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Articles 1 - 30 of 41
Full-Text Articles in Education
Applying A Reflective Swot Analysis To Examine Four Pillars Of Culturally Sustaining Practices, Rebecca M. Nelson, Laurie A. Ramirez, Chandra C. Diaz, Nancy B. Ruppert
Applying A Reflective Swot Analysis To Examine Four Pillars Of Culturally Sustaining Practices, Rebecca M. Nelson, Laurie A. Ramirez, Chandra C. Diaz, Nancy B. Ruppert
Middle Grades Review
Teacher educators and preservice teachers are increasingly tasked with ensuring that their classrooms are safe and respectful environments that encourage metacognitive reflection and modeling best practices. With this in mind, this paper uses a SWOT analysis (Orr, 2013) tool that employs the Four Pillars of Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy framework established by Diaz et al. (2023) to invite educators, teams, and schools to contribute their own work to uplift and share strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats, as well as resources and experiences they engage in with a community of those who share their vision for a more equitable, inclusive teaching and …
Partnering With A Middle School: Making A Space For Rural Middle School Student Voice, Nicole C. Miller, Kathleen M. Alley
Partnering With A Middle School: Making A Space For Rural Middle School Student Voice, Nicole C. Miller, Kathleen M. Alley
Middle Grades Review
In this Practitioner Perspective, we explore two boundary spanning field experiences provided to teacher candidates to center middle school student voice and lived experiences supported by a school-university partnership. Surveys and teacher candidate reflections provided perspectives on both experiences and how these connected to coursework. We describe how both experiences influenced teacher candidates, enhancing their understanding of young adolescents, and bridging the theory-practice gap. Lessons learned through these experiences and future recommendations are included.
Family Matters: Teachers' Perceptions Of Community And School Culture After Seven Years Of Personalized Learning Reform, Tony Durr, Nicole Graves, Patrick D. Hales
Family Matters: Teachers' Perceptions Of Community And School Culture After Seven Years Of Personalized Learning Reform, Tony Durr, Nicole Graves, Patrick D. Hales
Middle Grades Review
This paper explores the school culture and sense of community of a Midwestern middle school after seven years of personalized learning reform. This mixed method study identified a strong school culture based on the School Culture Triage Survey. Focus group interviews supported the survey findings and attributed the successful implementation and expansion of the personalized learning program to affiliative collegiality, autonomy/innovation, being student-centered, and intentional. These findings can be powerful for any school in instituting personalized or customized learning models.
A Shared Vision? Exploring The Perceptions Of Principals And Teachers Regarding The Middle School Concept, Shawn A. Faulkner, Chris Cook, Ryan Alverson, Mike Dicicco
A Shared Vision? Exploring The Perceptions Of Principals And Teachers Regarding The Middle School Concept, Shawn A. Faulkner, Chris Cook, Ryan Alverson, Mike Dicicco
Middle Grades Review
From decades of recommendations, middle school advocates have recommended various organizational structures and instructional practices to meet the specific educational needs of young adolescents. Several notable national studies have sought to assess and report the status of implementation of these recommended practices, though largely from the perspective of the building principal. The purpose of this study was to examine both teachers’ and principals’ perceptions concerning the middle school concept. Based on responses of over 1,600 teachers and principals from all 50 states, findings indicate support for components of the middle school concept related to curriculum and instruction as well as …
A Distributed Leadership Perspective For Critical Consciousness In Middle Grades, Kenneth M. Bond, Daniel P. Tulino
A Distributed Leadership Perspective For Critical Consciousness In Middle Grades, Kenneth M. Bond, Daniel P. Tulino
Middle Grades Review
In middle-grades settings, students are cultivating critical consciousness to apply general knowledge of equity to their local context(s) (Nojan, 2020). As educators work to foster environments that allow middle-grade students to cultivate critical consciousness, expectations have shifted in the area of leading for equity. We have outlined a leadership framework we believe will advance the collective critical consciousness with examples for middle-grade contexts. Our focus is working toward equitable outcomes through one’s sociopolitical development and creating ways to further the collective critical consciousness of the entire school community through a distributed leadership perspective. Through this lens, our hope is to …
Three Rs For Middle Level Education: The 2022 Ncpomle John Vanhoose Lecture, David C. Virtue
Three Rs For Middle Level Education: The 2022 Ncpomle John Vanhoose Lecture, David C. Virtue
Middle Grades Review
The author contends the most prominent challenges and conditions facing middle level education now and in the near future point to three imperatives for the field: middle level education must be relevant, resilient, and robust. After conceptualizing the field of middle level education as an interdisciplinary, applied field of study concerned with the formal education of young adolescent learners in school settings, the author discusses each of the three imperatives and provides recommendations for scholars to move forward alongside professionals in middle level schools and classrooms to achieve a bright educational future for young adolescents.
