Briefly discuss 3 ways teachers and schools can help ease the transition from elementary to middle school

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

Responses will vary, but should be from among the following:

• Sixth grade teachers, counselors, and the middle school principal visit elementary schools to talk with fifth graders and answer their questions.
• Sixth grade students visit elementary schools to talk about "kid stuff," including the things they may remember worrying about a year earlier. It's very encouraging to hear survival stories.
• Make a video of the middle school to be shown to rising middle level kids, typically 5th graders. I have organized several of these, with students carrying the camera and narrating the tour. It's great fun for the kids who make the video and equally so for the ones who watch. The young adolescent sense of humor shines through, putting the rising everyone more at ease.
• Offer tours of the middle school for 5th graders to take as a group. They have the security of their buddies with them as they walk around the new environment, listen in on classes, meet teachers and students, and see where they will enjoy the next three years. Include a "walk through" of a typical schedule and a demonstration of how to open and secure lockers. If possible, let the fifth graders try opening a locker, preferably with success. As silly as it may seem to us, there is an inordinate amount of fear linked to lockers, both how to use them appropriately and how to avoid being stuffed into one. Another source of anxiety is changing clothes for P.E. On the tour the students can see that there are some provisions for privacy.
• Send information to families and students about class scheduling, team assignments, books and supplies, school hours, transportation, and dates of special open houses for rising sixth graders and families. This information might also be published in the local newspaper.