefit from the involvement of parents because it reminds teachers that they are not alone and they have the support of their student's parents.

Middle School Advisory

This week for Middle Grades Organization our prompt is: Based on the research and readings, what makes a strong advisory program?  What would this look like in practice?  

In my opinion, a strong advisory program first and foremost focuses on building strong teacher-student relationships. From both the readings I've done and personal experiences, if a student does not have at least one positive student-teacher relationship, they will be less likely to succeed in school. The readings state that academic performance increases when students are aware that there is somebody with in the school that cares for them. Advisory should also help students to develop important life skills. During this time students can work on developing integrity, honing decision-making abilities, and understanding themselves and where they fit into the larger context of the school and the world.

In practice, a middle school advisory should allow students to freely communicate with each other and their advisor during advisory time. The activities completed during this time should not be traditional paper and pencil writing assignments that the students would complete in their academic classes. Students should be engaged and motivated as a way to start their day on the "right foot." Advisory time should not feel like an academic class, otherwise its purpose is defeated. As an advisory progresses, the sense of community throughout the class should become stronger.

To summarize, in my opinion, the most important characteristics of a strong middle school advisory program are:

1. Building positive teacher-student relationships
2. Ensuring students know that someone cares about them and their life
3. Working to develop important life skills
4. Motivating students positively for the day ahead of them
1. Supervising academic progress
5. Open lines of communication between students and advisors

Middle School Teaming

In Middle Grades Organization we were asked to reflect on Teaming. The prompt we were given was: Teaming is the heart and soul of middle school organization.  What are you wondering about middle school teaming?  What ideas in the readings or class discussions have challenged your thinking?  What ah-ha's have you had thus far?

Just last Thursday I met with my Cooperating Teacher that I will be Student Teaching with. He works on a five person team teaching grades 7 and 8. As we were talking, he mentioned that just last year the principal allowed the teachers to vote on whether they wanted 5 core teaching periods (with less students) or if they would prefer 4 core teaching periods (with more students) but they would have, from my understanding, 2 opportunities to meet as a team each day. The teachers overwhelmingly voted in favor of having more team time. After spending the week learning all about teaming, I started thinking about the students that will be in those large classes. Where I come from in Pennsylvania, we emphasized having the smallest classes possible, so it is an entirely different concept for teachers to choose to have classes in the range of 25-30 students. I understand the importance of working with your team more often, but how does increasing class size in order to do that affect students and their learning? I cannot wait to be in that classroom so I can see how things really do work for that school and why their larger class sizes are still as successful as their smaller ones. 

Looking back over the readings from last week leads me to believe that maybe increasing class size will not negatively impact students learning due to the fact that teams that work well together typically enhance student learning. I suppose that after my Education courses last semester, I am thinking about personalization 24/7 and how we can make learning relevant to all of our students, which seems like it would be something difficult to do with a class that size. This may simply be my inexperience talking, but I definitely see it as a concern, at this point in time.

The biggest "ah-ha" that I have had is how much teaming in my school district (in Pennsylvania) would have helped students. At my school district classes were not intertwined, teachers had to discuss students either at lunch or after school, and they had no time to coordinate with each other. I know in the near future that I will be lucky to land any teaching job, but after completing the reading and meeting my cooperating teacher (and part of his team), I feel very strongly that I working in multidisciplinary teams at the middle school level is truly the only way that teaching should be done.