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Epstein, Joyce; Salinas, Karen ClarkPromising Programs in the Middle Grades.National Association of Secondary School Principals,Reston, Va.Edna McConnell Clark Foundation, New York, W.Y.;Office of Educational Research and Improvement (ED),Washington, DC.ISBN-0-88210-246-X92

116p.

National Association of Secondary School Principals,1904 Association Drive, Reston, VA 22091-1537.Reports - Descriptive (141)

MF01 Plus Postage. PC Not Available from EDRS.*Educational Improvement; *EducationallyDisadvantaged; *Educational Opportunities;*Intermediate Grades; Learning Activities; MiddleSchools; *Program Effectiveness; ProgramEvaluation

Programs that have the potential to improve allintermediate grade students opportunities for learning areidentified and examined in this report. This 1989 review of over 200programs focuses on 80 programs that stress high academic content ornew access for educationally disadvantaged students in the middlegrades. However, none can be labelled "effective" due to seriousmeasurement and evaluation problems. Following a preface and anintroduction, chapter 1 discusses important issues underlying theidentification of promising programs for disadvantaged students inthe middle grades and their common components. Chapter 2 offersexamplas of programs to improve mathematics, reading, writing andlanguage arts, thinking skills, science, and social studie,i. Commonthemes of the programs are discussed in the third chapter, whichhighlight the belief that all students can learn; the importance ofcommitment; the limitations and benefits of pullout programs; theview of the educational system as a community; and the need for bothprevention and treatment programs. Appendices include a directory ofpromising programs in each of the subject areas and the survey anddiscussion guide. (50 references) (LMI)

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PROMPT' Pr' RS

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U ilt MIDDLE ultiDroM1111111."MN MOM

Joyce Epstein and Karen Clark Salinas

2 BEST COP i AVAILABLE

PROMISING PROGRAMSIN THE

MIDDLE GRADES

Joyce L. EpsteinKaren Clark Salinas

NATIONAL ASSOCIATION OF SECONDARY SCHOOL PRINCIPALSRESTON, VIRGINIA 22091-1537

Joyce L. Epstein is co-director, Center on Families, Communities,Schools and Children's Learning at the Johns Hopkins University,Baltimore, Md. She conducted the work on this monograph as co-directorof middle grades projects in the Center for Research on EffectiveSchooling for Disadvantaged Students (CDS) at Johns Hopkins Herresearch at the middle level concerns school and family connections, andthe organization and effects of middle grades education

Karen Clark Salinas is project director in the Center on Families,Communities, Schools and Children's Learning. She conducted this workas research assistant at CDS. She is currently working on programs thatassist teachers in the middle grades, including interactive homework forstudents and families and teacher/advisory cunicula.

Timothy J. DyerExecutive Director

Thomas F. KoernerAssociate Executive Director; Editorial Director

Laurel M. KanthakDirector of Middle Level Education

Carol A. BruceAssociate Director of Publications

Eugenia Cooper PotterEditor

All Rights ReservedCopyright 1992

National Association of Secondary School Principals1904 Association Drive

Reston. Virginia 2.2091-1537(703) 860- 0200

ISBN 0-88210-246-X

ACKNOWLEDGMENTSThis research was supported by grantsfrom the Edna McConnell Clark Foun-dation and the US. Department of Edu-

cation, Office of Educational Research andImprovement (OERI). The opinions expressedin this publication do not necessarily reflectthe policy of either funding source and noofficial endorsements should be infared.

The authors are grateful to the many edu-catons and program developers who providedinformation for this project Thanks go to our

student assistants Jocelyn Myers, LeslieRichardson, Kathleen Stephany, and EllenStalls for their help with many phases of theproject Many thanks, too, to M. Hayes Mizelland Wanda Fleming of the Edna McConnellClark Foundation for their encouragementand support, and to John H. Hollifield at theJohns Hop lcins Center for Research on Effec-tive Schooling for Disadvantaged Students forhis help in editing an earlier version of thismonograph.

PREFACEEducators in the middle grades aresearching for promising programs toimprove the education of all students,

and particularly of educationally disadvan-taged students. in 1989, we canvassed thefield for curricula that could help middlegrades teachers and administrators improveall students' opportunities for learning. Morethan 200 programs were reviewed, includingmany recommended by the U.S. Departmentof Education's Program Effectiveness Panel(PEP), those recognized as effective Chapter 1programs, and other programs described injournals, conferences, and informal publica-tions.

The search focused on programs that bringhigh content to the major academic subjectsfor educationally disadvantaged students inthe middle grades. Promising programs eitheremphasize new access to existing high contentor new high content. The programs offer learn-ing opportunities that prevent learning prob-lems from developing or that treat learningproblems. Students may be expected to makeaverage progress or accelerated progress inone year's time in programs that aim to be

lv

equally or more effective than others. Pro-grams aim to teach basic skills faster and bet-ter, or to teach basic and advanced skills inways that deepen students' thinldng, under-standing, and knowledge.

From the academic subject programsreviewed, we identified about 80 that hadpromising components for middle gradeseducators. None could be labeled "effective"because of serious measurement and evalua-tion problems. The programs include exam-ples that look promising for improving math,reading, writing and language arts, thinkingskills, science, and social studies in the middlegrades. One appendix identifies how to obtainmore information on the programs. Anotherappendix provides a questionnaire to guidediscussions about a school or district's presentprograms and needed directions.

The issues, measurement problems, utQthemes that underlie "promising programs"must be understood and discussed by educa-tors who judge and select programs for theirown schools, and the problems must beunderstood and corrected by researchers andprogram evaluators.

fi

INTRODUCTIONEducators in the middle grades aresearching for promising programs toimprove the education of disadvan-

taged students. In 1989, researchers at theJohns Hopkins Center for Research on Ele-mr-itary and Middle Schools (CREMS)nowthe Center for Research on Effective Schoolingfor Disadvantaged Students (CDS)can-vassed the field to identify and examine pro-grams that could help middle grades teachersand administrators improve the education oftheir students who were not suceeding inschool. The programs reviewed includedsome that the U.S. Department of Educationrecognized as effective Chapter 1 programs;some that the U.S. Department of EducationJoint Dissemination Review Panel (JDRP),now called the Program Effectiveness Panel(PEP) approved for support by the NationalDiffusion Network (NDN); and somedescribed in journals, conferences, and otherpublications. Only irograms that respondedto requests for information and that includedevaluations of some kind were reviewed.

There are hundreds of bright ideas for newprograms and practices. However, few mid-dle grades programs have been evaluated rig-orously enough for educators to knowwhether the programs are effectivethus,schools must make choices of programs with-out the benefit of final evaluations. Althoughmost programs discussed in this report havenot been fully evaluated, each has at least onecomponent that holds promise for improvingthe education of disadvantaged students inthe middle grades.

Educators must decide on their goals for allstudents, including educationally disadvan-taged students; gather information on pro-grams that could help them reach theLr goals;review materials, costs, and evidence abouteffects; select, synthesize, adapt, or designprograms, materials, and activities; provide

necessary staff development so that teachersand supervisors can implement the programssuccessfully; evaluate the effects of the pro-grams in their own schools; and revise prac-tices as needed.

It takes at least a year to plan, collect,review, select, and develop materials and pro-vide staff development to initiate a program.Committees of supervisors, teachers, and oth-ers might review several programs for a par-ticular subject to understand the componentsmost likely to increase student skills Commit-tee members should discuss different pro-grams to decide whether to pick one programor combine components from several pro-grams.

A second year is needed to implement aprogram and conduct preliminary evaluations.A third year will be needed to more rigorouslyevaluate the effects of a program on all stu-dents and important subgroups of students.These activities may go faster if programs areadopted rather than adapted, or if staff devel-opment is highly efficient and supervision ishighly effective. The process may be slowed ifprograms must be extensively tailored to theneeds of a particular district, school, or popula-tion of students or if new materials and activi-ties must be developed.

This monograph should assist educatorswith all six steps, but particularly with decid-ing on goals, gathering information, andreviewing evidence. It should be helpful inprogram development, staff development,and evaluation, especially in identifyingweaknesses to be avoided in these areas. Pro-gram improvement is a site-based processthat requires important investments of timeand considerable trial and error.

Chapter One discusses important issuesunderlying the identification of promisingprograms for disadvantaged students in themiddle grades and common components ofpromising programs.

TABLE OF CONTENTS

Preface iv Appendix A: Directmy ofPromising Progtams 65

Introduction Math 66

Reading 69

Otapter I: Issues To Consider 1 Writng and Language Arts 73

Common Components 6 Thinking Skills 75

National Recognition Programs 9 Science 76

Social Studies 77Chapter II: Promising Problams 15

Math 16 Appendix B: Survey andReading Discussion Guide 79

Writng and Language Arts 33 High Content 80

Thinking Skills 38 Defming "Disadvantaged 83

Science 45 Components of Promising Programs 84

Social Studies 48 Math 87

Promising Programs That Reading, Writing, Language Arts 91Combine Components 51 Thinking Skills 96

Conflicting Components 53 Science 98

Social Studies 103Chapter III: Discussion 56 Conflicting Components ofConclusion 59 Promising Programs 107

Common Themes inReferences 61 PromisingPrograms 108

vi

CHAPTER ONE

ISS1JES TO CONSIDER

rre search for promising programsfocuses on those that bring high contentto all students in the major academic

subjects in the middle grades. Some programsare designed to prevent learning problemsfrom developing. Others treat learning prob-lems if they schould occur. Some programs aredesigned to help students make regularprogress in one year. They are equal or alter-native to other standard programs, usuallyoffering some unique emphasis or pedagogythat may increase student interest, motivation,and success. A few programs are designed tohelp students make accelerated progressmore than ordinarily expected--in one year.They are substitutes for standard programs,offering innovative structures or approachesthat should enable students to make up lostground, enrich or extend learning, meet highindividual potential, or otherwise experienceexceptional progress and success.

The search for promising programs in aca-demic subjects in the middle grades revealedseveral issues that are important for educatorsto consider and discuss. These include thedefinition of high content education; identifi-cation of educationally disadvantaged stu-dents; intent of.prevention and treatment pro-grams; common or recurring components ofpromising programs; and strategies andcaveats for identifying and evaluating pro-grams that are promising.

High Content

High content programs either emphasizenew access or new content. New access pro-

1

grams aim for full and more equitable azcessto the high content that is already part ofschool programs. This includes making highcontent curricula and courses available to allstudents, using the existing high content intexts and other materials with all students,and teaching the same content to differentstudents in different ways.

Some programs that stress new access tohigh content seek to provide all students withthe curricula that previously were reservedfor the best and brightest students. In theseschools, decisions concern how to offercourses and experiences to all studentsinstead of some students. For example, inmany middle grades schools only some stu-dents have access to pre-algebra or algebra,foreign language, keyboarding or computeruse, literature, or other subjects (Becker, 1990;Epstein and Mac Iver, 1989; Mac Iver andEpstein, 1989).

Other new access programs focus on betterand fuller use of existing textbooks andinstructional materials. Texts and materialsvary in the extent to which they stress higherlevel thinking skills and other high content.And teachers vary in the extent to which theyuse these sections of the texts with the best stu-dents, average students, or slowex students. Inmost schools, there are already many opportu-nities and resources for high content in textsand supplementary materials, but access tothem is closed or limited because teachers donot make full use of these activities, or intro-duce these sections of the text only to some stu-dents.

Still other programs improve access to high

!J

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

content by offering new ways of learning theexisting content. When the curriculum isalrmedy challenging, but some students fail tolearn, teachers must find new instructionalapproaches to assist learning. Most Chapter 1and other remedial programs set this goal forimproving equity in students' access to highcontent. The programs use diverse teachingapproaches and instructional materials to helpstudents master skills they have missed.

Using existing resources, all schools canimprove the access to an education of highcontent for all students, including education-ally disadvantaged students.

New content programs aim to change or addcontent to the existing curricula for all stu-dents or for educationally disadvantaged stu-dents in particular.

New content is selected to increase orrevise what students learn, to improve thetypes of learning activities that students do,and to raise the levels of students' thinkingand competence.

For example, schools add new content todevelop students' higher level thinldng skillsor critical or creative thinking. Additions tothe existing curriculum are based on thebelief that all students can learn, that all stu-dents can be taught to think better, and thatall students need to be challenged with well-designed, mind-stretching activities at all lev-els of learning.

New content may refer to more relevantcoursescoursee that add meaning andimportance to schooL Career explorations andcharacter education courses that enable middlegrades students to expand their views of them-selves as students, workers, and members ofsociety are examples of new content added toexisting curricula. New content also may referto courses that expand a curriculum, such asanthropology, statistics, multicultural studies,or other topics appropriate for the middlegrades that become required or elective fullcourses or mini-exploratory courses that werenot part of the regular curriculum.

New content in the middle grades is some-times old content adapd from high schools,as when Latin is added to the foreign language

2

requirements, algebra and geometry areoffered as math courses, or an experience withShakespeare is added to the English program.Sometimes new content in the middle gradesgives students high school credit (e.g., in mathor foreign language), much as AdvancedPlacement (AP) courses give high school stu-dents a head start on college courses.

High content education includesnew access to the challenging, moti-vating, and important learningopportunities that already exist inthe cuniculum, and new content inadditions or revisions to the curricu-lum and instruction.

New content also may be added to increasestudents' active participation in learning. Thisapproach requires teachers to add or revisecurricula to stress active learning rather thanpassive listening, or to add new forms ofdemonstrations, projects, and group presenta-tions to the traditional paper and pencil testsfor students to show their acquisition andapplication of knowledge. This approach de-emphasizes the superficial coverage of con-tent by the teacher in return for a deeperinvestment in content from teachers and stu-dents. Indeed, progress h units of work thatstress active learning may be slower thanprogress in regular lessons, but students'interest, attention, and motivation may behigher and understanding may be deeper.

Educators must decide not only whatknowledge is needed in high content pro-grams and who will have access to it, but alsowhose knowledge will be included in differ-ent subjects and why (Apple, 1990; Lieber-man, 1990). These questions ask educators toconsider and to recognize in all subjects theperspectives and contributions of multiplecultures and important subgroups.

The expectation is that new content inthinking skills, new course topics, demanding

; 1)

Issues To Consider *

and prestigious courses, active learning, anddiverse perspectives will make more studentsmore interested in, engaged in, and committedto their schoolwork

New access and new =tent are two partsof a never-ending program of curriculumdevelopment and school improvement. Ofcourse, new content in one school may beexisting content in the next. Some schoolsalready offer advanced or unique courses tosome students but not to others (such as alge-bra, foreign language, creative thinking, orcareer exploration), while other schools do notyet offer these courses to any students. If newcontent is not added equitably, then newaccess becomes an immediate issue.

The word most often associated with highcontent is "challenge." Whether a program isproviding new access or new content, highcontent is challenging, important, and motivat-ing to the students, and extends basic andadvanced skills and abilities. Some wonderwhether it is enough to focus only on newaccess to high content to ensure more efficientand equitable delivery of odsting high contentto all students instead of only the best stu-dents. Is it enough to help teachers fully utilizethe existing high content activities in theirtexts, manuals, and supplementary materialsthat are currently unexplored and unutilizedwith all students, or used only with the beststudents? Or, is it necessary to go beyond thetexts and beyond present curricula to createnew content in the education of all students?For most middle grades schools, new contentis needed in advanced thinking skills, com-puter-based instruction, interdisciplinary units

of work, calculators and other technology inmath and other subjects.

The goal of some high content programs isto accelerate students' learning. The content ishigh because it requires quicker-than-averagemastery of skills, even by students who werefar below average in their skills. The goal ofother high content programs is to deepen stu-dents' learning, and the content is highbecause it requires new ways of ieflecting onprofound questions, essential distinctions,causes and effects, and different perspectives

3

and viewpoints (Lewis, 1989).The promising programs reviewed here

should help schools develop high content cur-ricula in two ways by providing new accessto existing high content for all students, or byadding new content to raise the quality of thecurriculum for all students.

High content may be extended to morestudents through new 4cces9

Ensuring access to all students to existinghigh contentOpening options for high content courses toall studentsUsing high content assignments in existingtexts and materialsTeaching in new ways to help all studentslearn high content.

Identify the high content materials,approaches, and assignments that already existin each subject Which students have accessnow to these opportunities, and which stu-dents need "new access"?

High content education may require newcontent by:

Changing or adding subjects, courses, ortopics to enrich contentAdding critical or creative thinking skills toall subjects, or as a separate subjectAdding new coturses of high relevance tomiddle grades studentsOffering high school equivalent courses andcredits in the middle gradesChanging instruction to increase activelearning in all subjectsAdding multicultural perspectives and con-tent to all subjects.

Discuss the subjects, courses, skills, and learn-ing opportunities that should be added to thecurriculum as new content for all students.

New access and new content programsmust be equitable, with all students havingaccess to the curriculum. All curricula must bechallenging, with all students working hard tomove from their present to more advancedlevels of understanding, knowledge, andapplications.

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Notifying Educationally

Dkait~ StufttsSchools identify educationally disadvan-

taged students or students who are at risk offailing in many ways. Some programs identifystudents who are older than average for theirgrade levelan indicator that the studentswere retained to repeat a grade sometimeduring their school years. Others identify stu-dents who fail two or more courses on themost recent report card, or who are far belowgrade level in reading or math work in classMost often, however, programs identify dis-advantaged students on the basis of testscorese.g., students who are in the lowestquartile or in the lowest 40th percentile on anationally normed standardized test. Someschools use only achievement test scores,whereas others use many criteria includingreport card grades, retention, teacher observa-tions of behaviors and attitudes, and others.

Even when they use the same criterion toidentify the "disadvantaged" (e.g., standard-ized test scores), schools set different limits forselecting studenis to receive Chapter 1 or otherremedial services. Some include all studentswho score at or below the 40th percentile, oth-ers offer services only to those below the 25thpercentile on a standardized achievement test.

A process of "educational triage" is used toplace students who are at risk of failing in theorder of greatest need and select some forassistance. Most schools do not have enoughresources for all who qualify. Thus, many stu-dents who need extra help do not receive it,particularly those who are marginally disad-vantaged.

Chapter 1 funds and other special servicesoften are limited in the middle grades, due todecisions by school leaders to emphasizeremedial instruction in the early grades. Thisusually means that older students must be fur-ther behind grade level and have more seriouslearning problems in order to qualify for extrahelp. For example, in one district's Clapter 1program, second grade students are eligiblefor services if they are three months behindgrade level in skills, but sixth grade students

4

must be 1,5 years behind grade level. In gen-eral, students who need more help make lesspregress in one year's time than do studentswho need less help (Carter, 1984). Most Chap-ter 1 programs report that older studentsusually those who need most helpmake lessprogress than younger students (Kennedy,Birmart, and Demaline, 1986; Winfield, 1986).

Some program vary from the typical pat-tern and report dramatic gains for students inthe upper grades, suggesting that the qualityof teachers, the quality of materials, the levelof innovation, and characteristics and needts ofparticular students determine the succesi ofprograms for educationally disadvantagedstudents.

Many promising programs aredesigned to move students forwardin skills, behaviors, and plans fromtheir own starting points. Theyallow students to move as quicklyas possible to complete missedwork, master basic skills, andadvance in learning.

Because of limited resources, students atany grade level may "test out" of a programbefore they are out of danger of failing andbefore they attain grade level skills. Regularclassroom teachers may or may not be able toassist these students, depending on howmuch help they need and how many studentsneed help.

At all grade levels, and especially in themiddle grades, students selected for specialservices are those who have the most seriouslearning problems. These students needhighly innovative instruction and support.Currently, most Chapter 1 programs andother special services are not innovativeenough, intensive enough, or well-organizedenough to do the job they must do with edu-cationally disadvantaged students.

Different definitions of "disadvantage" and

12

Issues To Consider

different approaches to educational triagemake it difficult to compare programs. Pro-grams should clearly describe how they iden-tify and select disadvantaged students for ser-vices in order for other schools to judge howprograms work in schools that are similar totheir own.

Me Midge Ikeda

This review includes descriptions ofpromising programs for students in grades5-8 that have been conducted in elementary,middle, junior high, or other school organiza-tions. Some programs for fifth and sixthgraders that are part of a sequence across theelementary grades differ from programs thatserve early adolescents only. However, manycomponents of elementary school programscan be adapted to grades 5-9 in middleschools, junior highs, or other grade organiza-tions. Similarly, programs for grade 6 in mid-dle schools can be adapted for use in K-6, K-8,or K-U schools.

As we reviewed programs, we looked forfeatures that were sensitive to the characteris-tics and needs of young adolescents (Califor-nia State Department of Education, 1987;Carnegie Task Force on the Education ofYour% Adolescents, 1989; Dorman, 1984; Lip-sitz, 1980, 1984; Maryland State Department ofEducation, 1990). Promising programs foreducationally disadvantaged learneis take intoaccount the simultaneous and often conflictingneeds of early adolescents. For example,promising programs to promote high contentin academic subjects find ways to balance stu-dent needs for individual attention with theirneeds for social support and acceptance bypeers; or student needs for independence andincreasing autonomy with their needs forstrong and responsive guidance; or studentneeds to feel competent with their needs forexploration and discovery.

Prevention or 1Yeetment

Middle grades schools face some important

5

choices about how to improve programs toprevent, reduce, or treat leaming problems.

Some programs and practices aim to pre-vent problems by raising the level of content

Id improving the performance of all stu-dents, includir.g disadvantaged students. Forexample, reading programs that require allstudents to read daily, write about what theyread, and report their ideas from their read-ing, aim to help all students improve theirreading, writing, and speaking sldlls, regard-less of their initial reading levels. When goodprograms are working to prevent learningproblems, all students are expected to make atleast one year of progress in one school yearor meet other indicators of continuousprogress. Procedures to help students correctminor problems are built into the regularinstructional process of programs that empha-size prevention of learning problems.

Other programs aim to treat problems tocorrect, increase, or accelerate the learning ofstudents who have fallen behind grade levelin their skills. This strategy targets only thestudents who need extra help and providesthem with needed instruction. Assistance maybe offered to students in their regular classes;or by pulling students out of regular classesduring class time; or by providing extraclasses for students before or after school, inthe summer, or on Saturdays (Mac Iver, 1991).

Many promising treatment approachesallow students to improve their skills fromtheir own starting points. Successful treat-ment programs aim to help students whohave fallen behind grade level catch up withtheir peers. This assumes that more than oneyear's progress can be made in one year'stime by students who have previouslylearned at slower than average rates. This is atall order that demands extraordinary instruc-tion and motivation to learn. Many treatmentprograms provide extra staff, materials,instruction, attention, and other resources thatstudents need to "catch up" to grade level.

Some prevention and some treatment pro-grams aim to be as effective as regular pro-grams. Students are expected to make the sameamount of progress as in a regular program

1 3

Promising Progrums in the Middle Grades

(i.e., one year's growth in one year's time).These programs provide educatoxs with alter-native programs for students who do notrespond to instruction as it is typically orga-nize& Other programs aim to be more effectivethan regular programs to help students makemore-than-expected progress or to acceleratelearning (ie., more than one year's growth inone year's time). This is still mainly an elusivedream. Few programs that were revieweddemonstrate consistently that students makeup lost ground and maintain skills at orbeyond grade level.