“Just Breathe”: Black Women Faculty Negotiating Joy And Hope In Academia, Brittany M. Williams, Laila Mccloud
“Just Breathe”: Black Women Faculty Negotiating Joy And Hope In Academia, Brittany M. Williams, Laila Mccloud
The Vermont Connection
Using Angela Davis’ (2016) conversational interview style writing approach, we discuss how we, as two Black women early career scholars, experience, facilitate, and find joy, hope, and optimism in the face of hostility in academe. In tandem with songs of promise and perseverance by Black women creatives, we reveal how music connects to and helps to provide color for our professional and personal journeys, often contextualizing how we understand, negotiate, and persist within our chosen profession. With some consideration to the soundtracks of our lives, three major questions guided our writing: (1) Where within your teaching and research do you …
Love At The Center: Envisioning What Higher Education Could Be, Stacey D. Garrett
Love At The Center: Envisioning What Higher Education Could Be, Stacey D. Garrett
The Vermont Connection
Extending from a larger autoethnographic project, this scholarly personal narrative will portray one program director’s vision for the field of higher education. ACPA’s Strategic Imperative for Higher Education framework calls upon practitioners and scholars to start from a place of love. The field of higher education and student affairs was built on operating with an ethic of care. The pressures of a neo-liberal society work to dehumanize members of the field, turning us into cogs in a machine rather than human beings filled with hopes and dreams. This scholarly personal narrative, based on reflections and experiences as instructor and administrator, …
Understanding Middle School Teachers’ Levels Of Efficacy To Meet The Needs Of Young Adolescents, Erika Daniels
Understanding Middle School Teachers’ Levels Of Efficacy To Meet The Needs Of Young Adolescents, Erika Daniels
Middle Grades Review
Middle school students are in even more need of social and emotional support due to the cognitive, social, and emotional changes occurring at this stage of their development (Caskey & Anfara, 2014), and their teachers are key players in providing what is needed. Unfortunately, there are few Institutions of Higher Education that offer programs or coursework focused on young adolescents’ unique and specific needs (Howell, et al., 2016). This contrast with calls for school contexts that are intentionally designed to support young adolescents (Bishop & Harrison, 2021) and raises questions about whether and how middle school teachers are prepared to …
Critical Representation: Mattering & Belonging For Students Of The Global Majority, Rebecca E. Haslam
Critical Representation: Mattering & Belonging For Students Of The Global Majority, Rebecca E. Haslam
Middle Grades Review
Critical representation in literature and curricula requires an emancipatory agenda and examination of the ways in which people of diverse racial, cultural, linguistic, and other socially marginalized identities are portrayed, an assessment of how relevant, affirming, and accurate those representations are, and a consideration of the impact on a child’s sense of self and ‘other.’ This essay includes sample audit criteria for critical representation highlighting five sections: Storyline & Sense of Justice; Affirmation & Self-Worth; Relationships Among People; Author/Illustrator Background; and Language & Terminology, all with a focus on ‘mattering’ and holistic wellbeing of students of the global majority. Audit …
We're Back, Live And Unplugged: Non-Digital Gameplay For Review And Fun, Shawn M. Thorgersen Mr.
We're Back, Live And Unplugged: Non-Digital Gameplay For Review And Fun, Shawn M. Thorgersen Mr.
