Recently promulgated national education goals and school restructuring ideas overlook middle-school-aged children's unique needs and circumstances. Schools should foster the development of world-class people, not superemployees. Focus should be on developmental tasks and diverse opportunities for self-exploration, competency development,…

Based on 12 years of involvement with advisory programs in various formats, this article underscores their benefits--including positive school climate, student proficiency at solving peer conflicts, and enhanced student self-esteem. Advisory programs, which serve a prereferral function, should be coordinated by the school counselor and scheduled…

Examines school/family partnerships in the middle grades. Focuses on comprehensive district-wide programs, school restructuring, and adult/child learning programs studied at nine sites. Summarizes lessons concerned with high-stakes consequences, parental involvement opportunities, decision-making responsibility, leadership advocacy, support for…

School administrators must determine that change objectives are met and positively influence students, teachers, staff, and community. Principals who include entire staff in all change phases will increase teacher confidence and trust. Encouraging parents to be involved in committee work will give them the same feelings of ownership that teachers…

Construction, field testing with children with disabilities, and analysis of the preliminary version of the Preadolescent Home Observation for Measurement of the Environment (PA-HOME) are described. The paper concludes that the assessment is a reasonably reliable scale with moderate correlations with other measures of the family environment.…

Outlines current positions in the United Kingdom and the United States regarding pupil transition from elementary to secondary school. Presents U.S. findings as case studies from each state visited (New York, New Jersey, Kentucky, Florida, and Georgia), highlighting significant similarities and differences in organization and practice. United…

Concept of cooperative literacy implies an obligation of educators to increase all students' literacy and numeracy skills. Adapting cooperative learning as both a classroom management and a learning strategy helps manifest this responsibility across the curriculum. Two self-monitoring strategies are the Team Tally Sheet (to help students manage…

Because of changes in the family and other institutions, schools must fill the void created by students' lack of affective development before genuine learning can occur. This article provides guidelines for developing and implementing an advisory program for middle school students that successfully combines the elementary school's child-centered…

Four simple line-fitting procedures are presented for practitioners to summarize student time series performance data quickly: (1) Koenig's quarter-intersect procedure; (2) White's split-middle adjustment; (3) the Tukey I procedure; and (4) the Tukey II procedure. Data from 45 elementary school students in grades 4 and 5 are presented. (SLD)

Middle school transition brings with it considerable change for those involved. Using corporate and industrial management theories and practices presents a rationale for wholesale and comprehensive educational change. (six references) (MLF)

The language-related attitudes and beliefs that young students bring into the classroom carry serious implications for their successful second-language acquisition and intercultural communication. This article illustrates the predominance of student misconceptions and cultural stereotypes in one setting. Students' expectations and their beliefs…

Presents findings from the 1993 NASSP study concerning the prevalence of 10 essential middle-school elements (identified by a 1982/1992 National Middle School Association study) in middle schools across the United States. Although middle-level education has come of age and developed a unique identity, most schools must work harder to incorporate…

To tap the resources, knowledge, and expertise of parents, a West Virginia middle school initiated a parent-involvement program in fall 1992. The parents created their own program, the Red Apple Corps, which planned and promoted a back-to-school day, a birthday bulletin board, a tutoring program, a school pride award, and the school newspaper.…

Evaluation of using a hearing peer tutor to provide daily 20-minute math instruction for a profoundly deaf sixth-grade girl indicated that the peer tutoring intervention was highly successful, with the tutee meeting accuracy criteria for each of 4 curriculum objectives after only a brief period of intervention. (Author/DB)

The delivery of French immersion programs in Canada is discussed in terms of whether an immersion program in lower, middle, or upper grades is the most effective. (three references) (Author/LB)