Comprehensive programs in schools needto include both prevention practices to keepstudents from developing serious problemsand treatment practices to help students who,despite best intentions, develop serious learn-ing problems. An important question is: Whatprograms or practices provide the most effec-tive prevention and treatment strategies toboost, maintain, or correct students' skillswith challenging, exciting, and supportiveactivities?

CommonComponents

Promising programs across sebjects sharesome common features. This section discussescomponents that recur with enough fre-quency that they deserve careful considera-tion by educators. Different schools will selector design programs to emphasize differentfeatures, depending on the schools' goals andthe specific needs of students.

Coordination of regular classes with sup-plementary or pull-out classes. Many pro-grams make special efforts to enable regularand special or resource teachers to worktogether frequently and in puiposeful ways toimprove the quality of instruction for studentswho need extra help. When regular and reme-dial teachers coordinate lessons, remedialinstruction is based on the skills that studentsneed in order to succeed in their regular

6

classes. When regular and remedial teacherswork together in the same classroom, stu-dents do not lose instructional time or expo-sure to high content curricula by being pulledout of regular classes. The goal, overall, is forstudents to master the skills they need in theshortest possble time. For such coordinationto occur, principals must give teachers ade-quate planning time, with some commonplanning time for regular and resource teach-ers who teach the same children to talk andwork together.

Individualized instruction. Individualizedinstruction is featured in many promisingprograms to ensure that students receiveinstruction in the skills they need, rather thanspending time on skills they already know. Ifmaterials for individualized instruction arenot available, then individualized attention isprovided in small group instruction for stu-dents who need help with the same skills.Promising academic programs get as close aspossible to the students' individual needs toprovide pertinent instruction.

Many programs that provide extra help todisadvantaged students specify four featuresto help teachers organize and individualizeinstruction:

Diagnosis of students' starting skills toidentify which students need extra helpand on what skillsPrescription of a sequence of instruction onneeded skillsinstruction to help students learn theincluding varied teaching methods andmaterialsEvaluation of student success and readinessto move on to the next needed skills.Many programs that diagnose, prescribe,

instruct, and evaluate students have weaklinks between prescription and instructionand between instruction and evaluation.These connections must be innovative, effec-tive, and continued until students actuallymaster the skills satisfactorily. Most pro-grams do not ensure that the sequence of foursteps for individualized instruction is suc-cessfully completed. These four features are

14

organized in useful management systems forteachers and for students.

Students who fall behind oftenwill learn a skill (f it is taught anew way from the first tbne theytried and failed to learn it

Efficient and comprehensive managementsystems. Many promising programs includeelaborate paper or computer-based manage-ment systems (especially in math and read-ing) that help teachers identify students whoneed help, organize instruction, and monitorstudent progress. The management systemsset up complete arrays of all skills required ina subject and then help teachers account foreach student's progress on each skill.

Paper systems for tracking students' slcillsand progress may be considered excessive ifreams of paper are needed to monitor a class(e.g., 30 students X 150 skills X 2 quizzes ortests per skill X 2 teaching methods or learn-ing materials requires 18,000 pieces of infor-mation). Computer-based systY:ms help con-trol a-O.?, flow of information, but not all com-puter systems are "teacher friendly."

For management systems to work, educa-tors reed to review alternative systems to findthose that will best meet their needs. Thenstaff development must bn provided to helpteachers implement and use new record-keep-ing techniques comfortably, quickly, and fully.Whether computer-based or paper-based,good management systems assist teachers tobe more organized in their work, much asmedical management systems help doctorsdiagnose, prescribe, administer, and monitorpatients' symptoms, treatments, and progress.

Of course, students with low skills and testscores need more than better managementsystems. They require more and different cur-ricula, alternative instructional approaches,and a variety of materials. Management sys-tems are important for teachers but not suffi-cient for ensuring student success.

7

issues To Consider.IMPRPIMI11t-

Groups with temporary membership.Grouping is an instructional tool that teachersmust use in regular and remedial classes toprovide efficient and effective instruction tostudents who need to learn and work on thesame skills In many promising programs,group memberships are flexible and temporaryfor particular instructional activities, not fixedor permanent in ways that "track" or label stu-dents in negative terms.

Attention to different styles of learning.Some promising programs are responsive tostudents' "learning styles." This is an appeal-ing concept that asserts that children learn indifferent ways, with some preferring visual,auditory, tactile, or kinesthetic methods(Dunn, Dunn, and Price, 1989).

Most programs cannot and should not pro-vide a complete curriculum based only on onestyle of learning. Currently, measures toassess learning styles are suggestive, at best.Instructional materials that accompany pro-grams in most academic subjects for auditory,tactile, and kinesthetic learning are very thin.Middle grades students' learning styles are influx as they develop new ways of thinkingand learning. Labeling a "preferred style" atone time as a characteristic of a student is lim-iting at best, and dangerous at worst

Promising programs for students who needextra help in the middle grades use a varietyof visual, auditory, and manipulative materi-als to teach and reinforce skills, but do notpigeonhole students in a single or fixed learn-ing style. Promising programs also provide amix of opportunities for students to workwith peers and to conduct individual projectsto help them learn how to work coopera-tively, competitively, and intensively.

Students who fall behind often will learn askill if it is taught a new way from the firsttime they tried and failed to learn it. Althoughteachers cannot tailor all work to each child'spreferred learning style, teachers should beable to draw upon visual, auditory, andmanipulative methods to reteach math andother subjects in the middle grades to stu-dents who need extra help. Teachers of young

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

children in elementaty schools tend to do thisas they teach for mastery.

In the middle grades, many teachers do nottypically teach for mastery, but aim to "cover'course content They do not expect all studentsto master all skills. Rather, students areexpected to fall somewhere on a normalcurve--with some students succeeding well,some just passing, and others failing. Remedialinstruction or other forms for providing stu-dents with extra help brings middle gradesteachers back to a mastery model. Teacherswho want to help students catch up in skillsneed to add to their repertoires alternativeinstmctional strategies that encourage studentsto learn the same material in different ways.

Involving families in children's educa-tion. Promising programs involve parents intheir children's education. This does not referonly to Chapter 1 Parent Advisory Councilrepresentatives or only to traditional occasionssuch as Open House events or vrA activities.Major emphases are on helping all parents tounderstand early adolescence and middlegrades programs, and to become partners withteachers in encouraging children with theirschoolwork, interacting with them at home tosupport school goals and programs, andassisting children with decisions that affecttheir own and their family s futures.

Although some educators see families andcommunity groups as separate from theschools and argue that it is not the school'sresponsibility to involve adults, others arguethat schools must actively work to inform andinvolve families and others in the communityin order to improve student success and toimprove school programs (Comer, 1980;Epstein, 1987). Many promising programsinclude ambitious goals and practices to keepmiddle grades students' families informed andinvolved in their children's education,whereas most ordirtary middle grades pro-grams do not implement such practices andoften ignore families

Research shows that families need andwant clear information about how to helptheir middle grades students on school skills

8

and school decisions that affect the students'and families' futures (Dauber and Epstein,1989; Epstein, 1986; Epstein and Herrick,1991). On a daily basis, families need informa-tion from the school on what and how to talkto middle grades students about school andspecific subjects, how to monitor and guidehomework, how to encourage better work,and how to enrich learning with other familyexperiences. This is important for all students,but especially for students who are at risk offailing and who need positive messagesabout schoolwork and learning from as manysources of support as possible.

Because "educational triage" isused to allocate scarce resources,mwty studente who need extra helpdo not receive it.

One promising practice is to have an "at-risk" sra..ialist or school and family coordina-tor in each middle grades school whose onlyjob is to assist students who are at risk of fail-ing or who have other serious problems, towork with the families of these students, and towork with teachers and guidance counselors tohelp them understand how to establish pro-ductive connections with families (Earle, 1990).

Student responsibility for learning.Promising programs emphasize student par-ticipation and student responsibility for theirown learning. When students are active par-ticipants in their own learning, teachers keepfew secrets about the goals of programs, therequirements for success, alternativeapproaches for reaching goals, the meaningsof evaluations, or other aspects of teachingand learning. Students may be encouraged tokeep logs or diaries to comment on their ownwork and to keep track of their own progressand experiences. Participation and responsi-bility take many forms, but in promising pro-grams students are more often aware of theirown active roles in schoolwork and success.

Issues To Consider

Extra staff and extra resources. Promisingprograms for disadvantaged students arebeginning to search for and find new ways toallocate Chapter 1 and other available funds toobtain the extra personnel (teachers, aides),technology (computers, calculators), and otherinstructional materials that will help more stu-dents master required and advanced skills. Inman:- prngrams highly qualified and certifiedteachers are assisted by aides, supervised by aChapter 1 dixector, and/or assisted by otherdistrict level supervisors or lead teachers atschool. This adds up to high-powered teams ofsupervisors, teachers, and aides workingtogether to help students succeed. Several pro-grams place extra teachers and aides directly inregular teachers' classrooms to create class-room-based teams of teachers to provide extrphelp to students on a daily basis.

Staff development. Staff development maybe the most critical common component ofpromising middle grades programs for disad-vantaged students. Most of the programsreviewed in this monograph provide appro-priate and sometimes extensive staff develop-ment so that teachers are comfortable with andconfident about implementing programs. Staffdevelopment may take 2 or 3 days, or up to 18days or more; some programs provide follow-ups and continued guidance for teachers. Staffdevelopment should be as short and efficientas possNe to help teachers, curriculum super-visors, and other administrators fully under-stand the programs they plan to implement,but as long as necessary to ensure faithful andsuccessful implementatims.

Teachers need to learn new ways of think-ing and talking about their subjects, new waysof conducting lessons, new ways of interact-ing with slower students who are workingwith high content curricula, new ways ofmanaging their teaching and monitoring andrewarding students' learning.

Teachers must make choices about newprograms despite the absence of useful evalu-ations. The translation of ideas to practicetakes a more coordinated program of staffdevelopment than typically has been available

9

for most middle grades educators (Epstein,Lockard, and Dauber, 1991). Unless funds foradequate staff development are appropriatedand adequate staff development is provided,promising programs will fail.

NationalRecognitionPrograms

Two national recognition programs iden-tify promising programs that offer high con-tent education to disadvantaged students: theChapter I Recognition Program rewards aschool for designing and implementing itsown program well; the Program EffectivenessPanel (PEP) approves programs for dissemi-nation by the National Diffusion Network(NDN) (Cotton, Griswald, and Estes, 1988;National Dissemination Study Group, 1988).Many programs recognized by Chapter 1 andmany included in the NDN are described inlater sections of this monograph. In this sec-tion, we discuss a few issues raised by theprocedures underlying the criteria for 'wog-nition. Although programs receive a "stampof approval" from these two national recogni-tions, ed....4, ors cannot simply adopt theseprograms without carefully considering thestrengths and weaknesses of the programs,the adequacy of their evaluations, and theappropriateness of the programs for the stu-dents in their own schools.

Recognition of Chapter! Programs

When most educators think of "disadvan-taged" students, they think of Chapter 1 pro-grams and services. Chapter 1 programs arerecognized by the U.S. Department of Educa-tion's "Initiative To Improve the Education ofDisadvantaged Children." Schools seekingrecognition must submit a formidable appli-cation to explain program goals and objec-tives, coordination among teachers, parentand community involvement, professional

Ramis big Programs in the Middle Grades

development and training, leadership,instructional materials, methods, approaches,expectations for student learning and behav-ior, school and classroom climate, use of aca-demic learning time, recognition andrewards for students, and evaluation results.The required topics help schools organizedescriptions of their programs that mayassist other schools to replicate or adaptideas. Most schools, howeverven somereceiving recognitiondescribe their pro-grams in rather mundane terms. Most arepull-out or supplemental programs; few havehighly innovative components or curricula;many are strong on one criterion but weak onothers.

One of the key features of the Chapter 1Recognition Program is that federal regula-tions require all schools to report studentscores and progress on achievement tests inNormal Curve Equivalents (NCE) because ofthe equal interval nature of this measure.NCEs are normalized standard scores thatcorrespond to percentiles. Chapter 1 pro-grams are supposed to report NCE pre andpost-test scores, gain scores, and long-termgains. This should allow meaningful compar-isons of students` progress across schools, dis-tricts, and states, and should help educatorscompare and judge the effectiveness of pro-grams. Any gain from pre-test to post-test isconsidered a measure of progress, althoughmany educators who judge promising pro-grams tend to consider an increase of sevenNCE points or more as educationally impor-tent. This, however, is an arbitrary guideline.

Schools that feel confident enough to sub-mit their program for review probably havemore organized and stronger programs thanr1erage. Indeed, the recognized programstend to report higher NCE gairtssometimestwice as highthan other schools in their dis-iiict or state, or in the nation. However, thereare many problems with how the scores arecollected, compared, and reported across pro-grams. Problems abound in the timing oftests, subgroup and subtest differences, com-parisons, and lasting results on scores andgains. Consequently, most Chapter 1 evalua-

10

tions based on NCE scores cannot help educa-tors identify unambiguously effective pro-grama

Timing of tests. Until recently, manyschools reported only fall-to-spring NCEgains. These are somewhat deceptive indica-tors of student progress, particularly overtime. For example, many students' test scoresdecline from spring to fall because they forgetinformation during the summer. Then scoresclimb again by spring as students progressthrough the school year. The pattern of forget-ting and learning yields fall-to-spring gainsbut little spring-to-spring progress. That is,NCE gains are clear from fall to spring, butthe pre-test scores on which they are basedare artificially low in the fall, and the post-testscores do not change much from one spring tothe next. Within-grade progress made eachyear does not accumulate over time to bringstudents up to much higher scores. Differentquestions can be answered with fall-to-spring,spring-to-spring, and fall-to-fall scores, butcomparisons cannot be made across programsreporting gains over different interval&

Some of these problems should changebecause Chapter 1 programs are nowrequired to report spring-to-spring NCEscores and gains. This should make it possibleto more successfully compare programs onthis dimension.

Subgroup differences. Another problem injudging program effectiveness results fromdistricts' practices of reporting only combinedor average scores for very different schoolsthat participate in their Chapter 1 programs,for grade levels within and between schools,and for subgroups of students. Schools withindistricts vary greatly in the number of low-ability students they serve, ranging from fewor none up to 100 percent of the students.NCE scores that are reported as an "averagefor the district" may reflect successes in someschools and failures in others. Only a fewChapter 1 programs report scores separatelyfor each school and grade level.

The number of students who qualify for

Issues To Consider

Chapter 1 services creates a school climate forlearning that can affect the success of pro-grams and students in different schools(Stringfield and Davis, 1987). It may be thatschools with just a few disadvantaged stu-dents can assist them more quickly and moresuccessfully than schools with total popula-tions of at-risk students. On the other hand,schools with all or most disadvantaged stu-dents can organize schoolwide Chapter 1projects that dramatically restructure educa-tion to help all students succeed.

Within schools, students starting at differentskill levels may take different lengths of time tomake measurable progress. Most program donot provide information on subgroups of stu-dents with different starting scores. A few pro-grams report results in terms of the percent ofstudents who gain different amounts duringone year (e.g., a school may find that 30 per-cent of its students gain more than 10 NCE, 20percent gain from 5 to 10 NCE, 20 percent losemore than 5 NCE points, and so on). Distribu-tions like these can help educators decidewhether the program is equally effective for allstudents or whether to revise the program toreduce losses and increase gains of particularstudents.

Other student characteristics also mayaffect which students make expected orunusual progress. Are boys and girls equallybenefited? All racial groups?

When programs report "averages" withoutexamining and reporting subgroup differ-ences, schools cannot identify which proce-dures in their own programs must be changedto meet the needs of different groups of stu-dents, nor can potential users know whetherthe programs work successfully in schoolswith students most like their own.

Different tests and subtests. Scores andgains should be reported on specific subjecttests or subtests. For example, a reading com-prehension program should improve readingcomprehension scores but may not affectoverall reading achievement scores. A mathcomputation program should first affect stu-dents' basic math skills but may not have

1 1

short-term results an math problem solving.A writing program should improve writingskills before it has an impact on reading orother achievements. Many programs inappro-priately use the same scores to judge the effec-tiveness of Ifferent programs and practices.

IMM/131WMillYINIIM,I=r,

Wahin schools, students starting atdifferent skill levels may take chf.ferent lengths of time to makemeasurable progress.

Other outcomes. Although all Chapter 1recognition applications include achievementtest results, few programs include other mea-sures of achievement such as criterion-refer-enced tests, report card grades, honor rollmemberships, or student demonstrations ofabilities. Few programs measure and reportother important outcomes such as attendance,promotion rates, courses completed, infomialassessments from students and families aboutthe students' work and progress, homeworkcompletion, class participation, school com-pletion or graduation rates, disciplinaryactions, and other outcomes that may be pro-gram goals and that are encouraged in thefederal regulations for Chapter 1.

Educators not only need to build appropri-ate evaluations and expectations into theirown programs, but also should demand thisinformation in reports or materials thatdescribe or advertise promising programs.Results by school, grade, and student sul,-groups, results for subtests and specific sub-jects, and results on measures other thanachievement tests should be required to deter-mine whether programs are consistently suc-cessfuL If subgroup, subtest, and comparisongroup scores and gains were provided, itwould be easier to identify particularly effec-tive programs for schools with particular pop-ulations of disadvantaged students.

Pre and post-tests and comparisons. It isnot eno t. to use only pre and post-test gain

1.

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

scores to show that students improve as partio.ipants in a particular program Scores go upfor all students in most subjects over time,regardless of the program. Thus, it is necessaryto have comparison groups whose pre andpost-test scores show what happens underclearly contrasting ciramistances. This may beprogram treatment vs. control groups, com-parisons of multiple treatments, or other perti-nent comparisons. For example, over severalyears WR.I.T.&E., art NDN program toincrease students' writing skills, moved fromstudying pre and post-test gain scores tostudying treatment and control comparisons.Less rigorous studies may demonstrate thatstudents are helped and not harmed by a par-ticular program, but sooner or later, compari-son classes are needed to learn whether newprograms are better, equal, or worse than otherprograms for improving or accelerating stu-dent learning.

Lasting results. Sustained or lasting effectsalso must be carefully charted to indicatewhich Chapter 1 programs are really effective.Some programs report the average NCE gainsover two or three years of students whoremain in Chapter 1 programs. Often thisnumber is too smallfewer than 5 or 10 stu-dents in a schoolto provide a reliable pictureof sustained effects. Other programs report thescores over time of students who were inChapter 1 programs, but who return to regularclasses. Their progress reflects the work thestudents did during one or more years inChapter 1 programs and their work in regularclasses. Comparisons of sustained effects can-not be made on too-small samples of studentsor differently defined samples of students.

Moreover, sustained effects must bereviewed carefully. An average gain of 4.5NCE points over three years of students whoremain in Chapter 1 programs does not havethe same meaning educationally as gains ofabout 4,5 NCE points for each of three years. Ifyounger students made 133 NCE gain pointsthe first year and no gains thereafter, educatorswould have important information about the

1 2

need to improve the programs for older stu-dents.

High content education mayrequire additions or revisions tothe curriculum, including newsubjects, higher levels of chal-lenge, active learning, and diverseperspectives in increased studentmotivation and learning.

The problems of identifying successful pro-grams, however, go even deeper than howgain scores or sustained effects are measuredor reported. Scores and gains are important,but some districts report only gains. Most stu-dents who are offered Chapter 1 services havevery low NCE scores, and even consistentgains are not enough to help them reach andmaintain grade level skills. If students' NCEscores are loweg., in the teens, twenties, orthirtiesthe gains made in most promisingprograms are not large enough for a longenough time to have important effects on thestudent' educational improvement.

Almost every Chapter 1 program recog-nized by the U.S. Department of Educationstates its assumption that "all students canlearn" and that with effective supplementaryassistance, educationally disadvantaged stu-dents can be helped to meet the achievementlevels of their non-Chapter 1 peers. Data show,however, that most programs do not reach thisgoal. Studies are needed that follow studentover many years to determine which comp-nents of Chapter 1 programs help studentscatch up to the scores of their non-Chapter 1peers. In the future, Chapter 1 programs mustbe more innovative in order to actually acceler-ate students' learning.

Recognition of NU Programs

The U.S. Department of Education's Pro-gram Effectiveness PanelPEP (formerly

Issues To Consider

called the Joint Dissemination Review Panel orJDRP)--evaluates and approves programsthat it considers "exemplary." Developer/Demonstration Projects that receive PEPapproval are eligible for disseminationthrough the National Diffusion Network(NDN). These programs tend to be thought-fully developed "package deals" that providestaff training, materials for teachers and stu-dents, and follow-up activities and supervi-sion after the program has been implemented.

NDN programs not only offer materialsand training, but also make demands on theschools or districts that adopt the programs.This usually includes a signed contract forstaff development, fees for the training team,released time for the teachers who will learnabout the program, and the assignment of alocal facilitator or coordinator at the districtlevel to help teachers implement the programafter the initial staff development. Sometimesbuilding level leadership also is assigned tofollow up and assist implementation. Theadopting sites must permit evaluations of theprograms and maintain a demonstrationschool or classroom where visitors are wel-come to observe the program. These require-ments are more than symbolic. Districts thatinvest in a program are more likely to take theimplementation and conduct of the programseriously.

Most NDN programs are approved becausethey are supped to improve education for allstudents. Aciew are designed specifically foreducationally disadvantaged students. Thereare, however, many problems with the consis-tency of the quality of the programs in NDNand their evaluations. The quality of materialsand prototype activities that are sent in infor-mation packets range from poor to excellent.Some programs cryptically report that they areused in so many states or districts, when theyare really used in one or a few schools in thosestates or districts. Most of the evaluations ofNDN programs are well-meaning but inade-quate. They suffer from many of the sameproblems described in the previous section onChapter 1 program evaluations. For example,few compare treatment and control groups,

1 3

provide scores and gains on tests, or reportsubgroup differences.

Despite the importance of having pro-grams "ready to go" that schools can select tohelp them meet specific goals, the NDN pro-grams are of mixed quality with mainly mys-terious messages of effects. Educators mustcarefully consider the programs and theircomponents, the necessary staff development,the costs, the requirements, and the reportedbenefits for students like those they teach.

Only about 1 in 10 NDN programs are sub-mitted to PEP for recertification after four years.This means that even ambitious and extensiveprograms are often short-lived. Prcject directorsmove or leave their jobs, or supervisors andadministrators change. The collection of PEPapproved programs remains a relatively fluidset of "bright ideas" that include programsready for implementation or ideas that can beadapted for the rieeds of particular schools andstudents.

Swam of Recognition Programs

Programs disseminated by the NationalDiffusion Network (NDN) and those recom-mended as effective Chapter 1 programs varywidely in quality, but tend to be better orga-nized than other programs and are morelikely to closely monitor student progress.