Middle Grades Review
During the COVID-19 pandemic, middle grades students spent months isolated and, in many cases, learning remotely from teachers who were themselves scrambling to adapt to new technology. While addressing these experiences will require a multifaceted approach from stakeholders, teachers can help reintroduce students to their classrooms with student-centered, socially interactive, analog-based games intended to reinforce learning and boost engagement. This practitioner paper presents a context and a model for such play based on a popular public domain game that allows for team play, creativity, inculcation, and, frankly, fun while reviewing for mastery. The model affords teachers an extremely low-budget, student-crafted …
Teacher Candidates Collaborate To Create Place-Based Integrated Curriculum, Amanda Wall, Taylor Norman
Teacher Candidates Collaborate To Create Place-Based Integrated Curriculum, Amanda Wall, Taylor Norman
Middle Grades Review
A small group of middle level teacher candidates collaborated to create place-based integrated curriculum. These candidates and the authors, two teacher educators, selected two local sites, visited them together, and debriefed these visits. State and national standards as well as guidelines for integrated curriculum (e.g., Beane, 1997; Nesin & Lounsbury, 1999) informed the process. Through interpretive phenomenology analysis (Smith et al., 2009), we analyzed place-based learning as a catalyst for collaboration. Teacher candidates recognized possibilities with place-based learning to draw on local cultural, historical, and natural resources in ways that are relevant to students and their communities. We offer implications …
America’S Middle Schools: Examining Context, Organizational Structures, And Instructional Practices, Ryan Alverson, Mike Dicicco, Shawn A. Faulkner, Chris Cook
America’S Middle Schools: Examining Context, Organizational Structures, And Instructional Practices, Ryan Alverson, Mike Dicicco, Shawn A. Faulkner, Chris Cook
Middle Grades Review
The education of the young adolescent has consistently posed a challenge to the educational community. While the general belief is this age group (10-15-year-old children) would benefit from a specialized educational approach, historically, both the junior high school model of the early 1900s and the more current middle school concept have struggled to be fully implemented and embraced by the educational community. With almost a decade passing since the last national survey focused on middle grades schools (McEwin & Greene, 2010, 2011), researchers seek to reassess the context, organizational structures, and instructional practices of middle schools in the United States. …
Toward A Critical-Pbl: Centering A Critical Consciousness In The Middle Grades, Jaclyn Caires-Hurley, Margarita Jimenez-Silva, Rachel Harrington
Toward A Critical-Pbl: Centering A Critical Consciousness In The Middle Grades, Jaclyn Caires-Hurley, Margarita Jimenez-Silva, Rachel Harrington
Middle Grades Review
The dual pandemic of 2020 that includes racism and COVID-19 demonstrates the need for students to become socially responsible and critically conscious world citizens. Students in the middle grades are developing their sense of identity while concomitantly trying to understand the complex world around them. While many teachers understand the need for critical pedagogy, many still struggle to find time to teach rigorous content standards while integrating social justice education. In this article, we propose the four pillars of Critical-Problem Based Learning (Critical-PBL). Using critical standards, critical problems, critical content, and critical discourse, we offer a framework to support teachers …
Fighting Back Against Anti-Asian Xenophobia: Addressing Global Issues In A Distance Learning Classroom, Dara Nix-Stevenson, Laura Shelton, Jennifer Smith
Fighting Back Against Anti-Asian Xenophobia: Addressing Global Issues In A Distance Learning Classroom, Dara Nix-Stevenson, Laura Shelton, Jennifer Smith
Middle Grades Review
This practitioner essay will outline a project designed by a team of three critical educators at The Experiential School of Greensboro (TESG), a new grassroots charter school in Greensboro, North Carolina. In this essay, we will describe the social context of TESG, discuss how we built towards addressing complicated topics related to systemic racism, and outline the ways we addressed anti-Asian racism and xenophobia in a remote learning context during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Success Plan For The Online Learning Experience: Student Engagement, Teacher Accessibility, & Relationships, Ruchelle Combs
Success Plan For The Online Learning Experience: Student Engagement, Teacher Accessibility, & Relationships, Ruchelle Combs
Middle Grades Review
Online teaching in the time of COVID-19 is a new and sometimes scary experience for even the most seasoned educator. It is certainly apparent that many students are struggling to make this instantaneous adjustment. Teachers have a duty to mitigate this stress as they continue to provide relevant instruction. Based on my experience, this can be achieved by fostering student engagement, staying highly accessible, and maintaining the relationships that were formed face-to-face in the conventional classroom.
