Teaming is the heart and soul of middle school organization. What are you wondering about middle school teaming? What ideas in the readings or class discussions have challenged your thinking? What ah-ha's have you had thus far?
I’ll start off by saying that I went to both a middle school (grades 7-8) and an upper elementary school (grades 5-6) that had divided their student body into teams. Through these four years and up until this class really I had never really understood the purpose of teaming in a middle school. This I think was due to the lack of commitment to team building and team building in my middle school experience. The only purpose I derived of having team organization in a middle school from my experience was to create a localized environment to prepare students for the more independence needed in high school. The academic teams in my experience lacked much of what is emphasized as necessary for creating a successful team in our readings. After reading and discussing teams in class, I’m starting to see as to why teaming is considered a good approach to teaching middle schoolers. Teaming, if done properly, does seem to have serious potential with regards to student support and academic achievement.
Hi Patrick, I can't express how much I relate to this post. My middle school "grouped" students by their GPA/Honors status but none of the teachers were given any time to plan or integrate curriculum with each other. In our 2 weeks in this class, I clearly see that teaming is incredibly important to teaching middle school students. I am very excited to learn more about teaming and work in our simulation teams for this class.
ReplyDeleteClearly, teaming involves so much more than just grouping kids together. As you articulated, teams need to develop a strong identity so that young adolescents feel a sense of belonging!
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