Educators cannot, however, rely solely onthe approved programs. Many evaluations areincomplete or inaccurate. Although some pro-grams report significant effects, they are notalways educationally important. Programdevelopers often state that a program will beuseful at other or all grade levels despite thefact that the program was originally designedfor particular grade levels. Some programs forthe elementary gades can be adapted easilyfor use in the middle grades, but othersdepend on key school organizational featuresor appeal to particular characteristics of stu-dents that are appropriate for particular gradelevels.

These problems do not apply only to Chap-ter 1 or NDN programs. The descriptions and

Promising Progoms in the Micictie Grades

results of other promising programs that arenot submitted to the national recognition pro-grams are often suspect in the same ways.

These problemsinappropriate, inaccu-rate, or unreported timing of tests, subgroupdifferences, test and subtest scores and gains,implervmtation problems, and the lack of stu-dent outcomes other than test scoresraiseserious questions about which programs,whether programs, when programs, and forwhom programs are "effective."

Information about programs must bejudged with caution. The situation is very

14

much one of "let the buyer beware." Educa-tors who review Chapter I, NDN, or otherpromising programs must check to see if theproblems discussed here have been ade-quately addressed. They need to knowwhether new approaches and their results areclear, credible, and generalizable for use intheir own schools. There is great, even desper-ate, need to identify well-documented andevaluated programs and practices to improvethe content of education in the academic sub-jects in the middle grades.

CHAPTER TWO

PROMISING PROGRAMS

This section summarizes the results ofour search for programs that aim to addhigh content to the curriculum in the

middle grades in math, reading, writing andlanguage arts, thinking skills, science, andsocial studies. Because few, if any, programshave been adequately evaluated, our mentionof programs cannot be interpreted as unquali-fied recommendations. Rather, the programsinclude features that look promising for help-ing students succeed. Some should help edu-cationally disadvantaged students movetoward grade level, or all students feel chal-lenged by high content. Although most pro-grams are discussed in terms of one illustra-tive component, they may contain many otherparts. When several promising programsinclude the same curricular, instructional, ororganizational features, these componentsbecome noteworthy and may help middlegrades educators develop programs of "highcontent" in their own schools.

Appendix A is a directory to enable educa-tors to obtain more information about the fea-tured programs. The list in the appendix isorganized by subject and provides the title ofprograms alphabetically, contact person orreference, grade levels, whether the programhas received Chapter 1 or PEP recognition,and whether it was designed specifically fordisadvantaged students. Other resources andbackground materials are in the references.

It is amusing to look across prograrns to seethree types of titles. Some names of programsare designed to be inspirational to students.These include such acronyms as ProjectREACH, IPASS, Operation Uplift, HOTS,PAST, T.E.A.M., and others.

15

Other programs are named to be intellectu-ally appealing to teachers. These include suchtitles as Systematic Teaching and MeasuringMathematics, Team Accelerated Instruction,Individualized Prescriptive InstructionalManagement System, Structured Teaching inthe Area of Reading, Calculator AssistedMathemafics for Everyday Living, and others.These programs' acronyms may or may nothave meaning, but the titles are seriously pedagogicaL

New emphases for high content inmiddle grades math include prob-km solving, estimation, statistics,probability, measurement, realworld applications, and interdisci-plinary connections to other sub-jects, as well as advanced coursessuch as pre-algebra and algebra.

A third group of programs have genericand unemotional titles that are not designedto appeal to anyone in particular. These maybe consciously inconspicuous, part of a largereffort, and named to convey the feeling of"business as usual." Examples include Chap-ter 1 Reading and Mathematics, MathAchievement Program, Andover's IntegratedReading System, and others.

There is, of course, nothing to suggest thatprograms are more or less effective because oftheir titles. Many titles, however, indicate thegoals of programs and may alert educators to

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

programs that fit particular philosophies andapproaches.

There are, undoubtedly, many programsthat we missed that have equally promisingcomponents, and others are being developedevery day. The programs and componentsdistussed here illustrate those that middlegrades educators will find in their efforts tolocate, choose, adopt, or adapt higher contentlearning opportunities for all students.

Math: PromisingPrograms for theMiddle Grades

In the middle grades, math teachers worryabout the best ways to help students build astrong foundation in mathematics; the bestways to help students leam the skills theydon't yet have; the best ways to move fromarithmetic to algebra; and most of all, the bestways to make math comprehensible and rele-vant to students.

In math (as in most other subjects), mostschools and districts will continue to basetheir instruction on textbooks. Math text-books, in particular, are familiar and easy touse, as students and teachers have followedthe same format since the earliest elementarygrades. Some mathematics texts have takennotable steps toward high content math skillsand activitiese.g., Real Math Grades 7-8(Open Court, 1990). Although we are notreviewing or comparing textbook series, matheducators should periodically compare textscritically on whether or how Caey includehigh content The National Council of Teach-ers of Mathematics recommends topics thatmay be considered the new basic high contentfor all students. These include problem solv-ing, estimation, patterns, statistics and proba-bility, measurement, graphing, real-worldapplications, and interdisciplinary connec-tions of math with other subjects.

In this section we discuss the components

16

of a few programs that seem promising forimproving the math experiences of all stu-dents, and that may be particularly useful fordeveloping high content math programs foreducationally disadvantaged students. Manyof the promising math approaches for themiddle grades add "supplementary" materi-als to enrich and enliven textbooks. A fewprovide full alternative programs, new texts,or texts in alternative forms, such as com-puter-based instniction or individualized pro-grams.

Math Alasagemest Spins

Several programs feature management sys-tems based on the scope and sequence of mathWas. Although almost every teacher's text-book manual and district curriculum guideoutlines a comprehensive scope and sequencefor math skiii s, most manuals do not provideworkable management systmes for teachers toclosely and easily monitor student progress.Thus, teachers need to consider supplemen-tary math computer software or paper forms.

Management systems outline an array ofrequired skills in a particular subject across oneor more graea levels. Sometimes the skills arecross-referenced with several major texts so thatteachers can use the systems with any commontextbook series or can draw from multiple tedsto help students learn the skills. Some manage-ment systems also cross-reference quizzes andtests, teaching approaches and materials, andother supplementary activities. Teachers canuse these programs to organize their teachingand chart students' work and progress on eachskill. There are several examples of promisingmath management systems.

Conceptually Oriented Mathematics Pro-gram (COMP) is a papex-based managementsystem that helps teachers diagnose students'needs and cross-references math materialsthat can be used to teach different skills. Itincludes a teacher guidebook, student activitybook, awareness materials, tests, profilesheets, and other items. The math content is

2 4

Promising Programs

linked to that of eight common math text-books. Evaluations are needed of the effectson student learning of this teaching tool.

Individualized Prescriptive ArithmeticSkills System (IPASS) is a computer-basedprogram that helps teachers and studentskeep track of more than 150 sldlls for grades1-8. Teachers and students share responsthil-ity for monitoring progress and continuingwork. Evaluations show mixed results withsome modest and some strong progress bystudents in IPASS on achievement test scores.

Systematic Teaching and MeasuringMathematics (STAMM) provides a sequen-tial K-12 program covering hundreds ofobjectives, martipulatives, alternative assess-ment strategies, materials and resources forteaching, and other related information. Themanagement system is designed as a com-puter-based or paper guide for teachers tomonitor all important math skills. An earlyevaluation of STAMM (1984) reported thenumber of middle grades students who mas-tered at least 70 percent of the math objec-tives. Most students attained that level ofmastery, although other test results were notvery clear. In theory, a comprehensive K-12math outline should help teachers individual-ize students' programs from any startingpoint on the array of skills

Summary of management systems.Although the evaluations of these math man-agement systems leave much to be desired,the programs represent a considerableammmt of work by thoughtful math educa-tors. They could help math teachers andsupervisors to understand similarities and dif-ferences in management systems and toselect, design, or adapt management systemsfor their own curricula. Math managementsystems make a persuasive case for keepingclose tabs on what students laww and need toknow in order to help students make greatergains on math skills.

17

hutividualizett Math aid Peer

Team Accelerated Instruction (TAI) is anindividualized program in which students areassigned to small heterogeneous teams toreduce tite isolation that occurs in some indi-vidualized programs. Students move forwardfrom their own startirtg places in math with-out being separated from students who differin ability. TAI materials include worksheets,quizzes, and tests from basic elementary mathskills through an introduction to algebra tomeet the wide range of abilities and rates ofprogress typical in math classes. The proems,then, can be used in heterogeneous classes. InTAI, teachers instruct small groups to intro-duce new skills and facilitate individual learn-ing. Students manage and monitor their ownprogress. They are rewarded by the teacherfor individual and for team progxess, regard-less of their starting places. Evaluations ofTAI in elementary school grades 3-6 indicatethat students using TA1 gain significantlymore in math achievement, have more posi-tive attitudes toward math, and exhibit betterclassroom behavior than do students in con-trol groups.

Similar evaluations are needed across themiddle grades. The available materials maybe more appropriate for remedial instructionin the middle grades if most students are nearor beyond the most advanced skills in the TAIkit. Or, middle grades teachers who like theTAI concept may be able to design extra mate-rials up to or beyand a full year of high schoolalgebra or geometry to cover the broad rangeof math skills of students in gades

Math Pull-Out or Pull-1n Approaches

Traditional pull-out programs may be eas-ier to organize in elementary schools than inmiddle schools or junior highs. In elementaryschools, students may leave a class, go to aChapter 1 or resource room for remedialinstruction, and return to class relativelyunobtrusively. In most middle or junior highschools, leaving and returning to class can be

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

obvious, embarrassing, and often disruptivefor the student, teacher, and other students.For example, the Mathematics AchievementProgram (MAP) is a basic skills programdesigned for elementary school grades 2-5. Itprovides small groups of students with 30minutes of remedial math instruction in sepa-rate classes. Although this program appearswell-organized as a pull-out program in theelementary grades, it would be difficult toduplicate in middle schools or junior highs. Ifstudents are pulled out of regular classes, theregular and remedial teachers and the stu-dents need to monitor what information wasmissed in the regular class, how homeworkwill be completed, and how instruction iscoordinated between the regular and reme-dial teachers. When middle grades studentsfollow 40-55 minute periods, it is not easy toleave a class for 30 minutes and return with-out missing important information and expe-riences.

More promising for the middle grades areextra periods for remedial instruction duringthe school day. For example, in TeachingEveryone About Math (T.E.A.M.), smallgroups of sixth graders (here, in an elemen-tary school) meet for 45 minutes three timeseach week in art extra academic period.T.E.A.M. focuses on helping students mastermath skills in the last year of elementaryschool to in -Tease the students' chances ofsuccess in math in seventh grade in a newschool.

In T.E.A.M., the principal personally callsthe families of each of the students to explainthe program and to provide weekly progressreports. The Chapter 1 teacher, regularteacher, parent, and student meet every sixweeks to evaluate and discuss progress. Par-e tts are helped to understand the programand to encourage their children's math workat home. The program reports modest gainsfor a very small sample of students. Clearly,better evaluations are needed of the compo-nents of this and similar programs. Neverthe-less, its organization (an extra class period)and its other components of family involve-ment are important and adaptable to the mid-

18

dle grades. The concept of an intensive transi-tional program also could be important forthe last year in middle school before highschool..

......apreallem.agafflap.a..

One new direction for staff devel-opment provides opportunities formath teachers to work as mathe-maticiansthinking about, using,and creating math structures andproblems, or working as intents inmath-related occupationsbeforelearning new teaching strategies.

Two other programs also are based onextra math during the school day. In Class-mate 88, a Chapter 1 program, elementarystudents in grades 4, 5, and 6 receive extramath instruction in an extra class period. Theprogram includes 70 computer-based lessonsthat provide students with immediate scoresand feedback. Other parts of the programemphasize calculators, puzzles, and a varietyof math materials. The program reports mod-est but consistent fall-to-spring gains forupper elementary students. Although theevaluations of this must be more rigorous, thematerials could be usefully adapted for reme-dial instruction in the middle grades.

Operation Uplift is an individualized sup-plemental math program providing extramath periods for students in grades 1-6 andextra help in class All students receive sup-plemental instruction that is closely coordi-nated with regular classroom instruction fromextra teachers and aides who work with theregular classroom teacher. The program forstudents in grades 5 and 6 can be adapted forthe middle grades. Operation Uplift combinesan extra class period with a comprehensive,computer-based management system. Theprogram offers a Math Resource Guide thatcross-references math skills with software,games, and other activities. One of the mostdifficult tasks for curriculum reform seems to

Promising Programs

be linking the skills students need with newinstructional approaches. The Math ResourceGuide of Operation Uplift :nay be useful toother teachers who want to plan similarapproaches. The program evaluation datainclude only a limited sample of sixth gradersand so is not particularly useful for under-standing the effects of this program on middlegrades students.

There are other variations in programs toprovide students with extra or intensiveinstruction. Traner Middle School Chapter 1Lab for grades 7 and 8 groups students byability in math to eliminate the need to pullstudents out of class Two teachers, cate assis-tant, and one aide work with students onmath problem solving, geometry, statisticaltables, and other skills in individualized,small group, and computer-assisted instruc-tion using a variety of instructionalapproaches. The students attend the TranerMiddle School Lab with their regular teacheron a two-week rotation schedule. In this way,their regular math classes are supplementedby an enriched math program with extra staffevery two weeks for two weeks. The evalua-tion of this program is one of the few thatmeasured whether students who wereassisted in the middle grades continued totake math classes in high school. The limitedevaluation suggests that more Traner MiddleSchool Lab students continued with mathcourses through the 10th grade than did stu-dents ir a comparison group.

Schools that assign Chapter 1 students toseparate math classes in the middle grades (asin the Traner Middle school Lab) need tocarefully examine how these students aregrouped for instruction during the rest of theday. Most educators agree that students inlow-ability groups face severe self-esteem andmotivation problems, created or exacerbatedby their assignment to low groups. One rec-comendation is that students should notspend all day in classes grouped homoge-neously by ability (Maryland State Depart-ment of Education, 1990). However, few havefigured out how to schedule students in somehomogeneous and some heterogeneous

19

classes daily so that they are not "tTacked" byability in all subjects, all day, all year, andevery year.

Chapter 1 Mathematics Pioject (K--8) aimsfor the same goals as the Traner MiddleSchool Chapter 1 Lab, but organizes extrateachers and help for students within hetero-geneously grouped math classes. All studentsreceive instruction as a whole group for partof the class time. Then, small groups worktogether and receive individual assistancefrom an extra remedial instruction teacherwho works in the classroom with the regularteacher. A clear management system helps thetwo teachers organize, instruct, and monitorstudent progress on math sldlls. The programevaluation shows rather consistent successand few failures for students who participate,and is one of the few programs to measureoutcomes in terms of percent of students pass-ing a criterion-referenced test

Summary: pull-out or pull-in for extrahelp. Middle grades schools provide studentswith remedial instruction in separate ckss-rooms grouped by ability, in pull-out pro-grams during regular classes, in extra classperiods, by assigning extra teachers to workin the same classroom with regular classroomteachers, and in several other ways (e.g., Sat-urday classes, beforeand afterschoolcoaching or tutoring, summer school). Pull-out programs and extra math classes vary inthe size of the group (the student to teachesratio may range from 3:1 to more than 20:1);the length of time of a period (from 15 to 60minutes); the scheduling of extra help (e.g.,removing students during class time orassigning them for remedial instruction dur-ing extra class periods); the presence of extrateachers or aides in the regular math teacher'sclassroom; and the quality of math materials.

The program evaluations do not clarifywhich of these factors are critical for programeffectiveness, but the promising programsand new survey data offer a few clues. In themiddle grades, scheduling may be as or moreimportant than class size. Longer periods of30 minutes or more rather than short 15-20

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

minute dosages of remedial instruction areprobably needed. Extra class periods and theassignment of extra math teachers or aides toregular math teachers' classrooms probablybenefit middle grades students because thesearrangements are less stigmatizing than pull-outs from regular class.

Survey data from a national sample ofprincipals in schools that contain vide 7 sup-port the practice of an extra math periodrather than pull-out approaches. Principalswho reported that they provide remedialinstruction in extra academic periods sched-uled during the school day (as an elective orstudy period) were more likely to expectfewer students to drop out of school beforehigh school graduation (Mac Iver, 1991; MacIver and Epstein, 1991).

Math and Student Recognition

All Chapter 1 programs describe how theyreward and recognize students. This focuseseducators' attention on disadvantaged stu-dents' need to !mow that a teacher realizeswhen they are making progress and that eachnew skill is important Many NDN and otherpromising programs for middle grades stu-dents also are sensitive to early adolescents'need for recognition in ways that are valuedby students in the middle grades. T.EA.M.,for example, combines active learning withresponsive and public recognition to let eachstudent and their peers and families knowthat progress in learning math is being madein clear and measurable steps. Other pro-grams make a point of includi.ng Chapter 1students in all recognition and reward assem-blies or other school programs.

A basic issue in math and other subjectsconcerns whether to grade students on thebasis of relative achievement, mastery, orprogress. Promising programs suggest thatmath grades and recognition should be basedon student progress rather than only on rela-tive ability. Programs such as TAI and otherprocesses (Mac Iver, 1990) take seriously themotivational power of pmgress reports, cer-tificates, and public recognition,

20

Of all the components of promising pro-grams, regardless of instructional approach, itis likely that practices that organize and indi-vidualize frequent meaningful rewards andrecognition will positively influence students'motivation, self-esteem, achievements, atti-tudes, and commitment toward math.

Math and Attituft

Some promising programs make a point ofdeveloping students' positive attitudes aboutmath. For example, Comprehensive SchoolMathematics Program (CSMP) is designedfor the elementary grades, including grades 5and 6. The program focuses on math applica-tions, estimations, predictions, probability,statistics, and problem solvingthe new highcontent topics. In the available evaluations,effects on students' math skills are not particu-larly impressive, but the program shows somepositive effects on criterion-based problemsolving test scores. The developers emphasizethe program's focus on increasing or main-taining students' enthusiasm about math. Itreminds teachers that in the middle gradesattitudes about math are as important asachievements in math for encouraging stu-dents to work hard and to continue takingmath courses even if they are not the bestmath students.

Student Responsibility for Learning Math

Many promising programs in the middlegrades require students to take responsibilityfor their own learning. Some programs (suchas Chapter 1 Mathematics Improvement Pro-gram and TAI) put students in charge of partof a computer-based or paper managementsystem to organize their own work and tokaep track of their successes, failures, andneeds for instruction. Other programs usecontracts, pledges, or other plans. For exam-ple, one technique called Challenge U asksstudents to design their own contract of mathactivities and math tests to ensure that theycomplete the required units of work.

Promising Programs

Math and Poirot loolositti

The Cnapter 1 Reading and MathematicsProgram includes a strong parent involve-ment componIgst with the specific goal ofreaching the parents of more students. Theproject includes after-school computer classesfor parents and meetings with parents at pub-lic housing projects rather than only at theschool building.

A few programs for educationally disad-vantaged students combine rewards at schoolwith recognition at home. Teachers sendhome positive notes or certificates when stu-dents have mastered each important skill, orcall families with positive messages. One mid-dle school sends home weekly computerized"report cards" in math so that students andfamilies can Lelebrate short-term progress. InT.EA.M., the principal calls home weekly andparents are involved in regular evaluations ofstudents' progress. In other programs, stu-dents are asked to show someons at homehow they mastered each new math skill.

These and other approaches mobilize fam-ily support for math in the middle grades. Thepractices are supported by research thatemphasizes the importance of subject-specificparent involvement for boosting studentachievement and attitudes in specific subjects(Epstein, 1991; Epstein and Dauber, 1991;Epstein and Herrick,1991).

Technology and Math Insbuct Ion

Promising math programs in the middlegrades often integrate computer-based activi-ties to organize, vary, enrich, and enliveninstruction. Several programs (such as Class-mate 88, The ESC Mathematics Curriculum,Math Motivational Centers [M2C], and TranerMiddle School Chapter 1 Lab) include clearand purposeful uses of computers by studentsto learn and to practice skills, and for teachersto manage instruction and monitor studentprogress. M1C, for example, includes a man-agement and instruction system for more than200 math objectives for an individualized pro-gram that helps the teacher select from multi-

21

ple materials (workbooks, ldts, audiovisuals,games, and computer-assisted instruction) toorganize and supplement learning. The pro-gram reports rather sizable gains for studentsin grade 9 compared to a control group of stu-dents, and seems to be adaptable to the mid-dle grades.

Other technologies, particularly the use ofcalculators, can supplement and enrich mathprograms. For example, Calculator AssistedMathematics for Everyday Living (CAMEL)integrates the calculator and real-life applica-tions into the math program for general math-ematics students. The program measureseffects based on the percent of students mas-tering at least 70 percent of the materialtaught in each unit of work, and almost allstudents attained that level of mastery.Although this is a program designed for highschool students, the materials and approachesare adaptable to the middle grades. In generalterms, middt: grades math teachess will needto decide the place of the calculator in theirmath classes.

A promising new program that should beevaluated is The Education Services Corpo-ration (ESC) Mathematics Curriculum. Thiscomputer-based program focuses on mathproblem solving, inductive and deductivethinking skills, and the use of calculators andcomputers to provide regular lessons andindividualized instruction. In grades 7 and 8,for example, software is available for morethan 150 lessons tn algebra, geometry, graph-ing, statistics and probability, and other newhigh content math topics. A computer-basedmanagement system is included. ESC Mathe-matics Curriculum prides itself on lively, col-orful lessons to build a solid math foundationin the midflie grades so that students will con-tinue with high school math. The integratedinstructional system is an expensive one,however, requiring schools to rent softwareon an annual basis, after installing extensivehardware. It is said to be operating in morethan 1,000 schools, despite its high cost andlack of formal evaluations. It is a program towatchone that deserves to be rigorouslyevaluated because it combines several key

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

components of promising programs with theadded feature of enabling students to work attheir own pace to accelerate learning.

Math, Biddy Skills,and New Re* for Toad=

One large investment in a supplementarymath program is the Middle Grades Mathe-matics Project (MGMP) developed duringmore than a decade at Michigan State Univer-sity with support from the National ScienceFoundation (NSF). Activities range fromworkshops for outstanding middle gradesmath teachers, to the development of a text-workbook series of math activities for middlegrades students. The math activities are basedon thinking skills in math, including spatialvisualization, probability, similarity, factorsand multiples, algebra, and other topics thatare generally considered to add new and highcontent to math programs. Manipulatives areemphasized to give all students opportunitiesto visualize and constnict math concepts. Dis-advantaged students are not a special focus ofthis program, but creative teachers should beable to use and adapt the activities to teachthe MGMP concepts to all students, includingstudents at risk of failing math.

Staff development is centikto MGMP.Teachers are defined first as "mathemati-cians" and are helped to operate as such. Thisis an important and provocative componentof many promising programs in all subjects.The goal is for teachers to feel that they aremembers and leaders of a community ofactive learners at school. They are not only"tellers" of information, but also thinkers,scholars, and we:kers. With their roles clari-fied, teachers are then provided clear guide-lines on how to teach challenging middlegrades math concepts to their students. Theteachers are taught using the same methodsthey will use to teach the studentsanotherpromising approach to staff development inseveral programs.