The Global Pandemic As Learning Opportunities About The World: Extending School Curriculum, Bogum Yoon
The Global Pandemic As Learning Opportunities About The World: Extending School Curriculum, Bogum Yoon
Middle Grades Review
The purpose of this essay is to offer middle grades educators with suggestions on promoting students’ global perspectives by using the international pandemic as a main topic during and after the COVID-19 crisis. The outbreak of the coronavirus has affected individuals’ lives and education around the world including the United States. This phenomenon invites educators to work with students for deepening their understanding about the interconnected world as global citizens. Yet, education about the world is severely lacking. There is little in-depth discussion on how educators can help young adolescents to learn this interconnected world concept by using the current …
Teacher Education In The Time Of Covid-19: Creating Digital Networks As University-School-Family Partnerships, Tracey S. Hodges, Cailin Kerch, Melisa (Lisa) Fowler
Teacher Education In The Time Of Covid-19: Creating Digital Networks As University-School-Family Partnerships, Tracey S. Hodges, Cailin Kerch, Melisa (Lisa) Fowler
Middle Grades Review
As COVID-19 has suddenly transformed the landscape of learning in the United States, teachers are doing what they do best: figuring out how to effectively respond to support their students on their own. However, by creating digital networks that include university-school-family partnerships, the reach of teachers and teacher educators can increase. Teacher educators can provide support, systems, and strategies to maneuver the additional stressors and challenges posed by teaching during COVID-19. In this essay, we discuss how university-school-family partnerships mitigate the impacts of trauma, augment digital learning, and provide support for a variety of instructional scenarios happening in homes. Our …
In A Spirit Of Curiosity, Concern, Collaboration, And Humility: Considering The Work Of Middle Grades Education In The Context Of A Pandemic, Kristie W. Smith, Kristina N. Falbe
In A Spirit Of Curiosity, Concern, Collaboration, And Humility: Considering The Work Of Middle Grades Education In The Context Of A Pandemic, Kristie W. Smith, Kristina N. Falbe
Middle Grades Review
When we envision the ideals of middle school, we so often think about the importance of physical setting. Physical setting helps to create a material space for so many of the tenets of the middle school mindset. For example, “a successful (middle) school for young adolescents is an inviting, supportive, and safe place---a joyful community that promotes in-depth learning and enhances students’ physical and emotional well-being. In a school (with a material, physical setting), human relationships are paramount.” (National Middle School Association, 2010, p. 33). With the outbreak of Covid-19 and pandemic conditions forcing so many to shelter-in-place, our collective …
Covid-19, Middle Level Teacher Candidates, And Colloquialisms: Navigating Emergency Remote Field Experiences, Brooke B. Eisenbach, Paula Greathouse, Caroline Acquaviva
Covid-19, Middle Level Teacher Candidates, And Colloquialisms: Navigating Emergency Remote Field Experiences, Brooke B. Eisenbach, Paula Greathouse, Caroline Acquaviva
Middle Grades Review
COVID-19 challenged teacher educators and teacher candidates in ways we could have never imagined. Colloquialisms regarding the move from educator preparation to practice shifted from common truths to dynamic considerations in light of the pandemic and transition to emergency remote teaching and learning. In this essay, we share our experiences working with middle level teacher candidates during the COVID-19 pandemic. We identify the ways in which our teacher candidates rose to the challenge and demonstrated critical thinking, creativity and compassion beyond our prior expectations of rising middle level educators amidst a time of unprecedented change and uncertainty.
Exploring Current Practice Of Using Technology To Support Collaborative Argumentation In Science Classrooms, Pi-Sui Hsu, Saurav Mukhopadhyay, Rakez Al-Ararah
Exploring Current Practice Of Using Technology To Support Collaborative Argumentation In Science Classrooms, Pi-Sui Hsu, Saurav Mukhopadhyay, Rakez Al-Ararah
Middle Grades Review
The purpose of this qualitative study was to explore how middle school science teachers enact the practice of using technology to support collaborative argumentation in their science classroom. This study employed qualitative case study and drew on data sources of interviews and observations. This study identified two themes. Six teachers regarded scientific argumentation as an important science practice, but five of them integrated this practice into their science class without formally introducing it. All teachers integrated different forms of technology to engage students in scientific argumentation. In this study, the findings suggested there is a need to provide professional development …
Moving From Inaction To Action: Challenging Homo- And Transphobia In Middle School English Language Arts, Henry (Cody) C. Miller, Kathleen M. Olmstead, Kathleen Colantonio-Yurko, Amy Shema, Natalie Svrcek
Moving From Inaction To Action: Challenging Homo- And Transphobia In Middle School English Language Arts, Henry (Cody) C. Miller, Kathleen M. Olmstead, Kathleen Colantonio-Yurko, Amy Shema, Natalie Svrcek
Middle Grades Review
What happens when teachers have opportunities to engage in LGBTQ-affirming practices but choose not to? In the following paper, the authors present a vignette from a middle school context and consider ways to challenge silences to support LGBTQ students in middle school English classrooms. The authors provide discussion and resources to help teachers engage in LGBTQ affirming practices with middle school students.
