Transitions

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Transitions
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IntroductionsAgree Disagree Dont Know

• Our current transition practices are effective.
• Our schools provide welcoming materials to new
  students and parents.
• We provide an effective orientation program to
  new students and parents.
• We provide social support strategies such as peer
  buddies and peer parents.

3
Purpose of Committee

• To review current research on ensuring a smooth
  transition academically and socially for each
  student from grade to grade and from level to
  level and to make recommendations for improving
  support.

4
Review of Literature and Research
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Risk-Focused Prevention

• Transitions and mobility
• Substance abuse
• Delinquency
• Drop-out

6
Search Institute Implications for Schools

• Building relationships with students is the
  foundation of fostering Developmental Assets in
  their lives as young people as well as learners.
• Creating supportive environments is a key to
  providing a learning and growth experience that
  is both productive and positive.
• Connecting to programs and practices that already
  are known by staff and are sound instructionally
  enables the asset model to be infused within the
  existing goals and priorities of schooling on an
  everyday basis.

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Transition to Elementary School
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Effective Transition Programs to Elementary School

• Establish positive relationships between
  children, parents and educators
• Facilitate each childs development as a capable
  learner
• Differentiate between orientation to school and
  transition to school
• Draw upon dedicated funding and resources

9
Effective Transition Programs to Elementary School

• Involve a range of stakeholders
• Planned and effectively evaluated
• Flexible and responsive
• Based on mutual trust and respect (Dockett and
  Perry, 2001)

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Transition to Middle School
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Transition to Middle School

• Students expressed concerns
• Getting to class on time
• Finding lockers
• Keeping up with materials
• Finding lunchrooms and bathrooms
• Getting on the right bus to go home
• Getting through the crowded halls
• Remembering which class to go to next (Weldy,
  1991)
• Personal safety (Anderman Kimwell, 1997)

12
Transition to Middle School

• Teachers identified the following challenges
  (Weldy, 1991)
• Changing classes
• Reduced parent involvement
• More teachers
• No recess, no free time
• New grading standards and procedures

13
Transition to Middle School

• Teachers identified the following challenges -
  continued
• More peer pressure
• Developmental differences between boys and girls
• Cliquishness
• Fear of new, larger, more impersonal school
• Accepting more responsibility for their own
  actions

14
Transition to Middle School

• Teachers identified the following challenges -
  continued
• Dealing with older children
• Merging with students from five elementary
  schools
• Unrealistic parental expectations
• Lack of experience in dealing with
  extracurricular activities
• Unfamiliarity with student lockers

15
Transition to Middle School

• Teachers identified the following challenges -
  continued
• Following the school schedule
• Longer-range assignments
• Coping with adolescent physical development
• Social immaturity
• Lack of basic skills

16
Transition to Middle School

• Students perception of the quality of school
  life decline as they progress to middle school
  (Diemert, 1992)
• Students in teamed settings in elementary schools
  demonstrated a stronger affiliation in school
  activities and fewer concerns about the
  transition to junior high school than students in
  self-contained 6th grade classrooms (Waggoner,
  1994)

17
Transition to Middle School

• Students academic achievement is impacted with
  each transition (Gronna, 1998)
• Aggressive and disruptive elementary students
  recorded more negative attitudes toward middle
  school (Mekow, 1989)

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Effective Transition Programs from Elementary to
Middle School

• Effective programs help
• Build a sense of community
• Respond to the needs and concerns of the students
• Provide appropriate, faceted approaches to
  facilitate the transition process (Weldy, 1991)

19
Effective Transition Programs from Elementary to
Middle School

• Provide several activities that will involve
  students, parents, teachers and staff from both
  levels
• Establish a transition protocol that can be
  easily replicated and updated annually with
  little effort
• Establish a timeline for the transition process
  (Schumacher, 1998)

20
Effective Transition Programs from Elementary to
Middle School

• Schedule meetings between collaborative groups
  from sending and receiving schools
• Assess the human and financial resources
  available to support the transition process.
  Identify adult and student leaders from all
  schools and constituencies to help with the
  transition (Schumacher, 1998)

21
Effective Transition Programs from Elementary to
Middle School

• Ask students, teachers, guidance counselors,
  parents and others to evaluate the transition
  program (Schumacher, 1998)

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Examples of Transition Activities for Middle
School (Schumacher, 1998)

• Curriculum articulation for all teachers (discuss
  curriculum and instructional practices)
• Teachers from receiving schools can visit the
  sending schools to initiate personal contacts

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Examples of Transition Activities for Middle
School (Schumacher, 1998)

• Letters can be sent home welcoming students and
  families, and inviting them to school activities
• Parent Teacher Association members can call each
  new family welcoming them to the school
• School counselors and special education teachers
  from each school can meet to share information