MGMF has been shown to strengthen teach-ers' self-confidence, skills, and understanding

22

of math teaching. So far, !est; attention has beengiven to evaluating whether students learnmore or better because of the program.

Aliggna as New Centimf

One provocative project that is developinghigh content materials for middle gradesmathematics is The Algebra Project. TheAlgebra Project seeks to make algebra avail-able to all seventh and eighth grade studentsregardless of the students' prior skills or aca-demic achievement in math. The project aimsto motivate students in math so that they feelable and encouraged to take advanced mathcourses in high school.

The Algebra Project first accelerates sixthgrade math skills to prepare students for alge-bra in grades 7 and 8. In grades 7 and 8 anadvanced text is used along with motivatingteaching approaches in algebraic concepts,such as positive and negative numbers. Theprogram also includes family and communityconnections, places responsbility on studentsfor the pace and scope of their learning, andincludes before-school study sessions withcollege role models as tutors for the middlegrades students. The Algebra Project opera-tionalizes many components of "accelerated"education with new content and new accessin the middle grades math curriculum.Although the evaluations so far do not ade-quately examine student skills and abilities,there is evidence that some students in theprogram enter advanced math in h'gh schoolwhere none did before..

Math: Smug and Discussion

Math may be the easiest subject to evaluatebecause of its hierarchy of sldlls and numeri-cal character, but most schools and districtsdo not assess their math programs carefully.Few reports from promising math programsprovide the comparisons that are needed toshow that one program is clearly and consis-tently better than another for educationallydisadvantaged students in the middle grades.

Promising Programs

Currently, there is no one program that standsout as unusually and consistently effecti-..:e.Rather, the programs discussed in this sectionare promising Some fully restructure matheducatica and others revise practices slightly.Several components in these programs maybe important for improving math instructiort

Comprehensive management systemsConceptually Oriented MathematicsProgram (COMP)

Individualized Prescriptive ArithmeticSkills System (IPASS)

Math Motivational Centers (M2C)Operation UpliftSystematic Teaching and MeasuringMathematics (STAMM)

Traner Middle School Chapter 1 Lab

Effective grouping practices and individu-alized instructionChapter 1 MathematicsTeam Accelerated Instruction (TAI)Traner Middle School Chapter 1 Lab

Extra class periodsClassmateOperation UpliftTeaching Everyone About Math (T.E.A.M.)Traner Middle School Chapter 1 Lab

Rewards and recognition of studentsComprehensive School MathematicsProgram (CSMP)

leaching Everyone About Math (T.E.A.M.)Team Accelerated Instruction (TAI)

Student responsibility for learningChallenge U in Teaching EveryoneAbout Math (T.EA.M.)

Chapter 1 MathematicsImprovement Project

Team Accelerated Instruction (TAI)School and family connectionsChapter 1 Reading and Mathematics

Computer-assisted instructionClassmate 88

23

ESC Mathematics CurriculumMath Motivational Centers (MC)Traner Middle School Cliapter 1 Lab

Innovative curriculaThe Algebra ProjectMiddle Grades MathematicsProgram (MGMP)

Staff developmentConceptually Oriented MathematicsProgram (COMP)

14tifiddle Grades MathematicsProgram (MGMP)

Systematic Teaching and MeasuringMathematics (STAMM)

One of the standard debates about math foreducationally disadvantaged students iswhether such programs should provideinstruction in computational skills or higherlevel math skills. The promising programsreviewed do not resolve this debate. Indeed,this may be a false distinction, as basic skillsprovide a base of high initial content onwhich students build more complex skills asthey are ready and able. Instruction in basicskills need not be boring. After all, when thesame skills were taught to all students the firsttime, high-ability students were challengedand interested in the lessons. This dilemmamay be solved if teachers have varied materi-als and several different instructional meth-ods to present skills to students who do notlearn them the first time.

Many of the key components of math maybe pertinent for bringing high content to othersubjects. Similarly, innovative practices inother subjects may provide ideas and strate-gies for use in math.

The new directions for math suggest that inthe future students will be offered high con-tent in math along with more responsive pro-grams that provide all students high supportand high expectations for success in math.High content may be in the form of newaccess to existing challenging math curricula,or new additionsalgebra and other skillssuch as problem solving, estimation, statistics,

3 IA.

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

probability, and measurementto increasethe types and levels of thinking in math thatmeet the high standards and goals set by theNational Council of Teachers of Mathematics,the National Board for Professional TeachingStandards, and others.

Reading: PromisingProgyams for theMiddle Grades

Promising programs in the middle gradesinclude those that emphasize developmentalreading, literature, reading across the curricu-lum; the integrafion of reading, writing, think-ing, and related skills; school-based readingfor pleasure; and at-home reading activities orother connections with families. One key com-ponent of most programs is that they draw ona wide selection of reading materials at manyreading levels to capture the interests of st,dents of all abilities and to encourage studentsto wk to advance their skills in reading andin all subjects where reading is important.

Reading Management Systems

A management system in reading mayhelp teachers diagnose, instnict, and monitor30 to 50 or more objectives at 16 different skilllevels, providing teachers with more than24,000 pieces of information about studentsand their progress. These programs also orga-nize a wide variety of appropriate materialsand technologies for teachers to provide stu-dents with instruction in different skills. It ispossiblethough not yet proventhat amanagement system that helps teachers care-fully orchestrate individualized instruction inreading will help students increase andimprove learning.

Management systems are only as good asthe materials that support the instruction thatstudents need. Teachers and curriculumsupervisors often collect numerous and var-

24

ied materials and cross-reference them so thatteachers can find and use appropriate andvaried approaches for each skill they teach ina dear "scope and sequence" of skills at eachgrade level. For example, the Individualized-Diagnostic-Prescriptive Learning Lab Chap-ter I program, which includes grade 6 in anelementary school, reports that it uses 20times as many instructional resources as regu-lar classrooms. Evaluations of this LearningLab show mixed results in different schools,varying from no gains, to modest gains, to siz-able gains during one or more years. (Evalua-tions of a variation of this program in mathreport sizable gains for students in mathsldlls, perhaps due to the availability of richinstructional resources in math.)

Individualized Prescriptive InstructionalManagement System (IPIMS) is a remedialreading center based on individualizedinstruction and clear record keeping. Stafftraining is provided as part of the adoptionprocedures of this NDN program. Studentsuse color-coded, multilevel materials to fol-low an individual plan that is designed to behighly motivating. Parent involvement is partof the program design. Modest gains arereported for participants.

PEGASUS-PACE is a continuous-progessprogram that starts with a full array of skillsand techniques for teachers to diagnose stu-dents' starting levels of learning, provideappropriate instruction, and monitor studentprogress. PEGASUS-PACE provides the com-puter software needed to produce the chartsneeded to monitor student progress and alsoincludes other software for reading activitiesfor teachers and students. In this program,teachers, student-teachers, classroom aides,secretarial assistants, and video technicianswork together as a team. Leadership for theteam is provided by a project director, evalua-tor, and curriculum experts. PEGASUS-PACEuses several components of promising pro-gramsextra staff, high-level supervision,new technologies, and a management systemto organize teaching and monitor learning. In

3 2

Promising Programs

one school results were measured in terms ofthe percent of students who attain mastery,and about 80 percent of the participants in twomiddle grades (grades 5 and 9) reached therevired level.

Some programs try to solve the problem ofburdensome record keeping by assigning stu-dents the responsibility to keep their ownrecords of work and progress. Others replacepaper management systems with computerprograms to ease teachers' record-keepingactivities. Although other types of readingprograms may prevent problems from occur-ring, effective and efficient management sys-tems that monitor needs and progress may benecessary to treat problems.

Reading Pu ii-Ont or Pu 114n Approaches

Treatment programs either pull studentsout of regular classes for extra reading instruc-tion, pull teachers in to regular classrooms toprovide extra teaching during class time, orpull students in to extra reading periods inaddition to regular classes. Several pull-out orpull-in approaches bring extra staff to thereading program. These types of assistancerequire a high degree of coordination betweenregular and remedial reading teachers.

The Washington Middle School ReadingIntervention Program arranges a "limitedpull-out" program for students in grades 6and 7 in which students receive remedialreading instruction for 40 minutes a day fortwo of every three weeks. All students attendthe multimedia reading lab during the thirdweek of the cycle where they work at 18 learn-ing stations to improve specific reading skills.Eighth grade students who are behind inskills receive services every day in anextended pull-out program. The more intensefocus for eighth graders is a "last chance"transitional program to help students learnskills they will need in high school.

A management system underlies this pro-gram for all three middle grades to help teach-ers diagnose students' needs, prescribe andprovide lessons in needed skills, and test and

25

monitor progress. The activities use multiplemedia Including computers, films, tapes,study skills, regular lessons, tests for mastexy,and other techniques. Still, the program doesnot report impressive or consiMent gains. Itmay be that sixth and seventh graders needmore intense interventions, or that the pro-gram is not coordinated closely enough withreading skills that are on standardized tests, orthat other outcomes of attitudes and interest inreading should be measured. This program,Like many others, illustrates that programsneed to continually assess and revise practicesuntil they can demonstrate clear and consis-tent effects on students' skills, attitudes, andenjoyment of reading.

Many pull-out programs make purposefuldecisions about which classes students willmiss for remedial work. For example, Chapter1 Reading purposely does not remove stu-dents from regular reading, math, Unary, art,music, or physical education classes, as theseare considered necessary basic skills classes orrewarding experiences. The Chapter 1 Reme-dial Reading: We Can Help Them Read pro-gram instructs sixth graders during a studyperiod, not a regular subject class period inwhich the students would be visible by theirabsence. In many promising middle gradesprograms, teachers tend to provide remedialinstruction in extra class periods to maximizestudents' exposure to and partidpation in reg-ular classwork and to minimize students' feel-ings of embarrassment about needing extrahelp. This strategy is supported by research asone that is responsive to early adolescents(Mac Iver, 1991; Mac Iver and Epstein, 1991).

Teaching Reading and Interesting NewStories (TRAINS) is a program for middlegrades students to improve functional read-ing, independent reading, and self-esteem orself-concept of ability as a reader. A formallink between the school and a local collegeprovides big brothers and big sisters to Chap-ter 1 students in the middle grades. The stu-dents meet for skill-building activities for 42minutes daily (presumably one period), butonly during social studies or academic assis-tance (study) periods, not during other regu-

:3 .3

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

lar classes. The program uses multimediamaterials, including computers for instruction.The middle grades students write their ownbooks for students in the primary grades andread them to the young children. With studentteachers and aides, the teacher-student ratio inthe remedial classes is 1 to 6. Only modestgains on test scores are reported for the stu-dents in the program, but the program clearlyemphasizes affect as well as skills.

11,.Even promising programs tend todisappear over time due to changesin school leadership, staff, budgets,or goals. We need ways to draw onthe hard work and products of pro-grams so that each new effort doesnot have to start its plans anddevelopment from ground zero.

In the Waukegan Reading Project studentsare assisted for 30 minutes a day with manyhigh interest/low readability materials, withan added focus on study skills. The studyskills processSQ3Rstands for Survey,Question, Read, Recite, Review. An interestingfeature of this program is the assessmt ofstudents' read-aloud progress. Teachers taperecord students' oral reading at the start andend of tbe year and share these tapes witheach student's parent at a parent-teacher con-ference. The program shows modest gains inreading skills.

Many promising remedial reading pro-grams add staff membets to provide studentswith more inunediate and better attention andto provide teachers with the best informationand guidance about good practice. SeveralChapter 1 reading programs add teachers,aides, paraprofessionals, supervisors, and/orprogram directors to increase services to stu-dents and to improve conditions for teachers.For example, Chapter 1 Reading and Mathe-matics Program, which aims to accelerate stu-dents' learning beyond one year's progress in

26

one year's time, includes a program director,four resource teachers, a paraprofessionalaide, a parent resource teacher, and com-puter-assisted instruction to provide studentswith extra help. This program also aims toinvolve all parents, which may be anotherway to increase the number of adults whoencourage and support student learning.

ESL Supplemental Program for LimitedEnglish Proficient Students is a bilingual pro-gram that coordinates student reading andcommunkation skills with home, school, andcommamity connections. The program forgrades K-6 includes three teachers and threeaides who provide individualized instructionon the skills students need in regular class-rooms. Students meet 45 minutes a day, fivedays a week, to work on listening, speaking,reading, and writing skills, especially as theserelate and apply to the students' home andcommunity. On reading tests, the program hasmixed resultsstudents in some grades makesmall, modest, or large gains, and others loseNCE units over a year. More information isneeded with better measures on whether andhow the extra staff and the emphasis an homeand community linkages benefit students.Although this program was designed for theelementary grades, its components are adapt-able to middle grades schools and to non-ESLremedial programs.

After-school and summer programs alsoprovide extra learning time for students, justas pull-out or extra class periods do during theschool year (Davidson and Koppenhaver,1988). Remedial and enrichment classes afterschool and in the summer may help the stu-dents who can join those classes, but cannottake the place of ongoing programs for all stu-dents that are part of the regular school day allyear.

Wilkes County Chapter 1 Project is a typi-cal, promising, Chapter 1 reading programthat includes many potentially important corn-ponents--individualized instruction, recogni-tion and rewards for students, parent involve-ment, reading for pleasure at school and athome, 30-50 minutes daily extra assistance,and extensive staff development so that the

r) 4t-) (i

Promising Programs

teachers can implement the program effeo-tively. The program reports sizable gains butlow scores and inconsistent results for studentsat different grade levels and across severalyears in time.

In reading, as in math, programs vary in thenumber of students in remedial instructionclasses (from one--to-one tutoring up to fullclasses of more than 20 students), the numberof teachers and aides, and the length of classperiods (from 15 to more than 60 minutes).There are no studies, however, that adequatelytest the effects on student progress of differ-ences in class size, time, staffing, or other com-ponents to know which features or combina-tions are important or essential

Developmental Reading In the Middle Grades

Many districts outline a full developmentalreading program for K-8 or K-12 based onone or more textbook series and/or selectionsof literature for each grade leyeL Students areexpected to learn a vast and varied array ofvocabulary, comprehension, writing, andother skills that create a developmentallycoherent program. Most developmental read-ing programs use reading textbook series, butdevelopmental reading also can be conductedwhen students read literature. A few promis-ing programs are described here.

Structured Teaching in the Area of Read-ing (STAR) is designed to improve the read-ing skills of students in grades 2-9 by linkingreading and writing. In grades 7-9, this pro-gram takes the form of a 10-period Commimi-cations Arts Program, not a daily period as inthe earlier grades. Results from the program inthe upper grades are inconsistent, with stronggains reported only in grade 9. The programwas designed to respond to students' needs tocontinue to develop reading and writing skillsthrough the middle grades, but 10 periods ofwork may not be enough to do the job.

Andover's Integrated Reading System(AIRS) features lessons to increase readingcomprehension and enjoyment of literature. Itincludes a computer-based management sys-

27

tern that helps teachers organize and monitorstudents' progess. The program focuses on 18skills to improve reading comprehension forstudents who are at first through seventhgrade reading levels. Modest gains werereported for the students in the program.Although designed for the elementary grades,the program and approach are adaptable tothe middle grades. The AIRS lessons may beused or adapted to supplement any textbookseries.

A different approach is taken in a new, not-yet-evaluated pmgram developed by the Har-court Brace Jovanovich Publishing Co., Dis-coveries in Reading. Soft-covered books andworkbooks have been designed to interestmiddle grades students who have low read-ing skills. The books include stories thatappeal to early adolescents, with some storiestailored to particular cities or states. For exam-ple, the sample books were written for use inBoston and include stories that refer toBoston's sports teams, police, and other activi-ties. If the program proves to be effective, itwill be an attractive option for teaching basicreading skills because of its relatively lowcost It is, however, a textbook series that doesnot require students to read literature.

Reading MantaSeveral promising programs are based on

literaturegood books at the students' ownreading levels that advance their abilities andinterests and lead to ever more challengingbooks. Literature adds high content to readingprograms, whereas some textbooks includemundane reading selections or parts ofdigested literature to help students practicereading skills. Promising programs based onliterature assume that developmental readingskills can be taught from novels and other lit-erature at the same time that students areintroduced to provocative ideas, novel charac-ters and settings, and a love of words andreading. In many eases, however, teachersmust take the initiative to design their ownlessons in literature, whereas teachers' manu-

3 .)

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

als provide reading lessons for use with thetextbook series. It is becoming increasinglyclear that all students, including students atrisk of failing in reading, can use, enjoy, andbenefit from reading literature to build vocab-ulary, comprehension, and thinking skills, aswell as a love for reading. Good evaluarionsare needed on the skills learned or missed inliterature v& textbook reading progams.

Cranston's Comprehensive Reading Pro-gram (CCRP) is an example of a district-wideK-U management system for a developmen-tal reading program that includes children'sliterature as one of several components. Thedevelopers suggest that it can be used alongwith any textbook series to help teachersorganize instruction and to monitor students'progress in reading. The program descriptionrelates that students in the program madeimportant fall-to-fall gainsa rarely used cri-terionbut the actual data from the evalua-tion are not reported.

One promising programFUTUREPRINT_emphasizes reading and great literature forall seventh and eighth graders. An adaptationof a "great books" appnaach, it gives studentsresponsgoility for their own learning and pro-vides incentives for middle grades students tocomplete work as quickly and as well as theycan. The program also assigns middle gradesstudents to read aloud to preschool children.Teachers identify students' starting readinglevels, design personal contracts with studentsto include specific reading, writing, and otherskill development, instruct small groups orindividuals on specific skills, and give stu-dents clear evaluations of their work.

The program provides lists of readingbooks and selections in science fiction, adven-ture, sports, teenage interests, mystery, ani-mals, classics, and other topics. There aremore than 125 selections for students whoread at grades 1-4 reading levels (i.e., highinterest, low readability materials); more than125 selections for students at grades 4-6 read-ing levels; about 120 selections for students atgrades 6-8 reading levels; and about 90choices fe; students reading at grade 8 levelor higher. The program emphasizes student

28

participation in their own learititg and in see-vice to others in reading to young children.Modest NCE gains were reported for studentsin the program The lists of book selections fordifferent reading levels are an importantresource that may be useful to teachers andcurriculum supervisors seeldng high contentbooks that interest middle grades studentswho are reading below grade level.

A reading program on the horizonTheLiterature Project Reading for Realis beingdeveloped and tested in California and Indi-ana. It includes over 40 read-aloud books andover 40 partner-reading books speciallyselected for early adolescents. The readingsinclude fiction, historical fiction, science fic-tion, biography, autobiography, fables, endother selections with connections to poetry,art, writing, spealdng, and other aspects of thelanguage arts. The books have been selected toinclude multicultural characters and perspec-tives, and important issues, problems, anddilemmas for middle grades students. Manu-als, lessons, books and paperbacks, and videosof successful use in middle grades classes maybe ordered. Formal evaluations have not beenconducted, but the program has amassedimpressive documentations of implementa-tions of the program in schools serving advan-taged and disadvantaged students.

Reading and Writing

A promising combination for the middlegrades is the integration of reading and writ-ing activities. Currently this is a "hot topic" inthe elementary grades starting with the con-troversial,. computer-based "Writing to Read"program in kindergarten and grade 1 to moreconventional integrated programs throughgrade 5 or 6. Some middle grades schools arejust beginning to acknowledge that they mustprovide students with reading courses sepa-rate from and in addition to English courses.A few have also recognized the natural andimportant connections between reading andwriting, or reading, writing, thinking, andother subjects. Much more must be done to

Promising Progroms

adequately evaluate programs that integratereading and writing or that integrate othersubjects into reading programs based on basaltexts or literature.

One promising approach is CooperativeIntegrated Reading and Composition (CIROfor grades 1-8. This program links readingand writing and includes students as activelearners with responsibility for their learningand progress. C1RCa cooperative learningapproachassigns students to heterogeneousteams to read aloud to each other, to helpeach other with questions about reading andwriting, and to react to each other's writtenwork. CIRC follows a standard "writing pro-cess" approach to help students improve theirwriting skills, but asks students to write aboutwhat they read. CiRC emphasizes clear andfrequent rewards and recognition of students'individual and team progress.

A variation of this programStudentTeam Readingis being developed and usedin middle schools with educationally disad-vantaged students. It emphasizes high inter-est reading selections in an anthology of liter-ature and study skills to help middle gradesstudents learn how to learn. These approachesare promising but have not yet been evalu-ated in the middle grades.

Reading Across the Curriculum

Reading Education AccountabilityDesign: Secondary (READS) is an NDN pro-gram for reading in grades 7-12. Some sampleactivities of READ:S look interesting, othersordinary, and others dull. In one implementa-tion of this program, a building expert orleader coordinates the program and guides theteachers who are using READS. Staff leader-ship and expertise of this type may be impor-tant for implementing successful programs.Building experts or lead teachers are paid fortheir extra work coaching teachers, much ascoaches or dub leaders who assist students.

READ:S outlines 60 skills in reading(including vocabulary development, readingcomprehension, and study skills) that can bereinforced across all subjects in the curricu-

29

lum. The program indudes computer-assistedactivities that can be used by teachers of dif-ferent subjects to teach reading skills in theircontent areas. The coordination of readingslcills across subjects is based on priority skillsin the language arts curriculum

READ:S boasts high participation fromteachers of many content areas. This has beena problem for many programs that report thatsubject specialists do not want to teach read-ing even when their students need readingskills to succeed in their subjects. The compo-nents of READS may provide some impor-tant ideas for solving that problem. Evalua-tions of READ:S suggest students improvetheir general reading skills, but less attentionhas been paid to evaluating student learningin different content areas.

Content Reading Including Study Sys-tems (CRISS), designed for the high schoollevel, also emphasizes reading across the cur-riculum. In this program, staff development isprovided for teachers of science, math, socialstudies, and English classes so that they feelcomfortable teaching and reinforcing readingand study skills. Students also are helped tobuild skills in note taking, self-questioning,organizing reading content, and other learn-ing strategies. Evaluations suggest the pro-gram helps high school students retain andrecall information. The program developerssuggest the program can be used from grade 4up, but evaluations of program effects mustbe conducted in the middle grades.

Project R-3, named for Readiness, Rele-vancy, and Reinforcement, is a comprehensiveprogram that aims to integrate reading, math,and social studies to help students acceleratetheir learning and make up lost skills ProjectR-3 is promising because it stresses activelearning, makes learning relevant in terms ofreal world problems and issues, and pur-posely involves parents in the students' activi-ties. The program includes 18 booklets withmore than 140 active learning, career-related,math, and social studies activities. The pro-gram reports that students in Project R-3 make1.5 months reading gain for one month of pro-gram participation, and even greater gains in

3 7

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

math-2..7 months gain for one month of pro-gram participation. The program couldenliven reading, math, or social studies classesin some interesting ways.

Even if the summarized programs are notadopted in full, the procedures and materialsthat have already been produced by programdevelopers for reading across content areasshould be helpful in other schools.