Conceptualizing Democracy As Preparation For Teaching For Democracy, Karynne L. M. Kleine, Christina J. Lunsmann
Conceptualizing Democracy As Preparation For Teaching For Democracy, Karynne L. M. Kleine, Christina J. Lunsmann
Middle Grades Review
In this essay, a broad spectrum of the work of influential educational scholars was examined in order to identify crucial components of teaching for democracy. Synthesizing the literature with their experiences as middle level teachers and teacher educators, the authors determined those conceptions that would be most fruitful for moving in-service teachers to enact the more “muscular” concepts that foster civic participation and social justice. This collaboration resulted in the identification of four democratic practices as a foundation for designing a course on teaching for democracy. These included amplification of the voices of historically marginalized people, recognition that those in …
Picturing Teacher Agency: Developing Upstanding Heuristics In A Middle Grades Social Studies Methods Course, Jennifer L. Gallagher, Jennifer Farley
Picturing Teacher Agency: Developing Upstanding Heuristics In A Middle Grades Social Studies Methods Course, Jennifer L. Gallagher, Jennifer Farley
Middle Grades Review
This paper presents a multi-case study of teacher candidates in a pre-service middle grades social studies methods course. The research aimed to understand how the middle grades teacher candidates viewed their future as upstanders with agency in middle grades settings. The focus of the research was on heuristic representations that the teacher candidates created to illustrate how they understood their role in supporting the democratic aims of middle grades social studies. Qualitative data was collected and analyzed through chordal triad of agency theory (Emirbayer & Mische, 1998). The findings indicate that preservice teachers best understand their future as change agents …
Career Exploration At The Middle School Level: Barriers And Opportunities, Samantha Godbey, Howard R. D. Gordon
Career Exploration At The Middle School Level: Barriers And Opportunities, Samantha Godbey, Howard R. D. Gordon
Middle Grades Review
In this essay, we discuss issues related to the integration of career exploration in our nation’s middle schools. We discuss the theoretical and empirical basis for career exploration at the middle school level and identify selected barriers to its effective implementation, namely with regards to career advising and parent involvement. We also propose new directions for practice and research as we work to counteract these barriers.
Research And Practice In Transition: Improving Support And Advocacy Of Transgender Middle School Students, Rebecca K. Lewis, Sabrina F. Sembiante
Research And Practice In Transition: Improving Support And Advocacy Of Transgender Middle School Students, Rebecca K. Lewis, Sabrina F. Sembiante
Middle Grades Review
In this essay, our purposes are to inspire particular avenues of future research addressing Transgender students, in middle school in particular, and to inform the professional development of teachers in support of these Transgender youth. In relation to the ways in which research can more authentically represent Transgender identity, we argue for the use of Transgender theory as a guiding framework for research addressing Transgender students, issues, and needs. We also describe the particular affordances of qualitative, ethnographic, and phenomenological studies in capturing the unique and highly personal experiences and realities of Transgender individuals, and specifically, in middle school. We …
Walking The Talk: Promoting Middle School Philosophy By Embracing Student Voices, Rick Marlatt
Walking The Talk: Promoting Middle School Philosophy By Embracing Student Voices, Rick Marlatt
Middle Grades Review
This practitioner perspective responds to recent scholarship calling for reinvigorating middle level education by suggesting that the purposeful inclusion of student voices in collaborative learning activities can help educators champion the academic and social growth of early adolescents. The recent practicum experience of a preservice candidate who prioritized the voices of her students illustrates the promotion of democratic education, innovation, and social justice in middle level education.
The Education Of Escobar Cruz: Sports, Identity And Masculinity In Middle School, Eligio Martinez Jr.
The Education Of Escobar Cruz: Sports, Identity And Masculinity In Middle School, Eligio Martinez Jr.
Middle Grades Review
Some assert that middle school should be the stage in an individual’s educational trajectory where they begin to make plans for the future. For many young men of color, middle school becomes a stage where they begin to get off track academically. This is the story of Escobar Cruz, a young Latino male student, and his navigation through the 7th grade attempting to figure out who he is and who he wants to become. Escobar must choose between listening to his English Language Arts teacher or his peers and soccer coach and make decisions that will impact his future. Masculinity …
Foreword, Lee Burdette Williams
Drawing On The Layers Of A Partnership To Prepare Middle Level Teachers, Margaret Rintamaa, Penny B. Howell
Drawing On The Layers Of A Partnership To Prepare Middle Level Teachers, Margaret Rintamaa, Penny B. Howell
Middle Grades Review
The University of Midwest (UM) and the University of Metro Midwest (UMM) are located approximately 90 miles from each other in a central Midwestern state. They are the only two research-intensive institutions in the state, and both have middle level teacher education programs preparing candidates in school-embedded clinical sites. Both teacher preparation programs are guided by the requirements from accrediting bodies, AMLE Teacher Preparation Standards, (AMLE, 2012) and the missions of our institutions. In this essay, we will describe our collaborative partnership and how two teacher educators from two institutions utilize school-embedded clinical sites to connect and prepare middle level …