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Examples of Transition Activities for Middle
School (Schumacher, 1998)

• Students of the receiving school can become
  ambassadors of goodwill.
• Letters between students in the sending and
  receiving schools can be exchanged
• Programs new to the entering students can be
  highlighted during student visitations

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Examples of Transition Activities for Middle
School (Schumacher, 1998)

• An unstructured open house can be held prior to
  the opening day of school a structured evening
  open house can be held during the second week of
  school
• A school handbook can be distributed to each
  family to include phone numbers school history
  yearly schedules teachers identified by grade
  level, team, and subject taught bell schedules
  lunch procedures and other practical information

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Examples of Transition Activities for Middle
School (Kleinaitis, 1999)

• Administrators meet with rising students
• show videotape that highlights the MS environment
  (a day in the life of a middle school student)
• discuss dress codes discipline policies

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Transition to Middle School

• Elementary teachers and other staff should not
  use middle school as a threat or misplaced
  motivational tool (Lorain, 2006)
• Parents need to learn about young adolescents and
  their developmental issues and stages (Lorain,
  2006)

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Transition to High School
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Transition from Middle School to High School

• Students experience a decrease in achievement
  from middle school to high school. This
  achievement loss may represent the first time
  high-achieving students experience grades lower
  than As.
• (Alspaugh, 1998 Isakson Jarvis, 1999)

30
Transition from Middle School to High School

• Students attending school districts with
  transitions at grade six and grade nine
  experienced greater achievement loss than
  students in districts organized K-8. (Alspaugh,
  1998)

31
Transition from Middle School to High School

• Behavior problems in the form of suspensions and
  expulsions appear to increase significantly early
  in the ninth grade year.
• (Graber Brooks-Gunn, 1996)

32
Transition from Middle School to High School

• MS students identified academic ability as
  important to making it in secondary schools
• Time management
• Ability to stay on task
• Social skills
• Behavior
• (Zeedyk et al, 2003)

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Transition from Middle School to High School

• Expanded social experiences in high school
  represent a new opportunity for students who
  experienced exclusion in MS
• (Kinney, 1993)

34
Transition from Middle School to High School

• Students greatest concerns
• Amount of homework
• Class difficulty
• Organizational issues (getting lost)
• Parents greatest concerns
• Peer pressure academically and socially
• Students look forward to
• Making new friends
• Having more freedom
• Attending school events
• (Akos and Galassi, 2004)

35
Transition from Middle School to High School

• Teachers concerns that students would feel
  pressure
• To do well in class
• Experience challenging courses
• Difficulty making new friends
• (Akos and Galassi, 2004)

36
Transition from Middle School to High School

• Students whose parents monitored their activities
  and intervened positively (schoolwork, peer
  networks and direct participation) were more
  likely to have a smooth transition
• (Falbo, Lein, Amador, 2001)
• Increased school contact with parents resulted in
  reciprocal parent contact, improving overall
  communication between the schools and families
• (Feurerstein, 2000)

37
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Involve collaboration between 8th and 9th grade
  (Mizelle, 1999)
• Middle schools and high schools should
  communicate to identify distinctive features of
  academic, social and organizational logistics and
  philosophies (e.g., course grading, rigor of
  courses, disciplinary procedures, length of
  periods, extra-curricular activities available,
  role of counselors) (Gibson, 1969)

38
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Ask students to reflect on and to experience the
  complexities and nuances of the distinctive
  features of high school will have greater impact
  than isolated information sessions (Mizelle
  Irvin, 2000)

39
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Provide targeted early intervention in order to
  promote academic recovery in falling students
  (Roderick Camburn, 1999)
• Provide students and families with a wealth of
  information about the academic, social and
  organizational similarities and differences
  between MS and HS (Mizelle, 1999)

40
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Expand the number and duration of visits between
  schools
• Allow students to spend a day with secondary
  students
• Invite secondary school students and teachers to
  speak at the feeder schools
• Provide mentors to MS students by secondary
  school students (Zeedyk, 2003)

41
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Address the following
• Curriculum (e.g., academic rigor of courses)
• Facilities ( e.g., location of classrooms,
  restrooms)
• Safety and discipline (e.g., rules and discipline
  code)
• Provide accurate information (e.g., organization
  and logistics) (Mac Iver, 1990)

42
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Involve families
• Recognize the anxieties that accompany transition
• Consider transition as an ongoing process
  (starting in the middle of 8th grade through the
  entire 9th grade year)

43
Effective Transition Programs from Middle School
to High School

• Explain the similarities and differences in
  academic, social and organizational expectations
  (Akos Galassi, 2004)

44
Whatever It Takes

• Compare and contrast the way the staff assisted
  the student in transitioning to 9th grade
• Vignette 1
• Vignette 2