Reading and Connections with

Pantiles and Communities

Books and Beyond, an NDN program forgrades PreK-9 encourages students to readmore, watch TV less, and involves parents inchildren's reading for pleasure at home.Books and Beyond and similar programs(such as Book-It or other variations on thistheme) suggest that teachers, students, andfamilies can become more aware of students'TV and reading habits and that students andfamilies can be motivated to increase readingfor fun. Many promising reading programsinclude some attention to reading for pleasureat home and involving families in sharing orrecognizing students' reading skills and inter-ests. Innovative teachers could adapt pro-grams like Books and Beyond to make evenstronger connections between their schoolreading program, reading for pleasure, andfamily involvement.

The Friendly Place connects schools withthe local community to support studentachievement in reading. Located in a store-front on the first floor of a housing project, TheFriendly Place is an informal library/book-store that operates as art after-school center ofactivities providing homework help, crafts,other club activities, and Saturday activities aswell. It is a community literacy center for chil-dren and adults that provides books and othermaterials for all reading abilities, and otherenrichment and care.

Helping One Student To Succeed(HOSTS) engages volunteers as mentors andtutors in reading for students in the middlegrades. Parents or other volunteers from the

30

community meet with one or a small numberof students for one half hour every day topractice specifically prescribed reading skillsand to bolster stuslents' self-esteem and atti-tudes toward reading. A computer-basedmanagement system helps teachers diagnosestudents' sldlls that need attention and cross-references materials that tutors use to teachstudents specific skills. The program evalua-tions suggest that middle grades students inthe HOSTS program make important gains inreading scores in one year, although the eval-uations lack dear comparison groups.

and Rats*Classroom ifilowilans

Elementary Language Arts Team Effort(ELATE) purposely reduces or eliminatesinterruptions to classroom learning time. Forexample, assemblies are scheduled so thatthey do not interfere with time set aside forreading.

Annotmcements on loudspeakers are madeat predetermined times and not throughoutthe day. This is a basic practice to supporthigh content that is important in the middlegrades or at any level and in all subjects.

Reading and Staff Development

Reading, Thinking, and Concept Develop-ment is a prospective program supported bythe College Board and Public BroadcastingSystem (PBS) that will provide training forteachers in ways to improve students' readingcomprehension. The training program consistsof seven 30-minute PBS-TV shows on effectiveteaching strategies for the middle grades. Thecontent of the proposed programs includesinnovative approaches to teaching such skillsas anticipation, prediction, questioning,responding, and other thinking skills that mostreading programs now ignore or minimize,particularly with disadvantaged students.Although this is not a "reading program" inthe traditional sense, the staff development for

3S

teachers may be generally useful. Teachersmay be able to apply the techniques to increasereading and thinking skills in any subject

A Sawpie Reid*Prot pa with Many Copilots

One interesting approach to improvingpractice is the "California Demonstration Pro-grams" in Reading and Math for middle andjunior high schools. The state funds 24 pro-grams annually that show promise for acceler-ating the learning of students who fall belowgrade level. The goal is to create and imple-ment programs that help students make twoto three times the progress that is typicallyexpected in one year. All the demonstrationprograms must provide cost/benefit analysesof their results, and state funds are withdrawneach year from the least effective programs.Thus, there is an ongoing and continuallyimproving set of evaluated programs avail-able for educators to consider. The demonstra-tion programs are not "miracle cures," how-ever, and face the same problems of provingtheir effectiveness as other programs.

One program funded as a demonstrationwas Project Leaderprint. In the demonstra-tion school, 40 percent of the incoming sev-enth graders tested below fourth grade inreading. Many students were transient, tru-ant, and had low self-esteem. The school'sgoal was to initiate a reading program thatwould help each student make 1.3 months ofgrowth in reading for each month in the pro-gram. The reported results are higher thanthat--about 2.0 months of growth in readingfor each month in the program.

Project Leadexprint included a contract sys-tem that put students in charge of their ownprogress. Students were asked to chooseactivities to earn 10 contract points a day.Other components included a low teacher-student ratio, high interest materials, an unin-terrupted sustained silent reading program,individualized oral book reports, and otherpractices. A program director and four aidesassisted classroom teachers in working with

31

Promng Programs1students who were behind grade level. Theprogram included a large inventory of materi-als including books ranging from second totenth grade reading levels, films, tapes, read-alongs, workbooks, kits, and others. Readingmaterials covered topics in literature, careerawareness, sports, history, music, art, science,and social studies.

Project Leaderprint used innovativescheduling and included all students, not onlydisadvarataged students. The students rotatedevery 4-6 weeks from English to readingclasses and back again, for a total of one halfyear of reading and one half year of Englishinstruction due ag one year. The programincluded an unusual and potentially impor-tant alternative evaluation system in readingthat was not associated with the students'English marks or report card grades. Studentswho did poorly in English were not automati-cally penalized with poor grades in reading ifthey made real progress from their own start-ing points in reading skills. A variety ofrewards and other recognition also wereoffered, including free paperback books, posi-tive notices to home, and trophies for studentswho made the most improvement.

Project Leaderprint included many compo-nents of promising programs and illustratedhow they can be combined without stigmatiz-ing disadvantaged students in the middlegrades. Ironically, despite its ambitiori, exten-siveness, and promise, Project Leaderprint isno longer operating. It is an example of thecontinuous appearance and disappearance ofpromising programs. The programs disappearas financial support, leadership, and teacherschange. Educators who see some promise inthe components of Project Leaderprint willhave to reinvent them in their own schools.Materials will have to be redeveloped. Thisproblem could be partially solved if therewere an active clearinghouse or library inwhich materialssuch as high interest/lowreading skills materialswere classified,stored, and shared so that educators could useor adapt the products of previously devel-oped programs, even if the programs were nolonger available.

3 (3

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

lkadinv aid Ohrussion

Promising reading programs aim toimprove students' basic reading skills. Eachprogram reviewed includes one or more fea-tures that raise the quality and content ofreading, and that give the program a uniquequality or personality. These includeemphases on improving self-esteem, attitudestoward reading, reading for enjoyment, orfamily involvement. Some programs set inmotion a token economy that rewards stu-dent for good work A few alter the gradingsystem to reward progress and not just perfor-mance relative to others. Most recognize theneed for many and varied materials, includingcomputers, audiovisual materials, multilevelbooks, or other resources. Others emphasizestudents' responsibility for their own work.

To reach various cognitive and affectivegoals, programs typically combine highly pre-scriptive lessons in reading skills with moreopen, student-directed activitiessuch as stu-dents engaging in discussions or choosingbooks to read for enjoyment in school or athome. It is not yet dear what combination ofhigh prescription by teachers and high choiceor self-direction by students leads to the mostlearning and the best attitudes in reading inthe middle grades.

Reading programs have not been evaluatedrigorously enough to show that one programis dearly and consistently better than anotheror which of the many different componentscontribute to students' success. Nevertheless,several components of these programs may beimportant for improving reading instruction:

Comprehensive management systemsIndividualized-Diagnostic-PrescriptiveLearning Lab

Individualized Prescriptive InstructionManagement System (IPIMS)

PEGASUS:PACEWashington Middle School ReadingIntervention Program

Pull-out or pull-in approachesChapter 1 Reading

32

Chapter 1 Reading and Math ProgramChapter 1 Remedial Reading:We Can Help Thern Read

ESL Supplemental Program forLimited English Proficient Students

Teaching Reading and InterestingNew Stories (TRAINS)

Waukegan Reading ProjectWilkes County Chapter 1 Project

Developmental readingAndover's Integrated ReadingSystem (AIRS)

Structured Teaching in the Areaof Reading (STAR)

Effective grouping practicesCooperative Integrated Readingand Composition (CRC)

The Literature ProjectReading for RealStudent Team Reading (S1R)

Effective mwants and recognitionof studentsProject Leaderprint

Student responsibility for learningChapter 1 ReadingFUTUREPRMITThe Literature ProjectReading for RealProject Leaderprint

School, family, and communityconnectionsBooks and BeyondChapter 1 Reading and MathematicsThe Friendly PlaceHelping One Student To Succeed (HOS1S)

Computer-assisted instructionReacting Education Accountability Design:Secondary (READS)

Teaching Reading and InterestingNew Stories (TRAINS)

Reading across the curriculumContent Reading Including StudySystems (CRISS)

Promising Programs

Project R-3Reading Education Accountability Design:Secondary (READs)

Innovative curriculaCranston's Comprehensive ReadingProgram (CCRP)

FUTUREPRINT

Extra staffPEGASUS:PACEProject LeaderprintReading Education Accountability Design:Secondary (READS)

Reading, Thinking, and ConceptDevelopment

Staff developmentWilkes County Chapter I Project(Many others above include extensive staffdevelopment.)

Writing andLanguage Arts:Promising Programsfor the Middle Grades

In writing, promising programs focuseither on helping students become better writ-ers using the writing process or helping teach-ers become better evaluators of students' writ-ing. Of all the programs reviewed in any sub-ject, the most consistently praised programswith consistently positive results are thosebased on the writing process. This refers tothe original Bay Area Writing Process nowcalled the National Writing Project (Danielsand Zemelman, 1985).

In language arts, programs address prob-lems similar to those discussed in reading andmathhow to design effective preventionand treatment programs to improve the con-tent of language arts curricula, how to pro-

33

vide effective remedial instruction, how toprovide alternatives for staffing more effec-tive programs for disadvantaged students,and how to monitor and evaluate studentprogress.

New directions to create high content lan-guage arts programs include linldng writingto language arts and basing all language artswork on the elaboration of the successful writ-ing process; or linking language arts andreading, writing, and thinking; or creatingother interdisciplinary connections (e.g., lan-guage arts and art, music, science, social stud-ies, or other subjects).

The Writing Proms

Project Write aims to improve the gas ofstudents who need remedial instruction inwriting. The program recognizes that stu-dents feel rewarded when their writing is"published," and that students at risk of fail-ing rarely have their work praised by theirpeers, teachers, or families, or published forothers to read. In Project Write, at-risk stu-dents engage in the writing process to plan,write, and rewrite; have peers read, review,and react to their writing; and bring theirwork into final, publishable form. The pro-gram operationalizes theoretical aspects ofaccelerated education in writing. Evaluationsof this program report the mainly positiveperceptions of teachers, administrators, andparents of the program, with little informationon quantitative effects on students' skills orthe students' attitudes.

Writing Is Thorough and Efficient(WR.I.T.SzE.) applies the National WritingProject process. It replaces the language artscurriculum with an integrated approach tolanguage through writing. Students arehelped to organize, classify, compare, con-trast, and express ideas through writing jour-nals, working as "young authors," and learn-ing literacy skills that include the mechanicsof writing, grammar, spelling, and other lan-guage skills. Although there are no compari-

41

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

son or control classes in the evaluationsreported, WRI.T.SrE. reports very consistentand significant pre and post-test score gainsfor students in the program in many schoolsand across grade levels. This program is astrong testimony to the success of the writingprocess and of the potential benefits of inte-grating writing and language skills.

Milking and Writing

Thinking To Write is mainly a writingskills development program based on the writ-ing process. The manual for teacher; empha-sizes the need to develop students' abilities toanalyze, synthesize, make comparisons, con-iider strategies, and apply otier thinkingskills. The workbooks for students offer aseries of "prompts" to help students organizetheir thoughts and to progress in their writingfrom relatively simple classifications andobservations to more advanced expositionsand syntheses of ideas. Although no evalua-tion data are provided on this program, theapproach and exercises for students may beadapted for use in any writing program.

Wagons at Students' WritingThe Profile Approach to Writing is

designed to help teachers reduce the time ittakes to evaluate large numbers of writingassignments, and, by doing so, increase theamount of writing teachers ask students to do.Teachers guide students in rewriting andimproving their work with standardizedinstructions to examine the content, organiza-tion, vocabulary, language use, and mechan-ics of writing in their first drafts. But mainly,the Profile Approach to Writing focuses teach-ers' attention on how to look at students' writ-ing and evaluate it quickly and reliably. Theprogram provides some evidence that itimproves teaers' speed and reliability andthat students from diverse backgrounds sub-sequently pass writing tests, but there are nostrong comparative data that provide con-vincing evidence of the effectiveness of this

34

approach for all students or for disadvan-taged students.

The Ferguson-Florissant Writing Projectprovides teachers with training in the use ofthe writing process, including prewriting,composing, editing, and evaluating writtenwork, and training in the use of holistic scor-ing procedures to grade students' work. Thisis a combination program that applies theNational Writing Project process to improvestudents' writing and a strong empF,Asis onhelping teachers undtustand how to evaluatewriting. The formal evaluation of this pro-gram demonstrates the success of the writingprocess .1s students trained in the Ferguson-Florissant Writing Project improve their writ-ing skills more than other students (Hawkinsand Marshall, 1981).

Writing or language arts programs toimprove teachers' evaluation techniques oftenrequire the evaluation of students' work overtime. Teachers compare writing samples fromstudents at the beginning and end of the yearto see how students' skills improve. This use-ful technique can be used in cortjunction withany writing program.

Writing and Thchnolagy

The Education Services Corporation (ESC)Writing Program is one of several computer-based integrated instructional systems avail-able that help students use word processingskills in the writing process. Students areguided on screen through prewriting, firstdrafts, revising and editing, and final dxafts.Students write narratives, descriptions, letters,news stories, and other forms as part of theprogram.

Like other ESC computer instruction, theWriting Program requires extensive hardwareand software. Because of the cost, excellentcost/benefit evaluations of effects on studentlearning are needed. These evaluationsshould compare the integrated instructionalpackages in writing (and in math, reading,and science) offered by ESC, WICAT, CCC,and other companies. Comparisons also must

4 '

Promising Programs

be made of students' successes and problemsin computer-based vs. regular classroominstruction in writing.

Word processing is the way that studentswill write in the future. If computer-basedinstruction makes learning to write, edit,rewrite, and review peer writing easier andmore interesting, students using computersshould have better attitudes about writingand could do measurably better wridg thanstudents learning to write in other ways.

Staff Development for Writing

Most promising wridng programs followthe National Writing Project process in whichstudents plan or prewrite, compose, obtainpeer or other reactions, and edit, rewrite, andevaluate their work. Different programs adaptthis process, adding components to enrich theprocess or to help special groups of students.The writing process and its many adaptationsrequire extensive and excellent staff develop-ment and support for teachers because theproces&- -closer to "effective" than any in thisreviewrequires more time and effort by stu-dents and by teachers than typical writingexercises (e.g., as when teachers assign atopic, give students 30 minutes to write acomposition, grade, and return papers).

The promising programs suggest thatapproaches to improve teachers' mechanics ofevaluating writing should be used along withother practices to improve the siudents' writ-ing processe.g., how students are taught tothink, write, rewrite, and react to their workFor example, the detailed checklist in the Pro-file Approach to Writing gives teachers goodguidance about grading, but must be com-bined with a highly active, motivating writingprocess for students to improve their writingskills. Curriculum teams in schools and dis-tricts will need to examine several programsin order to combine components for effectiveprograms overall.

Teachers have choices to make among sev-eral promising programs that set similargoals. For example, teachers may compare

35

Individualized Language Arts with WRI.T.&r F.. The Individualized Language Arts pro-gram features a diagnostic and prescriptiveapproach to improving students' writing andlanguage sldlls. It provides teachers with twodays (10-15 hours) of inservice training toimplement the program. WRIT. & E. sets stu-dents in motion as writers and asks teachersto work as writers too. Teachers participate inthree days (15 hours) of inservice to imple-ment the techniques. The Profile Approach toWriting provides teachers with four to fivedays of inservice training to enable them toread and grade students' writing morequickly and objectively.

Several staff development approachesdevelop the teacher as a writer in a commu-nity of active learners. That is, the teacherlearns the writing process and how to teach itby writing his/her own work and continues towrite with students in class. The students seethe teacher as a writer writing as some-thing that the teacher considers personallyimportant.

Clearly, if teachers are to learn about,adapt, and implement these or other writingprograms, they will need time for staff devel-opment and time to work together. States, dis-tricts, and schools must give serious attentionto the design and delivery of staff develop-ment for middle grades teachers (Epstein,Lockard, and Dauber, 1989), particularly forteachers and administ-ators who are responsi-ble for improving the curriculum for educa-tionally disadvantaged students.

Language Arts Remedial instruction

Elementary Language Arts Team Effort(ELATE) in language arts and reading com-bines prevention and treatment approaches.Regular and remedial teachers are given extraplanning time to work together to coordinatetheir work with students. Chapter 1 teacherswork in the regular teachers' classrooms toprovide immediate instruction or tutoring tosmall groups or individuals. When studentsare pulled out for extra help, the activities are

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

based on regular classwork because the reme-dial instrucfion teachers are familiar with thestudents and their lessons.

Chapter 1 programs that apply for nationalrecognition are asked to document how theyoperationalize several tenets of effectiveschools. For example, ELATE describes itsgoals and objectives, parent and communityinvolvement, strong leadership, appropriateinstructional materials, high expectations forstudents, regular feedback, monitoring, andreinforcement of students, and other practicesconsidered effective. This project alsoarranges for high coordination of regular andspecial service tear:hers, professional develop-ment, and maximum use of classroom timefor learning. It is one of many examples ofthoughtful descriptions of Chapter 1 pro-grams. ELATE reports gains for students thatexceed the gains of Chapter 1 students in thestate at some grade levels but not others. Pro-grams like ELATE that include many promis-ing components should be carefully evaluatedto learn which components are more or lessimportant for the success of the students.

The Reading English Rotation Project is atreatment program to correct learning prob-lems. Students who need extra help aregrouped and regrouped to work with teacherson the skills they need. In a 90-minute blockof time, the students rotate through threeclassrooms called Skills Lab, DevelopmentalReading, and Basic English every 30 minutesfor specific reading and language skills. Theaim of this program is to keep students whohave short attention spans moving and moti-vated and to allow teachers to specialize inteaching specific skills. This project raises oneof many controversies about middle gradeseducation and remedial instruction. Do mid-dle grades students have short attentionspans? If they do, should they have shortclasses? Can middle grades classes be effec-tive if they are only 30 minutes long? Is thisthe best organization of a large block of timefor reading and language arts in the middlegrades? Should teachers specialize or general-ize their skills?

The Reading English Rotation Project eval-

36

uates its success by the percent of studentswho start out behind grade level and whomake more than 10 months progress in a 10-month school year. However, in the evalua-tion report, only about half the students attainthat criterion. This program may be viewed asan alternative approach for some studentswho need help but who do not respond wellto a regular language arts program To knowthis for sure, however, better comparativeevaluations are needed.

Language Arts and Extra Staff

Individualized Language Arts providesstaff training and follow-up activities forteachers who adopt the program, as do mostNDN programs. Even more important, theschool or district must put someone in chargeat the school site to help teachers use andevaluate the new method. This extra leader-ship may be critical to the successful imple-mentation of new or improved programs.

New emphases for high content inreading, writing, and language artsinclude literature in reading, thewriting process, and the integrationof reading, writing, thinking, andspeaking across the currieuhim.

The Individualized Language Arts pro-gram helps teachers diagnose students'strengths and weaknesses in language skillsand provide instruction based on students'needs. It includes a holistic scoring procedureto help teachers evaluate students' writing.Although several evaluations have been con-ducted, only summaries of results were pro-vided. These suggest that students' writingimproved from the beginning to the end ofthe school year, at least in some grade levels,and compared to similar groups. There is noway to know how much the extra staff andleadership contribute to the success of the

Promising Programs

program in improving students' writing overother writing programs.

Nevertheless, extra staff is an importantcomponent in several programs in reading,language arts, and other subjects that we havediscussed. For example, the Reading EnglishRotation Project requires a lead teacher who isin charge of four aides in a reading lab thatincludes appropriate computer hardware andsoftware and other diverse, non-textbookmaterials. Districts that want to help studentsaccelerate learning are going to have to fmdways to invest in or reassign extra personneland materials to implement promising pro-grams with intensity and integrity.

Lau ge Arts EnrichmentSupplementary programs are available to

expand and enrich students' basic languageskills. Culminating activities (such as theaterproductions) are important motivators andprovide students with evidence of theirprogress and completion of work. Middlegrades students, including educationally dis-advantaged students, respond well to drama,creative dramatics, dramatic readings, andother group-oriented theatrical activities thatencourage student participation in the use oflanguage.

One example ot this is the Folger LibraryShakespeare Festival for grades 4-12. Thisprogram (or adaptations of it) can be usedwith heterogeneous groups of students. Pro-ductions need not be elaborate and often needno props or coe.tumes. Middle grades English,language arts, reading, social studies, andother teachers should be aware of the poten-tial of drama for providing opportunities toimprove students' skills in communication,higher level thinking, and social interaction.

One reason that drama is often overlookedas a promising practice is that teachers lackthe training that gives them confidence tomanage drama with educationally disadvan-taged students. Many teachers fear that suchactivities are inefficient in terms of time use,or that the students will get "out of control,"

37

or that drama is =related to important skills.As in most examples of promising practices,staff development is the key to how well mid-dle grades teachers of educationally disad-vantaged students implement practices toinvolve students in dramatics to boost stu-dents' interest in and production of language.

Wpm. Ark; and Family andcornmafty Conections

Several promising programs involve fami-lies in their children's writing and languagearts activities. For example, the LanguageDevelopment Magnet School for SecondaryRecent Immigrant Students includes oppor-tunities for parent education; corruntmicationsfrom the school to the home; volunteers atschool; interactions with children aboutschoolwork at home; and parents in decision-making roles. These practices representEpstein's (1987) five types of school and fam-ily connections. A unique feature is that theprogram serves students and families whorecently immigrated to the United States andwho speak little or no English. 11 this programcan conceptualize and operationalize ambi-tious school and family connections, then anymiddle grades program can do the same.

Students from the Language DevelopmentMagnet School are reported to enter regularschools with skills that place them at orbeyond grade level, removing the disadvan-tage that often is associated with new Mimi-grant status. The family-school connection isbelieved to contrilute to the program's suc-cess in preparing students for regular schools.

Another example of ambitious school andfamily connections is project ELATE, inwhich parents are asked to help identifytheir children's needs, participate in homevisits about the children's development andschool programs, become volunteers, evalu-ate the program as their own child experi-ences it, become involved with children'sleisure reading at home, discuss studentreport cards, and participate in parent-teacher conferences. These practices include

4 5

Promising Programs in the Made Grades

five major types of parent involvement.Promising programs in language arts and

other subjects feature subject-specific parentinvolvement with their own children in learn-ing activities at homethe type of involve-ment parents request most of all (Dauber andEpstein, 1989; Epstein, 1986).

One process that helps teachers make con-nections between the classroom curricula andfamily involvement is Teachers Involve Pal .

ents in Schoolwork (TIPS) InteractiveHomework in Middle Grades Language Artsand Science/Health. TIP'S is being developedand used in the middle grades, includingschools serving educationally disadvantagedstudents. In TIPS, teachers design weeklyhomework assignments that require studentsto talk to someone at home about somethinginteresting that they are learning in class. Inorder to complete their homework, studentsmust interact with family members. Parentsare not asked to teach subjects in the middlegrades, but to support, encourage, react, shareideas, listen, discuss, and respond to studentsin many different ways. The goal is to keepfamilies of middle grades students aware ofschool subjects and requirements, studentprogress, and to organize ongoing exchangesbetween the school and every family. Manu-als and prototype aciivities in middle gradeslanguage arts and science/health may beordered and adapted to the curriculum objec-tives of any school. Formal evaluations of theeffects on student learning are underway, butevaluations of the implementation of TFPS areencouraging.

