Educational Reform Movements: Middle Schools, Part 1 of 3
For several decades now, I have watched school districts switch from junior high to middle school configurations, and back again, in cyclical patterns that have sometimes led me to question the motivation of the decision-making process. It is not my intent in this three-part series to evaluate the middle school movement. Rather, I’ll reveal some of the secondary motivations for these changes and present the issues that may have positive or negative impact on the ability of all students to make music.
Basically, the middle school movement is concerned with students from ages 10-15 who are in various stages of physical, emotional, sociological and intellectual development that coincide with adolescence. One of the primary motivations for having a middle school is to emphasize a process, a support system and a curriculum focused on student-centered decision-making.
Common themes in the middle school movement include the following:
Teaching Teams
Teaching teams are developed, usually within the perceived "core" subjects.
Teaching teams have a common planning time, often equivalent to two class periods per day. Non-core teachers often teach six (out of seven) classes per day, compared to only five per day for the "core" subjects.
The teaching team moves with each student cohort as they progress through the middle schools grades.
Normally these teaching teams do NOT include the arts.
Environment of Learning
Improving students’ social skills with interaction and long-term support from teaching teams.
Specialized instruction and certification of teachers to provide insight into student behavior, learning styles and development.
Reduced class size to increase learning and interaction (maximum of 120 students per teaching team).
Integrated Curricula
Teachers develop an integrated curriculum for the subjects that are included in the teaching team.
Common planning is intended to provide for the development of challenging content while providing maximum interest.
The emphasis is on assessment and advising, not just grading, with the aim of developing students’ critical thinking skills.
The Exploratory "Wheel"
Exploration of a broad range of subjects in shortened courses.
Reduced class sizes in exploratory courses.
Enables hiring of part-time teachers who don’t qualify for benefits, a potentially significant cost savings.
Non-essential (non-"core") courses may be moved to the "wheel," or only scheduled on an alternate day basis (e.g., music may alternate with physical education, instrumental music may alternate with vocal music).
For more information on middle school philosophy go to the National Middle School Association website at: www.nmsa.org.
Secondary Motivations
Despite these intended advantages, in visiting many school districts over the past years as a music advocate, I’ve often realized the movement to a middle school grade alignment may have little or nothing to do with these middle school philosophies. Two main issues surface as secondary issues: overcrowding and availability of space, and a financial crisis.
A Solution to Overcrowding
The most significant of these secondary motivations relates to the use of space (facilities, or housing of students) and the distribution of the student population. I have yet to witness a situation in which space usage was not a major player in the process of adopting a middle school "concept."
What typically happens is that a school system that is overcrowded in a certain area of the district, or at a certain level of instruction, needs to move students to other schools in the district that have space. To avoid the most volatile of all school issues (boundary changes), the district proposes a change from junior high to "middle schools," while adopting few changes in the way it actually delivers education. A good indication of this is the movement of lower grades (five and/or six) into the former junior high school, while maintaining the previous system of instruction for those grades. Nothing really changes except grade five and/or six students attend classes in a different school building.
Relieving Financial Constraints
A financial crisis, either real or perceived, may accompany this movement of students. The district may make significant changes that are perceived to resolve a financial crisis. This may involve the elimination or reduction of various aspects of the music curriculum. It may also be used as a means of resolving other issues in the district, such as the elimination of elementary "pull-out" classes.
In Part 2, I'll share some of my experiences about how these secondary motivations result in positive and negative impacts on the music program.
In Part 3, we'll look at a specific case study of a district that successfully implemented the middle school concept.