Language Arts Evaluation

The evaluation of language arts programscan be improved in several waysmeasuringdifferent outcomes, measuring achievementin different ways, and measuring results forsubgroups of students, particularly disadvan-taged students. For example, the LanguageDevelopment Magnet School for SecondaryRecent Immigrant Students monitors severaldifferent tests of language skills instead of

38

using only a general achievement test. Theseinclude criterion-based assessment instru-ments and techniques that are closely linkedto the content and purpose of the program.ELATE measures achievement, self-esteem,and attendance to see how students areaffected by the practices of the program.

Programs that include multiple compo-nents ultimately must conduct analyses tolearn which parts of the program contributeto particular results. All programs should pro-vide better data on whether and how muchdisadvantaged learners who start out behindgrade level accelerate their learning and catchup to their peers in writing and languageskills.

Thinking Ski Hs:Promising ProgramsFor the Middle Grades

When educators use the term "high con-tent" they often mean programs to teach stu-dents `-o think critically or creatively. The termalso distinguishes between basic or minimumthinking competencies that require only mem-ory or simple applications and advanced ormaximum competencies that require interpre-tations and complex applications. Althoughfew thinking skills progams have been ade-quately evaluated, there are several programsand many materials that middle grades edu-cators could consider to begin to increase theamount and kind of thinking their studentsare asked to do.

Questions About Thinking Skills

Two main questions are debated aboutthinking skills programs. First, should think-ing skills be taught as a separate subject or aspart of each subject in the curriculum? Someprograms integrate thinking skills in all sub-jects, whereas others focus students' attention

4E;

Promising Programs

on thinking and problem solving as a separatesubject. Careful evaluations are needed ofwhich courses require and promote whattypes of knowledge, problem-solving abilities,or related thinking. There is some concernabout the apparent lack of generalizability toother subjects when thinking is taught as aseparate subject and equal concern about thelack of development of general thinkirg skillswhen students are trained to think in math,science, social studies, or other specific sub-jects. This debate has not been resolved, butthe current trend is to find ways to includethinking skills in every subject and, if timepermits, to add extra classes or designatedperiods of existing subject classes to enlivenand enrich the curriculum.

The second question is should thinkingsidlls be taught to all students, only to thosewho have mastered basic skills, or only to thegifted or above average students? This issue isthoughtfully discussed by Presseisen (1988)who concludes: ". . . every youngster needs tcdevelop his or her abilities to solve problems,to examine issues and ideas critically, and toinvent or creatively design new materials andsolutions.. . . (W)hat was once the province ofthe gifted and talented . has become anecessity for the entire school generation fac-ing the twenty-fust century." Promising pro-grams tend to build thinking skills into theexperiences of all students, including disad-vantaged learners.

The two questions are linked. Some sug-gest that to think critically in a subject (e.g.,history) a student must be bright, or on gradelevel, or "know a certain amount of history"(Adams, 1989). But, all students in a history,social studies, or other class, regardless oftheir reading scores or scores on a history test,come into the class ready to think if they arehelped to do so. In the middle grades, think-ing, discussing, and debating can be intro-duced to students who are thinking con-cretely or abstractly, on or off grade level, andin or out of specific subjects.

A third question, debated for a while, was:Should early adolescents be taught to think?

39

A few researchers and philosophers advanceda notion that early adolescence was a timewhen students would not be able to do muchthinking or show much cognitive develop-ment because of the nature and rate of braingrowth during this period of life. Mostresearchers and educators challenged thisassumption from the start, and Keating (19 )

confinrts "There is no persuasive evidence offundamental canstraints in the ability of earlyadolescents to engage in critical thinking."

Ctilleal and &offal Thinking

Two types of "thinldng"critical and cre-ativeare addressed by various programs.Critical thinking skills include problem solv-ing, decision maldng, other scientific reason-ing skills, and reasoned judgments. Creativethinking skills include boosting students' abil-ities to generate ideas and think fluently, flexi-bly, originally, divergently, and elaboratively.There is some overlap in the two types ofthinking in helping students solve problems,compare and contrast ideas, and distinguishamong alternatives. But few critical thinkingprograms would include "relaxation exer-cises" to help students improve the originalityand flexibility of their ideas (as in ICE's cre-ative thinking activities; see program below).And few creative thinking programs stressdeductive reasoning activities, as do all criti-cal thinking programs.

Adams (1989) makes other distinctionsbetween thinking skills programs that take a"macrological" or "micrological" approach.The fanner category includes critical and cre-ative thinking programs that require studentsto consider multiple points of view and tointerpret and apply complex information. Thelatter category includes abstract thinking pro-gams that emphasize observations and classi-fications in relatively content-free aptitudeexercises. These distinctions may help schoolschoose the types of activities they prefer forstudents.

Macrological programs feature activitiesthat have no "right" answer and that require

4 7

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

contemplation and discussion. In these pro-grams, students are asked to raise and discusssuch questions as: What if? Suppose that?From whose perspective? What evidence dowe have that? What would you imagineabout? Teachers design and use "essential"questions that help students understand theworld and their own place in it, such as: Whohas authority to make decisions that affect ourlives? and other questions that can organizeinterdisciplinary units of work (Lewis, 1989).Micro logical programs feature activities thathave "right" answers and that requirethoughtful but focused solutions to problemsor puzzles using words, symbols, or percep-tion skills.

In the end, each district, school, or teachermust decide what they mean by "thinkingskills" and what experiences in critical or cre-ative thinking they want all middle grades stu-dents to have in separate classes or in all sub-jects.

Critical Thinking In All Subjects

Keating (1988) defines critical thinking asunderstanding something at a deeper ratherthan a superficial level, which requires thetransformation or integration of informationrather than the simple application of proce-dures. Several programs organize activities toincrease critical thinking skills.

Improve Minimal Proficiencies by Acti-vating Critical Thinking (IMPACT) guidesthe teaching of thinking in all content areas. Itfocuses on 22 thinking skills that can beinfused into instructional strategies in all sub-jects. The program assumes that students donot think at higher levels unless teachersintentionally enable them to do so.

IMPACT emphasizes problem solving,decision making, and critical thinking in math,reading, and other classes. There is heavyemphasis on the students' responsibility fordeveloping enabling skills, processing skills,and operationsthree levels of scientificthinking that comprise many specific subskills.The prototype activities use innovative "mind

40

grabbers" that cleverly link a challengingthinking exercise with math, study skills, orother subjects.

IMPACT comes squarely down on the sideof thinking sldlls for all students, includingdisadvantaged students, in order to advancetheir school skills and success in all subjects. Inone evaluation, students in IMPACT did mea-surably better than other students in reading,math, and on the Cornell Critical ThinkingTest. The latter, however, is considered bysome to be the equivalent of a reading orachievement test and may not measure thalc-ing as a separate skill focus (Arter and Salmon,1987).

This, and all thinking skills programs,require strong staff development of middlegrades teachers who may not previously havethought about how to teach thinking skills

The Structure of Intellect (SOT) programaims to develop students' critical skills, rea-soning, and creative thinking skills, althoughit appears to focus mainly on critical thinkingand reasoning. It offers many activities forteachers to link thinking skills directly tomath and reading to improve students' abili-ties in these subjects. The program is orga-nized hierarchically from basic thinking toadvanced thinking skills in reading and mathfor use across the grades, including the mid-dle grades. The program developers believe501 affects academic achievement, particu-larly in reading and math, but clear evalua-tions are needed of the effects of SOI on mid-dle grades students.

Critical Thinking Handbook: A Guide forRemodelling Lesson Plans in Language Arts,Social Studies, and Science (Paul et aL, 1989) is areference book for teachers in grades 6-9. Itillustrates how lesson plans in different sub-jects could incorporate thinking skills. Thebook works much like a "master class" inmusic or dance. The authors show an originallesson, critique it in temts of how well it callsupon thinking skills, and then present arevised and improved lesson that is morelikely to develop those skills. This should beuseful to teachers who seek ideas of how toapply the concepts of critical thinking in the

PromisIno Programs

subjects they teach. The examples demon-strate that teachers do not have to changetheir curricula in order to write lessons thatbuild students' analytic and creative gas inthose subjects.

cfeetha Mang in All Subjects

The Institute for Creative Education (ICE)is an NDN program that integrates creativethinldng into the content of all subjects. ICEincludes about 125 exercises for grades K-6and 130 for 7-12 that can be used or adaptedby any teacher to increase students' exp ri-ences exploring alternative solutions to inter-esting problems, brainstorming to producecreative ideas, and other activities.

Results of evaluations of ICE are difficult tointerpret. Compared to others who are not inthe program, students in ICE are said toimprove in flexibility of thinking, originality,and elaboration of ideas, but many of thereported differences are minor. Students inthese programs are exposed to novel andpotentially motivating exercises, but evalua-tions of ICE or other creative thinking pro-grams are needed.

Like other NDN programs, informationabout ICE may be obtained from NDN StateFacilitators, but access to program materialsusually requires inservice training and formaladopfion procedures. Once training is com-pleted, however, most thinking skills pro-grams require few extra expenses other thanteachers' time to develop their lessons. Forexample, although training and program eval-uations for ICE cost between $4,000 and$11,000, the project developers suggest thatteachers need only "a few arts and crafts sup-plies and recycled junk" to conduct the pro-gram in their classes.

thinking Rills as a Separate Subject

Philosophy for Children aims to build stu-dents' critical thinking skills in reasoning,logic, reflective thinking and speaking, and

41

other skills of comprehension, analysis, andproblem solving. Hundreds of exercises anddiscussion plans are provided for use or asexamples. Teachers use the lessons in con-junctica with specially written "novels" thatthe students read and discuss. The novelsintroduce and reintroduce philosophicalthemes as they apply to real world settingsand problems. Although Philosophy for Chil-dren is designed as a separate subject, itsdevelopers believe that it also could replacepresent reading or language arts programs asa new interdisciplinary reading, languagearts, and thinking curriculum. The programhas been used with students of all abilitiesfrom grades 3 to 8.

Most schools lack systematic pro-grams in critical or creative think-ing for all students, either as a sep-arate subject or as part of everysubject. Opportunities for problemsolving, puzzles, logic, divergentthinking, invention, cause andeffect, and other thinking skillswould bring new, high, and moti-vating content to middle gradeseducation.

Many quantitative studies have been con-ducted during more than a decade to evaluatePhilosophy for Children. Evaluafions havelooked at students' reading and math achieve-ment, creative thinking, rational behavior, for-mal and informal reasoning, discoveringalternatives, logic, and other skills. Most ofthe studies show that students in the programimprove from pre to post-test. They also arehigher in comparison to students not in theprogram, although the differences are oftenminor. Most studies have been conducted inclassrooms where students are involved withPhilosophy for Children for one or two years.

Promising Program in the Middle Grades

Nevertheless, this program is one of the bestevaluated and most often implemented of thethinking skills programs reviewed. It shouldbe of interest to educatars who are consider,-ing adding to their program a separate courseor class in thinking skills or a replacementprogram that combines reading, writing, andthinking. It should be compared with newprograms such as Futureprint or the Litera-ture ProjectReading for Real.

Another program that helps students thinkgreat thoughts, express ideas, and listen toeach other is The Touchstones Project Partic-ipation in Touchstones does not depend onstudent reading level, as each selection is readaloud before students discuss it. In a separateclass period, Touchstones aims to increasestudents' abilities to express their own ideas,appreciate and resolve differences with oth-ers, and transfer these skills to other subjectsand other settirtgs. Teachers may select fromamong 30-50 philosophical selections at eachof three levels of thinking for the middlegrades. The selections refer to issues in differ-ent subjects (e.g., science, literature, art, math,and others). Students, not the teachers, are thediscussion leaders.

As in most programs, some students enjoythe program, others do not. Anecdotaldescriptions of the program suggest that stu-dents in the Touchstones Project are morecooperative, ask more questions, and refer tothe philosophical readings in other settings.But, recent empirical studies of the effects ofthe program show that there are few measur-able results on attitudes or achievements ofinner city middle grades students (McPart-land and Nettles, 1990). The goals of theTouchstones Project are not well-defined andso it is not surprising that measured resultsare elusive. Without a clear statement of goalsfrom the developers and some evidence ofresults, most educators will have a hard timejustifying the use of limited school time forthis program.

Higher Order Thinking Skills (HOTS)combines computer-based activities withdialogs between students and teachers. HOTS

42

was designed to replace Chapter 1 pull-outremedial instruction classes that stress drilland practice with computer-based adven-tures, games, stories, and other software thatencourages thinking. The lessons dependheavily on teachers and students talkingtogether and reasoning about problems andcomputes activities. Students are helped tolearn to apply strategies for solving problems,make inferences from contexts, apply vocabu-lary and concepts in different contexts, andsynthesize information from two or moresources---all skills that could be useful to stu-dents in and out of the HOTS classroom.Originally designed for students in grades4-6, the HOTS program can be used throughthe middle grades.

HOTS is a pull-out program with promise.Classes meet for 35 minutes a day for one totwo years to provide students with the depthof thinking and speaking skills that shouldhave long-term and general payoff for learn-ing in all subjects.

The success of HOTS depends on teachers'abilities to use specific scripts to guide stu-dents' work It is expected that heavy empha-sis on problem solving and inductive reason-ing will contribute to disadvantaged students'self-confidence, awareness of their own abili-ties, and better performance in their regularsubject classes. The program is said to appealto students, who see it as something of areward to attend the HOTS classes, whereasfew students feel that way about most Chap-ter 1 classes.

Results reported by teachers who haveused the program suggest that, in the shortterm, students improve their self-confidenceand speaking skills Educators who have usedthe program give testimonies that studentsfrom HOTS classes score higher and havefewer discipline problems than similar non-HOTS students, and a few even make thehonor roll and are redefined as "gifted."These testimonies are either hokum or hcpefor the future. Although many teachers aresincere in their praise for HOTS, only theclearest, most rigorous evaluations will

Promising Programs

resolve the questions that are generated bysuch claims. Students in the program showsignificant spring-to-spring NCE gains onstandardized achievement tests, but these arenot studies of critical comparison groups.Because of the relatively high cost of the pro-gram and its high promise, clearer evalua-tions are needed of HOTS.

HOTS provides comprehensive training forteachers in conducting Socratic dialogs, cur-riculum guides for teachers that include thefull scripts of the discussions that they havewith students, and computer software onwhich the lessons are based. The program isnot inexpensive. Initial hardware and soft-ware are required alone with a full or part-time teacher, aide, or other staff member toconduct the program. After the initial invest-ment, the major cost of the program is for per-sonnel. New regulations encourage schools touse Chapter 1 funds to develop stuaents'advanced skills and programs of high content.Educators will want to review the new Chap-ter 1 and other federal and state regulations tosee if it is possible to invest Chapter 1 funds inthinking skills programs and other programsthat require large investments of staff, tech-nology, or materials.

The HOTS program developer asks a diffi-cult question: Why should a district spendmoney to buy hardware and software, andthen use both in ways they weren't intendedto be used? And, he answers that a "round-about but sophisticated approach to usingtechnology may improve the learning of at-risk students more than direct but simplisticroutes" (Pogrow, 1990). Some educators willquestion the use of HOTS because it requiresthe investment of two years of students' timein challenging discussions about games, deci-sions, and questions in hopes of improvingstudents' math and reading achievement.Some wonder if the program activities are toodistant from its goals. Nevertheless, there issomething provocative about a "giftedapproach for at-risk students."

Cognitive Research Trust (CoRD is a pop-ular thinking skills program for the middle

43

grades that may be conducted as a separatesubject or as designated class periods withinanother subject (such as English or socialstudies). It has grand goals of helping stu-dents consider all facts, develop wisdom withwhich to use new information, take broadviews, and realize there is not always a rightanswer or clear decision for important ques-tions about life.

CoRT helps students apply a thinking toolcalled PMI for Plus/Minusanteresting thatguides students to consider the good points,bad points, and interesting possibilities thatmight arise on any issue or problem. The goalis for students to increasingly raise the level oftheir thinking from simple awareness ofissues and willingness to explore ist les up tofocused, dellterate, and fluent use of thinkingskills to understand issues and make deci-sions. The program offers 60 lessons (six sec-tions or types of thinking with 10 lessons ineach) that teachers can use in 30-35 minuteperiods. Teachers can adapt the process to usewith issues that are pertinent for their ownstudents.

CoRT is said to give low-ability studentspermission to think. The same could be saidabout any of the thinking skills programs inseparate or regular subject classes if they areprovided for all students, including disadvan-taged students.

The author of CoRT presents no formalevaluations, and studies of the benefits of thisprogram for middle grades students clearlyare needed.

Evaluating Thinking Skills

Marty instruments purport to measure"thinking skills:' Tests for critical thinking inthe middle pades include the Cornell CriticalThinking Test, New Jersey Test of ReasoningSkills, the Ross Test of Higher Cognitive Pro-cesses, and others. Tests for creative thinkingfor the middle grades include the TorrenceTest of Creative Thinking, Williams CreativityAssessment Package, and others. Two refer-ences on available tests include Developing

re,

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Minds: A Resource Book for Teaching Thinking(Costa, 1985) and Assessing Higher OrderThinking Skills: A Consumer's Guide (Arter andSalmon, 1987).

The Consumer's Guide is a handbook thatrefers to about 60 tests of critical and creativethinking, many of which are usable in themiddle grades. Some information on each testis provided, including the time needed toadminister the test, psychometric data on reli-ability and validity, and other information.Missing is information on cost, and even moreimportant, missing are critical evaluations ofthe quality of the tests. One general concern isthat tests of thinking skills that require read-ing skills may simply be alternative readingtests, and not effective independent measuresof thinking.

Evidence suggests that thinking skills pro-grams are less likely to succeed if their goalsare abstract, unstated, or many steps removedfrom the skills that students learn. For exanpie, a few discussions of philosophical themesprobably will not have short-term measurableresults on students' conflict resolution skills oron their math and reading text scores. Rather,thinking skills programs may succeed onshort-term goals that are closely linked to theactual program activities. Thus, the Touch-stones Project may help students think aboutnew ideas and the contributions philosophersmake to society long before it helps studentseffectively resolve peer conflicts that arise in aschool cafeteria. Or, HOTS may help studentstalk more articulately with teachers and feelcomfortable with difficult computer-basedactivities long before it improves students'math problem-solving skills on middle gradesachievement tests.

Before educators select a test to measurethe effects of critical thinking programs, theymust decide how the activities or programsthey implement are expected to affect think-ing. For example, if thinking skills activitiesare imbedded in all or some academic subjectclasses, teachers may want to know whetherstudents' thinking has improved in the partic-ular subject more than whether the student

44

has attained some general thinking skill.Adding challenging activities to scienceclasses may first improve students' under-standing of science. Science teachers may notbe particularly or immediately concernedabout whether science thinking skills affectmiddle grades students` thinking in socialstudies. Evaluations of thinking skills in spe-cific subjects must compare the academicskills and other performance of students whodid and did not have the thinking skills por-tion of the curriculum, particularly on thetypes of knowledge or abilities that the think-ing activities were designed to improve.

Swam Thinking Skills

Educators may debate whether middlegrades students need critical or creative think-ing or both. Advocates of creative thinkingprograms stress that students should stietchtheir minds to create flexilale, original one-of-a-kind ideas or responsesthings no one elsewould think of. Advocates of critical thinkingprograms stress that students should developthe analytic skills that enable them to think inways that will help them to answer difficultquestions on tests that measure success. Mostthinking skills programs (creative and critical)have secondary goals to increase studenls'self-confidence, participation in class, andability to work with others.

Thinking skills tend to emphasize eitherpuzzle solving that demands attention andperception to activities that have a rightanswer, or the development of wisdom toconsider and solve or resolve difficult prob-lems or issues that have no right answer.Which skill or skills should middle gradesstudents develop?

Higher order skills are not necessarilyunusual or profound. For example, U.S. stu-dents are weak in their ability to solve multi-step math problems measured in the NationalAssessment of Educational Progress (NAEP)tests. Two-step and three-step problems arepart of every middle grades math text and

PrornWng Programs

require only that students have new access tomotivating, appropriate, and clear lessons onthese skills. Similarly, in reading and socialstudies, US. students are said to be weak intheir abilities to synthesize facts and ideasfrom several sources. These are basic readingcomprehension activities that all middlegrades students can master if teachers usetheir existing texts and provide clear lessonson these skills.

Because of the lack of good evaluations, it istoo early to know whether and how thinkingskills courses or exercises affect middle gradesstudents. It may be that thinking skills pro-grams in the middle grades should be viewedas an early step on a long path of programsand experiences. Early adolescence is a timewhen most students begin to move from con-cretv to abstract thinking abilities. Thus, think-ing skills in the middle grades are part of adevelopmental process, and educators willwant to weave many types of experiences intotheir programs for students. Like stretchingexercises that precede athletic activities, think-ing skills in the middle grades in variedformscreative, critical, applied, andabstractmay help students stretch theirreadiness for more extensive thinking skillsprograms in high school and beyond.

Science: PromisingPrograms in theMiddle Grades

As in math, science instruction in the mid-dle grades is mainly guided by textbook seriesselected by schools or districts. In science,teachers need to fully utilize the best that isavailable in texts and in many other resourcesto keep science current and exciting. Somepromising supplementary programs suggestways that all schools can raise the quality ofscience teaching and learning for all students,including disadvantaged students.

Some new programs may 'J.amatically

change science curricula and students' experi-ences in science in the middle grades. Themost promising supplements and alternativesfocus on active learninghelping studentswork as scientists with laboratory activities inclassrooms, in the community, or on comput-ers. Another promising direction is interdisci-plinary science instruction that links sciencewith health, social sciences, reading, writing,math, art, or other subjects based on concepts,issues, and problems that are important in thelives of early adolescents.

Active Learning in Science

Informal Science Study for grades 5-12takes an innovative approach by focusing onscience in non-school settings and activities.Students study the "physics of fun" asdemonstrated in amusement parks, gamesand sports, toys, and other play situations.The activities include the study of motion,acceleration, force, gravity, time, graphing,energy conservation, physiology, and otherconcepts. Although the prototype materials inthis program appear complicated, they pro-vide science teachers, department chairs, orothers engaged in science curriculum devel-opment with many ideas about how to relatereal world experiences to important conceptsin science. The Informal Science Study unitsthat could be adopted or adapted to fit thecurriculum objectives of other districts andschools. Formal evaluations have not beenconducted, but the program developers sug-gest that evaluations show that students whoexperience Informal Science Study gain intheir knowledge, comprehension, and appli-cations of the topics they study.

Foundational Approaches in ScienceTeaching (FAST) includes topics of ecologyand the environment for grades 6-8, matterand energy for grades 8-10, arid general sci-ence for the high school grades. The programemphasizes lab skills and active learning andrequires minimal classroom facilitiesheat,running water, and bench space. The pro-gram reports modest but consistent gains in

45 r

Promising Programs In the Middie Grades

students' abilities to do lab work comparedto other approaches. This does not necessar-ily translate into increased knowledge ofecology, energy, or general science comparedto students who study these topics in tradi-tional ways.

Nevertheless, many middle grades stu-dents spend years in elementary school withlittle or no lab work, and may benefit fromsupplementary programs that provide theseexperiences. The available lessons in FAST orother supplementary programs provide sci-ence teachers with ideas even if the programis not adopted outright.

High content in science empha-sizes active learning, including lab-oratory work applications of thescientific method, and interdisci-plinmy connections of science withother subjects.

Marine Science Project: FOR SEA illus-trates how improved science programs can bedeveloped around focused topics of localimportance and extended for their nationalimplications. The materials in this programinclude intriguing lessens in marine science inbiology and oceanography for the middleg. Ades. Marine Science Project: FOR SEAincludes 90 instructional hours of lessons (5hours for 18 weeks). This program has beenwell-evaluated. Students in the program gainmore in their knowledge of marine sciencethan students in control groups. Similar resultswere found for students who lived near anocean and those who lived inland, suggestingthat the program is generally useful for help-ing all students understand the nature, impor-tance, and problems of marine life.

Similarly, the program Survival Strategiesis based on lessons that are conducted in classand (where available) at a zoo in biology, con-servation, and animal populations. Regardlessof the availability of a zoo, however, middle

46

grades teachers may want students to con-sider serious questions of wildlife and conser-vation as part of an ecological or life scienceprogram that is relevant to early adolescents'interests. Survival Strategies asks students toconsider: Will wildlife as we know it survivethrough the 21st century? The students studylife cycles of populations of animals, competi-tion and predation, and other topics. The pro-gram concludes with a simulation game inwhich students manage a wildlife refuge.

Programs like Marine Science Project FORSEA and Survival Strategies should be col-lected and reviewed by committees of scienceteachers and other curriculum leaders to findexciting and challenging supplements to sci-ence textbooks, or to spark teachers' ideas todevelop similar approaches for other sciencetopics. One goal is to enrich middle gradesscience with active learning exercises thatstudents conduct in class, at home, with theirfamilies or friends on weekends, or in otherways.

Intalliscipikuny Science hornOne promising program that should be

available soon is Stanford University's MiddleGrades Human Biology Curriculum Project.This program builds on middle grades stu-dents' interests in their bodies, their emotions,and their lives during adolescence. The pro-gram links studies about physical develop-ment, social systems, ecology, history, psy-chology, and other aspects of health in aninterdisciplinary life sciences perspective. Italso includes a comprehensive set of teachertraining materials to bring teachers up to datein science knowledge in the biological andsocial sciences that are covered in the curricu-lum for students. This program offers a fullcurriculum designed to provide students witha strong base of science knowledge and posi-tive attitudes in the middle grades and toencourage students to take science courses inhigh school. The units of work emphasizelearnMg by doing, active thinking, and work-ing as a scientist.

Promising Programs

Educators will want to carefully review theearly evaluations of the effects of the HumanBiology Curriculum Project on middle gradesstudents' science knowledge and attitudes.The program will probably be available foruse before it is fully evaluated. If so, educatorsshould carefully "guesstimate" how the cur-riculum compares to their present science pro-gram, and how it fits their students' needs asa one, two, or three-year program, or as a sup-plementary program.

Science sod hichnelegy

Another promising direction in science iscomputer-based instruction that permits stu-dents to conduct science experiments on com-puters that would be otherwise impossible toconduct in most middle grades laboratories orclassrooms. Computer-based experimentsshould not take the place of all lab work,because students need to see, smell, ar ' feelscience. Programs like The Education Sys-tems Corporation (ESC) Explorations inMiddle School Science may, however,greatly enrich students' investigations andunderstanding of many topics.

ESC Explorations in Middle Schaol Scienceincludes 30 jnteractive computer simulationson space, atoms and matter, mechanics,energy, electricity, and others to supplementmost physical science textbook series. In theprogram, teachers are helped to link science toreading, writing, and math as studentsobserve, hypothesize, experiment, collect,analyze, and report data. This program iscostly because of hardware and softwarerequirements. It should be carefully evalu-ated, but it looks promising for adding newand high content to middle grades scienceclasses. Computer-based science programsfrom other companies (as well as new direc-tions in computer-based instruction in othersubjects) should be compared by educatorswho are considering making large financialinvestments in new content curricula in themiddle grades.

47

Ste ikivelepment lbknot Science Programs

When new units of work are needed, sci-ence supervisors and teachers must be giventime to work together to design, select, adapt,test, and improve activities. In other words,they need time to act as scientists themselvesand to translate their work into perspectives,units, and lessons for students. If teacherswere helped by school and district adminis-trators to become more proficient scientists orscience thinkers, and if they actively preparedor adapted curricula and instructionalapproaches, students would see what itmeans to work as a scientist, how science cap-tivates adults, and how important science is intheir own lives. The professionalization ofteachers in their special field is one of therecurring components of promising programsin all subjects.

Evaluating Science Programs

Science teachers and supervisors selectingnew or supplementary science programs needevidence that promising programs will helptheir middle grades students learn and likescience better than their present programs andbetter than other alternatives. Data of this sortare not readily available for most programs.

Although almost all middle grades schoolsgive students standardized tests in readingand math, few schools regularly measure ormonitor students' progress in science or com-pare their own school's success in science withothers in the district, state, or nation. Oneresult of this is that reading, English, andmath are given greater importance in middlegrades programs than is science. A few dis-tricts are beginning to add standardized or cri-terion-based science achievement tests or newassessments in science to their test schedules.

Other science indicatorsattitudes towardscience and lab skillsalso are important.Standardized and other tests of scienceknowledge may not be immediately affectedby science programs that stress active learn-

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

ing. But, students' involvement in doing sci-ence and being scientists may increase the-likelihood that they will enjoy science andcantintre taking more science courses in highschool. In the middle grades, science attitudesand activities may be as important as sciencefacts. Educators need to improve science con-tent and instructional approaches to make sci-ence so interesting to students that they willenjoy and elect science courses through highschool. Evaluations should include measuresof continued commitment to science, in addi-tion to measures of skals and attitudes.

Social Studies:Promising ProgramsIn the Middle Grades

Promising programs in sodal studies takeseveral different directions. Supplementaryactivities to use with textbooks and new pro-grams to replace present texts emphasizeactive learning by students and participationin research and community service. Socialstudies teachers and curriculum leaders seemto agree that new high content will be addedto social studies by increasing students' reflec-tion on and discussion of alternative and mul-ticultural perspectives of history, currentevents, and geography; and by inavasing theuse of original source documents, maps,diaries, and other materials that help historyand geography come alive for students.

Interdisciplinary units are being developedto integrate history, art, music, English, andother subjects that are currently in the stu-dents' curriculum. On the horizon are pro-grams that .introduce new content in the socialsciencesanthropology, sociology, psychol-ogy, and other fields that relate directly to his-tory. New content in social studies aims toenrich students' understanding of the humanexperience.

48

Multicultural Education in Social Studies

Respecting Ethnic and Cultural Heritage(REACH) offers four booklets on U. S. historyfrom the perspectives of African-Americans,Mexican-Americans/Chicanos, Asian-Ameri-cans, and American Indians. The booklets areshort and readable, and not only convey his-tory but also provide ideas for discussion thatshould be of interest to early adolescents. Theevaluations of this project suggest that stu-dents' ethnic awareness and acceptance ofothers are improved as a result of the pro-gram. Other evaluations of these outcomesand knowledge of U.S. history are needed.

There is much talk about the importance ofmulticultural curricula in the middle gradesand little evidence of it in most programsbecause of a lack of materials and testedapproaches. REACH, designed to be used over30-40 class periods, offers some good ideasand examples. Social studies curriculum super-visors and teachers may want to use the pro-gram as designed or revise the approach to fittheir own curricular objectives and time sched-ules.

Facing History and Ourselves: Holocaustand Him= Behavior is a program that intro-duces middle grades or high school students tothe history, human drama, and themes of theHolocaust, Armenian genocide, the atom bombin Hiroshima, and other issues of unusualmagnitude. The program is designed to enrichand supplement middle or high school socialstudies curricula. The NDN program providestraining for teachers and a textbook for stu-dents.

It brings to students' attention the impor-tance in 20th century history of ethics, socialattitudes and behavior, and an understandingof major contemporary issuesracism, vio-lence, prejudice, abuse of power, human rights,morality, law, and citizenship. The studentsaddress questions such as: What are the condi-tions that create a just society? How do peopletreat each other? Should rules set by authoritiesever be broken? What would, should, could Ihave done in a situation like the Holocaust, or

5 G

Promising Programs

in present day situations that promote discrim-ination, prejudice, or general unfairness? Stu-dents ask and discuss hard questions, raisingtheir level of thinking about social studies. Asin many other promising programs, the teacheris involved as a learner and thinker.

The program does not report formal evalua-tions but has many testimonies from teachers,students, and parents who say the programhelps students think in new and importantways. More pertinent evaluations are needed,particularly of how the program affects middlevs. high school students' awareness and under-standing of different and difficult concepts.

Social studies resources for multiculturalcurricula are available from many organiza-tions that specialize in the teaching of history,geography, social sciences, and related topics.For example, the Center for Teaching Interna-tional Relations (1989) offers supplementaryresources for social studies programs withprototype lessons about the future, humanrights, understanding conflict, Africa, China,Japan, and other cultures, ethnic heritage, andother topics.

Economics in Social Studies

Ideas and materials are available from theJoint Council on Economic Education (1989).This organization's catalog for teachers con-tains resources to supplement regular socialstudies programs, which typically ignore eco-nomic concepts and activities. The unitsinclude audiovisnals, instructional TV, com-puter-assisted instruction, and other tech-nologies and methods to teach the stock mar-ket, the economics of agriculture, and othertopics.

Student Participation in fire Community

The Civic Achievement Award Program(CAAP) in Honor of the Office of the Speakerof the House of Representatives is a promis-ing resource for social studies teachers ingrades 5-8. In CAAP, students study U. S. his-tory, cultural diversity, legislation, and other

49

facts and processes, and then use their knowl-edge to conduct individual or group researchprojects. Students then proceed to design andconduct community action projects. The pro-gram packets include two soft-cover texts forstudents, one at the fifth grade and the otherat the seventh grade reading level. The twobooks cover similar content, with slightlymore detail offered at the higher readinglevel. This enables a teacher to use the pro-gram in a heterogeneous social studies classthat includes students with a range of readingskills.

The program includes built-in rewards andrecognition for students who contribute totheir community with their action projects.The research and citizen participation activi-ties allow teachers to integrate reading, writ-ing, speaking, science, art, and other subjectsinto their social studies units.

High conten.4,- in social studiesincreases students' dep.,z of knowl-edge through the use of originalsources in history and geography;active learning through discus-sions, projects, and communtly ser-vke; understanding of the socialsciences; and awareness of inter-disciplinary connections of historyand geography with other subjects.

Of all the academic subjects, social studiesnecessitates that students work in heteroge-neous classes with students of all abilities, justas students will live and work with diversityin society. To conduct effective lessons withheterogeneous groups, teachers need instruc-tional materials for weak and strong readersthat cover the same content so that studentswith diverse reading abilities can think andwork together. CAAP workbooks provide oneexample for U.S. history in the middle gradesthat helps to solve this problem. School and

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

district social studies teams could considerdesigning or identifying similar approachesfor other social studies topics in the middlegrades.

Law in a Changing Society (LCS) is a pro-gram to improve students' citizenship skillsand to increase their understanding of the lawand legal institutions. Social studies teachersare provided training and information onthese topics and materials for students tolearn about the law, the constitution, and citygovernment, and for students to participate ina mock trial. Developed for grades 4 and 5,the program and approach could be adaptedfor middle grades units in which governmentand citizenship are prominent topics. A mocktrial is a useful prototype that would be quiteappropriate in the middle grades. Early evalu-ations show that the program increases stu-dents' knowledge about the law and pro-motes more positive attitudes toward lawenforcement. The evaluations are not satisfac-tory, however, for determining LC,5's poten-tial in the middle grades.

Social Studies and Family involvement

Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork(TIPS) Social Studies and Art links art his-tory and criticism to middle grades socialstudies curricula in American History, WorldCultures, and Government and Citizen Par-ticipation. TIPS Social Studies and Artinvolves parents or other volunteers to pre-sent and discuss artwork in social studiesclasses. Each month, the volunteers discuss anew art print with the class and leave theprint in the room until the next visit. Teachersfollow up the discussion with classwork,homework, or extra credit activities about theart print as it links to soda! studies. An evalu-ation of the program shows that students inthe program increase their awareness ofartists and their work, and about 80 percentof tl.e students develop likes and dislikes ofthe prints they see. Parent volunteers weresuccessful in the middle grades in ways that

50

assisted teachers and students to increase thecontent of the curriculum.

Interdisciplinary units in the middlegrades are recommended to introduce stu-dents to natural and important connectionsacross subjects, but these units take time todevelop. TIPS Sodal Studies and Art materi-als and the involvement of parents and othervolunteers help teachers enrich students'experiences with connections betwePit thesetwo subjects. The process can be adapted toother middle grades social studies units or toother curricula (such as language arts or for-eign language).

In addition to involving parents as volun-teers in social studies classes, there are manyways that teachers can inform and involveparents in students' social studies work athome. Epstein suggests that every teacher inevery subject can design at least one home-work assignment a month that requires stu-dents to talk to someone at home about some-thing interesting (Brandt, 1989). In socialstudies, students can be assigned homeworkthat requires them to interview, survey, andobtain reactions from parents or other familymembers about history, current events, gov-ernment, economics, natural resources, andother topics. (See Teachers Involve Parents inSchoolwork in the section on language arts.)

Shiff Development in Social &idles

Resource lists and catalogs are availablefrom many sources, including those men-tioned here. But, teachers cannot thoughtfullyuie resources without a supportive adminis-trative structure that provides the time andincentives to develop better programs. Alongwith staff development in the usual sense ofworkshops and instruction, teachers needstaff development that offers them time andsupport to work together to gather, review,select, adapt, or design materials in order todevelop coherent and enriching units of highcontent instruction.

55

Promising Programs

Promising ProgramsThat CombineComponents

Many of the programs discussed above inmath, reading, language arts, and other sub-jects include several components. The differ-ent features of programs may either be criti-cal, marginally important, or superfluous tostudents' success. In this section, we examinesome programs that combine components.Whether in specific subjects, or in programsthat affect a whole school, or in comprehen-sive programs for disadvantaged students,the questions about multiple components arethe same: Which components should beincluded and which are dispensable? Whichaffect what outcomes for what students?Which complement and strengthen eachother? Not all programs can be fully fundedand so not all components of promising pro-grams can always be included when schoolsadopt or adapt new approaches. Thus, com-ponent analyses are imperative, but they aremissing from most program evaluations.

Project Promise at James P. Tunilty MiddleSchool adds 90 minutes to the school day andthree homs of school on Saturday to increasethe learning time of students who are at riskof failing. The program includes teams ofteachers, flexible scheduling, and interdisci-plinary workparticularly integrating read-ing, math, and writing in all subjects. The pro-gram's promise is that all students will beworking at or beyond grade level if they dothe work specified for the program. The prin-cipal has the power to select teachers and todramatically change (or waive) school rulesand practices. The staff is given 45 minutes aday and two hours on Fridays for planningand staff development. Like many promisingprograms, it is neither teacher-centered, stu-dent-centered, nor directed by the principal asthe sole leader, but creates a community forlearning in which students are ac.;isted andteachers are supported as professionals.

Project Promise combines many compo-

51

nents. Which components are most importantfor increasing the success of students at risk offailing: strong leadership? extra time for stu-dents? extra time for teachers to plan anddevelop projects? smaller class size? heavyfocus on academics? or others? The leadershipof the district stated, "An evaluation of allthree schools in the program is due . . but itis not an evaluation designed to identify whatmight be applicable system-wide. There areno plans to undertake such a study."

The cost of the program at Timilty ?vfiddleSchool is about $1,000 more per pupil than atother middle schools in the districta costthat the district believes it cannot afford in allschools. However, without information on thecontrilautions of partifgar components of theprogram, other schools cannot learn whichlow-cost or high-cost features are responsiblefor the ostensible success of Project Promisenor decide which practices they can affordthat will benefit their students.

Of the many components ofpromising programs, which onsshave important effects on students'skills and attitudes? Which stu-dents benefit? At what cost? Wah-out thoughtful evaluations educa-tors will never know the answers tothese basic questions.

Project Promise not only illustrates howcomponents from other promising programscan be combined, but also illustrates unfortu-nate attitudes toward evaluation in manyschools, districts, and states that prevent edu-cators from learning about the payoffs of theirinvestments in program development andimplementation.

Another attempt to organize an effectivepull-out treatment program is 4 Success, con-ducted at the elementary level but adaptableto the middle grades. Although it is called a

5

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

"non-pull-out program" because the studentsare not pulled out of their classroom to go forextra help, the class is an "already pulled-out "homogeneous group of students who are mostat-risk academically. In effect, the studentshave been pulled in to a separate class or trackto work toward grade level. Two teachersone regular and one remedialwork togetherin a "success" class to give students extraattention, appropriate lessons, and support inall subjects. Similar programs in other middleschools provide remedial instruction, learningopportunities, and support to small groups ofstudents most in need of help. Some of theseprograms report, anecdotally, that they are sopositively organized that students do not wantto leave the class even when they are eligibleto return to regular classrooms.

This approach puts special remedial classesin the same light as those for gifted studentsas opportunities to leam in an enriched envi-ronment with teachers who want to teach theclass. The difference is that, in traditionalpractice, gifted and talented programs areviewed as enrichment programs to acceleratethe learning of the already accelerated, whileremedial instruction programs are usuallyviewed as treatment programs that oftendecelerate the learning of the already deceler-ated. Promising programs, like 4 Success, takethe same approach as the gifted and talentedspecial classes to accelerate the learning ofdisadvantaged students.

It is possible that in some schools, "success"classes are needed to give unusual resources,attention, and hope to small groups of stu-dents who are failing or are greatly at-risk.And it is possible that in some schools, theseclasses are highly successful. For example,some students make up two years of work inone, aad return to their age cohort. Buteuphemisms for "tracking"even for small,select groups of studentsshbuld not be takenlightly.

Promising programs for treating unusualneeds are intensive and combine many com-ponents, such as the Language DevelopmentMagnet School, an alternative temporaryschool for new immigrant students in the mid-

52

die and high school grades. Students withaverage or higher intelligence who lackEnglish language skills often are labeled inregular schools as "slow" or "disadvantaged,"with serious negative consequences for thestudents' self-esteem and motivation to learnin school The language Development MagnetSchool provides before, during, and after-school tutoring; teachers are available on a"hotline" to provide homework help; andcomputers are used to vary teaching andlearning approaches. Students' linguistk, emo-tional, and social needs are addressed, in addi-tion to their academic needs. Social support isbuilt into the program as peers, teachers, andparents all encourage students to work hard,build skills, and prepare for placement in reg-ular middle and high schools. As impressiveas this program seems, it is not possible toknow which of the many components of theprogram contribute to students' successes inthe alternative school and successful transi-tions to regular schools.

Summer Training and Education Program(STEP) is a promisdng program that was eval-uated by Public/Private Ventures (P/PV) tosee if consecutive, intensive summer learningactivities combined with work experiencv andfollow-ups during the school year couldincrease student success in school and helpstem the learning losses that often occur dur-ing summer, particularly for disadvantagedstudents. The program includes education,community service, outdoor adventure, cazeerinternships, and other features to appeal tostudents who might otherwise lose interest inschooling. Evaluations of STEP show that, inthe short term, students in the programdevelop social and personal responsibility,positive self-esteem, and more positive atti-tudes toward school and adults as a result ofcommunity service, community study, andcareer internships. The long-term effects of theprogram and the importance of particularcomponents of the program are not yet clear.

Summary: Combining CompGdnbt

Project Promise is a comprehensive pro-

PromisIng Programs

gram that combines many components to dra-matically restructure school time, staff selec-tion, staff planning, and remedial instruction.The Language Development Magnet Schooland STEP are other examples of programsthat combine many components in order toredesign or restructure schooling across sub-jects in the middle grades. It will be veryimportant during the next few years to evalu-ate promising middle grades practices todetermine which are successful, for whichstudents, at what cost, and compared to whatalternatives. 71-15 is necessary to justify thecost of comprehensive programs such as Pro-ject Promise, to determine needed revisions toprograms such as STEP, and to validate theworth of specific subject programs discussedin earlier sections of this monograph. Onlywith a menu of approaches and better infor-mation about likely effects will most middlegrades schools change their present practicesto institute more effective programs for disad-vantaged middle grades students (Epsteinand Mac Iver, 1990).

ConflictingComponents

As educators examine the many compo-nents in different promising programs inmath, reading, social studies, and other sub-jects, they will notice that some seem to con-tradict each other, others complement eachother, and still others work independently.This section discusses some of the importantdilemmas that must be discussed andresolved by educators as they consider whichof several programs or components of pro-grams they might adopt or adapt.

Core or Common Curriculum vs.

Meeting Students' Diverse Needs

Some promising programs help educatorsgive all students the same experiencesa

53

common cuniculurn. Other programs aim tomeet the unique and individual needs of stu-dents and the learning problems of individu-als. These two approaches set two differentbut important goals. A common curriculumaims to help all students keep options openfor future work in high school and postsec-ondary education. Individualized curriculumand treatment programs aim to understandand serve student diversity by accepting stu-dents at their present starting place and help-ing them progress from there. Individualizedprograms also may be designed to buildunique talents and skills on which studentsdiffer from each other to open differentoptions in high school and postsecondaryeducation.

When dedsions are made to offer studentsa common curriculum in the middle grades,educators need to consider how they also willprovide for the diversity in students' learningrates, learning styles, and the uniqueness ofstudents' interests and talents. When deci-sions are made to individualize regular orremedial instruction, educators must considerwhether they are, in effect, closing students'options for later education and occupationalchoices.

More lime vs, Different Use of Time

A related dilemma is how time is allocatedfor learning. Some students need more time tomaster required or advanced skills. Yet, mostmiddle grades schools set 45-55 minute peri-ods in which all students are required to learnthe lesson and complete their work. Educatorsneed to consider: Do all subjects require thesame time allocations? Do all students needthe same time or varied time to learn? Schoolsneed to consider whether, when, or why tocreate programs that allow students flexibletime to work, and whether, when, or why torequire all students to finish their work ortheir tests in the same amount of time.

A similar problem is raised in regular andremedial classes. If students need extra help,is it scheduled in school during regvlar class

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

time? in school during elective or extra classperiods? or during extended days or othertimes for learning? Are the minutes of aschool day currently arranged to help disad-vantaged students learn their work, applyknowledge, and pass their courses? Or, istime allocated to accommodate successful stu-dents or to accommodate teachers?

More time and extra time are not the onlyanswers for more effective programs for dis-advantaged students in the middle grades.New approaches are needed that make alltime in school more motivating and challeng-ing for all students, whether they are learningsIdlls for the first time or working at skills thatthey missed the first time they were taught.For example, one promising program consid-ers the lack of time as the major cause of stu-dent failure and links new time structureswith new evaluation structures in a no-failgrading process that encourages continuousand successful progress.

In the Fresh Start Minischoola highschool dropout prevention alternative pro-gramstudents are expected to meet highstandards and fulfill requirements in allcourses, but their report card grades are lim-ited to marks of Mastery, Satisfactory, and InProgress. "In Progress" indicates that the stu-dents have not completed a course satisfacto-rily, but that they and their teachers are work-ing on needed skills and requirements. Thesemarks can be translated to A or B for mastery,or C for satisfactory, but no Ds or Fs areawarded. All IPs (incomplete work that is InProgress) must be completed before the stu-dent graduates from the school.

The Fresh Start Minischool is art interestingexperiment that combines no-fail grading withcounseling, home visits and other connectionswith families, extra tutoring, and enrichmentactivities. It is impossible to tell which compo-nents of the program contribute to the appar-ent success of many students in the program.Evaluations show that about 60 percent of thetreatment students had at least one IFP insteadof a failing grade after one year. Course credit,not time, became the main issue. More stu-dents in the program stayed in school and

54

were graduated than did students in a ran-domly assigned control group.

The no-fail grading process revises howstudents perceive their work and their worthas students by providing them with moretime to master required skills. This processmay be even more easily applied in the mid-dle grades than in the high school gradeswhere it originated.

Basic Shills al Advanced Thinking Sidik

Basic skills and advanced skills are part ofa continuum of laiowledge in an education ofhigh content. Promising programs treat basicskills as high content by eliminating rotememorization and empty applications.Promising programs treat advanced thinkingskills as high content as a separate subject oras part of all subjects by including exercises toimprove students' critical and creative think-ing. Advanced sldlls at one time become basicskillsthe basis for ever more advancedwork. Schools must decide who will haveaccess to basic and advanced skills, and howall skills will be taught to help studentsunderstand the importance, application, andextension of what they learn.

High Standards vs. No Retentions

There is strong agreement that schoolsmust set and keep high standards so that stu-dents know they are working toward goalsthat matter. At the same time, there is generalagreement that retaining students to repeat agrade because of failure does little good forstudents' motivation to work, learn, or stay inschool. When students are removed fromtheir cohort of peers and friends, the label of"repeater" or "failure" can be worst than thelabel associated with remedial instruction.

Promising programs aim to reduce or elim-inate the need for students to repeat a gradeby the design and delivery of remedialinstruction. Extra teachers, adult voltuweers,peer tutors, coaching classes before or afterschool, or extra periods of instniction during

Promising Programs

the school day that do not remove studentsfrom their regular classes are among the com-ponents of promising programs. Many evalu-ations must be conducted to learn which ofthese components successfully help preventfailure and retentions.

Promising programs are organized so thatstudents receive help before they fail (to fixbefore they flunk) so that students can accel-erate learning to make up lost ground. Someallow students to make up two years of workin one in order to return to their originalcohort.. Others allow students to repeat onlythe course(s) they failed and not the wholegrade. Still others are designed as true alter-native programs so that if, in the final analy-sis, students must repeat a grade, it is offeredwith different instructional approaches andby different teacher&

Rad kali vs, Visage All Classes1111 Noels at Oace

Leaders at school and district levels debateabout whether an innovative program orpractice should be instituted in a few demon-stration schools or in all schools at the sametime. Most promising programs begin in one

or a few schools under dose supervision. If aprogram do.,s nrit woxic in a selected school,or if it needs to be fine-tuned, tailored, orrevised for particular subgroups of students,it pays to fmd out with pilot or demonstrationcases, before large investments are made inmaterials and staff development for wholeschools or whole districts. Yet, many districtsand schools want all schools or all grade lev-els within a school to adopt new programsand approaches at the same time. Thisassumes that having all teachers and adxninis-trators share a common perspective and com-mon goals will be an advantage. Or, itassumes that some schools, students, families,or teachers will feel shortchanged if they arenot given new resources or programs atexactly the same time as other schools. Or,practical reasons intervene, as when vendorsgive discounts for large districtwide orders ofequipment or materials.

Probably, a mix of pilot projects, school-wide projects, and total district programs isneeded. The default on decisions about newprograms, however, should be to start small,unless clear and convincing evaluations directwidespread adoptions. In time, effectivedemonstrations may become total school ordistrict programs.

CHAPTER THREE

In our search for promising programs,more than 300 were reviewed. More than200 of these were related to the content

areas discussed in this monographmath,reading, writing and language arts, thinkingskills, science, social studies, and comprehen-sive program& Of these, about 80 were foundto have some promising components thatcould be of use to middle grades educators toraise the content of the education of all stu-dents, and particularly of disadvantaged stu-dent& The programs are discussed briefly inthe text and listed in the appendix. Because ofserious weaknesses in evaluations, however,the programs cannot be recommended with-out qualification. Rather, middle grades edu-cators will have to carefully review availableprograms and decide which ones offer ideasand procedures that can be helpful in theirown schools and that meet the needs of theirstudents.

Common Themes

Several themes recur across promising pro-grams for the middle grades that may be par-ticularly important for increasing high contenteducation for disadvantaged students.

All students can learn. This assumptionhas become something of a cliché, but in itsbest meaning this is the basis of all promisingprograms to improve the skills of education-ally disadvantaged students.

Commitment counts. Many promisingprograms require pledges or other sign-up

56

forms from students and, sometimes, fromparents. Students are asked to acknowledgefrom the outset that they will do their part tosucceed in the progam. The formal pledgeofficially assigns students some responsibili-ties for their own learning, just as it assignsschools the responsibility to implement pro-grams well. When parents are asked to signpermissions for their children to enter reme-dial or special programs, they are more likelyto be receptive to messages from the schoolabout their child's progress or needs in theprogram and to provide support at homewhen guided on how to do so.

Selection procedures that require pledgesof commitment may be perceived as stackingthe odds for the program by including onlythose students and families willing to workhard. However, formal commitment may helpstudents focus their attentian on schoolworkA simila tack is taken when teachers in anyclass ask students or parents to design andsign contracts that outline the work studentsmust do to earn a grade of A, B, or C. Evalua-tions should pay attention to components likepledges and permissions to see if they con-tribute to the programs' and students' success.

Pull-out programs are not all bad, butthey are not all good either. There are bene-fits and disadvantages to pull-out programsfor remedial instruction in the middle grades.It is necessary to give students extra helpwhen they fall behind grade level. It also isnecessary to limit the effects of labeling thatoccur when students are singled out for theirweaknesses. This is a dilemma for students

Discussion

who want help but do not want to be identi-fied as "dumb" or "slow." It is a dilemma,too, for schools that want to provide appro-priate instruction for all students but alsowant to limit labeling and maintain orincrease students' self-esteem.

There are promising programs that pullmiddle grades students out of their classes forspecial assistance, or put students in separateclasses, or offer students extra classes forremedial work, but schools need to designthese programs carefully. In the middlegrades, extra planning is needed so that pull-out programs do not disrupt classes and donot negatively label students who receive spe-cial services. Many pull-out programs aredesigned to provide students with extra orunusual resources, materials, and personalattention. In many programs, teachers andsupervisors are trained in ways to motivate,recognize, and wpreciate students who areslower than othen in their rates or styles oflearning. These teachers have clear plans forhelping students move incrementally fromtheir own starting points to grade level mas-tery.

Some pull-out or special assignment pro-grams make membership and participation areward and an honor. Students in these pro-grams are supported by teachers and peersand not ridiculed for their unique needs, arerecognized for their selection in the program,and are informed about the program's goals,the teachers' objectives, and the students'responsibilities. The students are recognizedand rewarded for the progress they make,just as students are in other classes. Whenorganized along these lines, remedial instnic-tion need not be punishment for studentswho need extra help nor for their teachers.Rather, these programs may be the ones thatredirect students who have lost all hope ofsuccess in school.

But warnings must be attached to all pull-out or pull-in programs. A class composed ofstudents at risk for whom extra services aremobilized in new and motivating ways is, forall practical purposes, a pull-out program

57

with students tracked or grouped by ability.Pull-out programs require extra investmentsin staff, instructional materials, and other sup-port to reach the treatment goals, and carefulevaluations must be conducted to determinewhether this is a solution to or petpetuationof the students' learning problems.

Each school is a community of activeleanters in which students, teachers, adnthl-istratots, parents, and others are involved inbuilding new knowledge, important skills,and shared perspectives. Promising pro-grams engage principals, teachers, and stu-dents as active learners, actors, and interac-tors. This description"the school as a com-munity of active leamers"may characterizehigh content programs more than other popu-lar labels such as "teacher-centered" or "stu-dent-centered" schools, or labels that set theprincipal apart as "the instructional leader."

"Teacher-centered" programs that focus onactive teaching emphasize the teacher doingthe job well, covering the curricultim, usingeffective teaching strategies, maximizinginstructional time, and conducting excellentclasses as defined pedagogically in terms ofthe teachers' organization ad use of teachingtime. Programs that stress active teaching orthat tightly organize direct instruction placeless emphasis on how students learn differ-ently and more emphasis on standardizingteaching behaviors.

"Student-centered" programs that focus onactive learning emphasize the students'involvement in learning. The school is respon-sible for providing learning opportunities andschool services that match students' develop-mental characteristics and unique or individ-ual needs. Student-centered programs that toonarrowly match school experiences with stu-dent needs may appear over-solicitous andunchallenging. They may not provide thehigh content and challenging demands thatmotivate students toward maximum growthin learning or commitment to school.

When middle grades principals are definedas the instructional leaders of the school, they

6.7)

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

are expected to know all, including the bestways to teach all subjects, organize class-rooms, budgets, and schedules, discipline stu-dents, interact with families, and other skills.Of course, principals are not experts in allsubjects that are taught in the middle grades.Although principals serve vital leadershiproles, the "instructional leader" model oftennegates the teachers' roles in school and class-room decisions. Schools that overemphasizethe principal as instructional leader not onlylimit teachers to subordinate roles, but alsoavoid involving students and parents as con-tril3utors to school leadership, decisions, andschool improvement efforts.

Programs that build a community of activelearners combine the best aspects of activeteaching, active learning, and principals asleaders (Barth, 1990; Carnegie Task Force onthe Education of Young Adolescents, 1989;Lewis, 1989; Meier, 1989; Monroe, 1989).Teachers in these programs think, learn, con-duct research, and work with other teachersand with students to develop and improvecurricula and learning experiences. Studentsin these programs not only are active learnersand peer teachers, but also observe theirteachers as experts, resources, and adultlearners. Students see their teachers worktogether to solve problems, advance their ownknowledge, and work with students to makelearning exciting and rewarding. Principals inthese programs lead by example. Principals inan active learning community work withteachers, parents, and students to draw onothers' expertise and share personal talentsand wisdom to improve the school programfor all students.

One example of a school working on thisprinciple is Central Park East SecondarySchool, which bases its program on the con-cept of "student as worker" and teachers ascoaches, partners, and participants in learn-ing. The program, which combines severalcomponents of promising programs, demon-strates that inner-city students in publicschools can conduct important learning activi-ties in a caring and challenging environment

58

where teachers work as professionals, prob-lem solvers, and learners.

When educators recommend that all stu-dents should have access to high content andadvanced courses, they are recognizing that inmost schools, students in low-ability classesare offered less interesting and less challeng-ing work than students in high-ability classes.Schools that establish all classrooms as com-munities of active learners provide high inter-est and challenging work for all students andall staff members.

Both prevention and treatment programsare needed in the middle gxades for effectiveprograms for disadvantaged students. Pre-vention of serious learning problems is thefirst and main concern of all programs toimprove schooling for all students. Good pro-grams that help students learn and make con-tinuous progress typically include new andbetter curricula and materials, new instruc-tional approaches and other features of state-of-the-art curricula that emphasize activelearning, many opportunities for students toreceive rewards and recognition of progress,new technologies, extra staff and staff devel-opment, improved student-teacher interac-tions, and other practices. The programs oper-ate on the premise that a good program willtake students in new directions, will not cre-ate new learning problems, and can help stu-dents advance or accelerate learning.

Treatment programs to correct seriouslearning problems provide a safety net forstudents. There will always be a few studentswho, even in excellent programs, fall behinddue to personal, social, organizational, andother difficulties Corrections of serious learn-ing problems require unique and sometimesextreme and innovative approaches to moti-vate students to work on skills that they didnot learn the first time they were taught.

Many programs respond with diagnostic,individualized programs to help prevent stu-dents from failing courses, repeating grades,or dropping out of school. Treatment pro-grams need extra staff, responsive technolo-

Discussion

gies, varied materials, and resources to indi-vidualize instruction, such as computer-assisted instruction and other approaches thatallow students to move quickly throughsequences of skills at their own pace.

Promising treatment programs for educa-tionally disadvantaged students aim to helpstudents catch up to their peers withouttotally separating them psychologically orsocially from the rest of their classmates.Promising treatment programs establish asocial organization of remediation (Epstein,1988) to accompany the academic organiza-tion of remedial instruction. The social organi-zation of remediation builds into remedialinstruction not only the academic content of alesson, but also a social support system fromteachers, peers, and parents that makes itacceptable to seek and to receive remedialinstruction and to respond with hard work. Itis something of a trick to provide intensive"treatment" in ways that raise students' self-esteem and expectations for themselves. Amedical analogy makes the point: treatmentfor serious medical problems requires notonly the medicine (the equivalent academiccontent) but also the personal commitmentand social and psychological support to seethe treatment through.

Promising programs evaluate whetherthey reach the goals they set. This projectoriginated as a search for "effective" pro-grams, but because of the low quality of eval-uation designs and data, was downgraded toa search for "promising" programs. Many sec-tions of this monograph discuss how toimprove the quality of program evaluationsso Lhat the efforts and investments in imple-me Itations yield good information for judg-ing whether and how a program is successfulin helping disadvantaged students succeed inschool. Currently, most programs cannotknow whether or not they are reaching thegoals they set. Nor can other potential usersknow whether, how, or for whom one pro-gram is better than another.

Lipsitz (1984) calls for "order and joy" in

59

balanced middle grades programs that chal-lenge and support students. Many schools setmultiple goals for students, includingachievements, attitudes, self-esteem, andother outcomes that indicate success as a stu-dent and as an early adolescent. If goals areset, it is necessary to determine if goals arereached. Evaluations may use many differentmethods--quantitative and qualitative. Stan-dardized and criterion-based tests helpschools monitor and compare studentachievements. Other evaluations are neededthat allow students to demonstrate theirknowledge. Surveys, interviews, and observa-tions help schools assess student attitudes,self-esteem, and other affective responses.

There is no shortage of new ideas for andfrom teachers for improving middle gradeseducation, but without clear documentationand systematic evaluations, one bright idea isas appealing and se2mingly valid as the next.Only with better evaluation information in thefuture will educators be able to purposefullychoose among programs to meet the needs ofthe students in their schools.

ConclusionThere will never be a magic trick or quick

fix that guarantees successful programs for allmiddle grades schools or for all early adoles-cent students. Educators must be alert for newprograms that could help them developschool and classroom environments that chal-lenge and support all students.

It is the art of teaching, the art of leader-ship, and the art of teamwork of teachers,principals, other educators, parents, students,and others in the school community thatdetermine whether and how changes aremade to increase the content and quality ofeducation for all students. There is no substi-tute for the hard work needed to locate,review, select, adapt, create, implement, andevaluate new practices and approaches thatwill meet the needs of particular schools andstudents.

f

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

This monograph offers ideas, issues, andexamples of promising programs in the mid-dle grades that can be adopted or adapted inany school. By adding new and more equitableaccess to existing high content, or by addingnew content to the curriculum for all students,educators can change and improve whichstudents have the opportunity to learn, whatstudents learn, how students learn, howteachers teach, and how they organize andmanage instruction and classroom life. High

60

content education is the ultimate equalizer inthe education of economically and education-ally advantaged and disadvantaged students.If all students can learn, then all deserve thetypes of learning opportunities that makeschool important, challenging, joyful, moti-vating, and fair. In middle grades schoolsthat offer high content education, studentshave the chance to participate, learn, succeed,and plan ahead.

G s

),

REFERENCESAdams, M. J. "Thinidng Skills Curricula:

Their Promise and Progress." EducationalPsychologist 1(1989): 25.-77.

Apple, M. W. "Is There a Curriculum VoiceTo Reclaim?" Phi Delta Kappan 7(1990): 526-30.

Alter, J. A., and Salmon, J. R. Assessing HigherOnier Thinking Skills: A Consumer's Guide.Portland, Oreg.: Northwest Regional EducationalLaboratory, 1987.

Barth, R. S. "A Personal Vision of a Grade School."Phi Delta Kappan 7(1990): 512-16.

Becker, H. J. "Curriculum and Instruction inIvaddle Grade Schools." Phi Delta lappan7(1990): 450-57.

Brandt, R. "On Parents and Schools A Conversa-tion with Joyce Epstein." Educational Leadership2(1989): 24-77.

California State Department of Educatical. Caughtin the AC fducational Reform for Young

Cahfornia Public Sdwols.Sacramel The Superintendent's 1Vfiddle GradeTasic Force, 1987.

Carnegie Task Force on the Education of YoungAdolescents. Turning Points: Preparing Ameri-can Youth for the 21st Century. New YorkCarnegie Corp., 1989.

Carter, L F. "The Sustaining Effects Study ofCompensatory and Elementary Education."Educational Researcher 13(1984): 4-13.

Center for Teaching International Relations.C.T.LR. PRESS. Denver,Colo.: University of DenverGraduate School of International Relations, 1987.

Comer, J. P. School Power New York: Free Press, 198(1

Costa, A. L Developing Minds: A Resource Bookfor Teaching Thinking. Alexandria, Va.:Association for Supervision and CurriculumDevelopment, 1985.

61

Cotton, K. J.; Griswald, lvt. M.; and Estes, G. D.Effective Compensatory Education Sourcebook.Volume IV. Washington D.C: U.S. Department ofEducation, Office of Compensatory EducationPrograms, 1988.

Daniels, H., and Zemelman, S. A. Writing Project:Training Teachers of Composition, Kindergarten toCollege. Portsmouth, N.H.: Heinemann, 1985.

Dauber, S. L, and Epstein, J. L "Parents' Attitudesand Practices af Involvement in Inner-CityElementary and Ividdle Schools." In MinorityParent Involvement in Education, edited byN. Chavldn. Albany, N.Y.: SUNY Press, in press.

Davidson, J., and Koppenhaver, D. AdolescentLiteracy: What Works and Why. New York:Garland Publishing, Inc., 1988.

Dorman, G. Middle Grades Assessment Pmgram.Carrboro, N.C.: Center for Early Adolescence, 1984.

Dunn, IL; Dunn, K.; and Price, G. E. Learning StyleInventory (LSI): An Inventory for the Identcation ofHow Individuals in Grades 3 Through 12 Prefer ToLearn. Lawrence, Kans.: Price Systems, Inc., 1989.

Earle, J. The Steps to Restructuring: ClangingSeattle's Middle Schools. Alexandria, Va.:National Association of State Boards ofEducation (NASBE), 1990.

Epstein, J. L "Effects on Student Achievement ofTeachers' Practices of Parent Involvement" InLiterary Through Family, Community, and SchoolInteraction, edited by S. Silvern. Greenwich, Conn.:JAI Press, 1991.

"Parents' Reactions to Teacher Practices ofParent Involvement." The Elementary SchoolJournal 86(1986): 277-94.

. "What Principals Should Know AboutParent Involvement" Principal 3(1987): 6-9.

. "Effective Schools or Effective Students:Dealing with Diversity." In Policies for America's

6', 4

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Public Schools, edited by R. Haskins and D.MacRae. Norwood, N. J.: AbleK, 1988.

Epstein, J. L, and Daubex, S. L "Teachers' Atti-tudes and Practices of Parent Involvement inInner-City Elementary and Middle Schools."The Ekmentary School Journal, January 1991,pp. 289-303.

Epstein, J.L., and Herrick, S.C. "Improving Schooland Family Partnerships in the Middle Grades:Evaluations of Orientation Days and SchoolNewsletters," and "Implementation and Effects ofSummer Home Learning Packets in the NfiddleGrades." (CDS Reports 20 and 21) Baltimore, Md.:The Johns Hopkins University Center forResearch on Effective Schooling for Disadvan-taged Students, 1991.

Epstein, J. L, and Mac Iver, D. J. Education in theMiddle &odes: National Practices and Trends.Columbus, Ohio: National Middle SchoolAssodafion, 1990.

. "The /vliddle Grades: Is Grade Span theImportant Issue?" Educational Horizons 2(1990)-8841

. " Opportunities To Learn: Effects on EighthGraders of Curriculum Offerings and Instruc-tional Approaches." Paper presented at theannual meeting of the American EducationalResearch Association, Chicago, LI, April 1991.

Epstein, J. L.; Dockard, B. L; and Dauber, S. L.'Staff Development in Middle School Education."Journal of Staff Development 12(1991): 36-41.

Hawkins, M. L, and Marshall, J. C. EvaluatingWriting Grades 3-12. Florissant, Mo.: Ferguson-Florissant School District, 1981.

Joint Council on Economic Education. JointCouncil on Economic Education Catalog. New York:Joint Council on Economic Education, 1989.

Keating, D. P. Adolescents' Ability To Engage inCritical Thinking. Madison, Wis.: NationalCenter on Effective Secondary Schools, 1988.

Kenned , M. M.; Birman, B. F.; and Demaline, R E.The E veness of Chapter I Services. Washington,D.C.: U.S. Department of Education, 1986.

62

Lewis, A. 1-ligh Content Digging Deep" and"Question the Content" High Strides 2(1989): 1-2.

Lieberman A. "Navigating the Four C'sBuilding a Bridge Over Troubled Waters."Phi Delta Kappan 7(1990): 526-30.

Lipsitz J. Growing Up Forgotten. New Brunswick,N.J.: Transaction Books, Inc., 1980.

. Successful Schools for Young Adolescents.New Brunswick, N.J.: Transaction, Inc., 1984.

Mac Iver, D. Altering Evaluations, &wank, andRecognitions To Better Motivute Young Adolescents:The Incentives for Improvement Prognyns.Baltimore, Md.: The Johns Hopkins UniversityCenter for Research on Effective Schooling forDisadvantaged Students, 1990.

. "Helping Students Who Fall Behind:Remedial Activities in the Nfiddle Grades."Paper presented at the annual meeting of theAmerican Educational Research Association,Chicago, ILL, Apri11991.

Mac Iver, D. J., and Epstein, J. L "ResponsiveEducation in the Middle Grades: Teacher Teams,Advisory Groups, Remedial Instruction, andSchool Transition Programs." American Journalof Education.

Maryland State Department of Education.What Matters in the Middle Grades:Recommendations for Maryland Middle GradesEducation. Annapolis, Md.: The Maryland TaskForce on the IsEddle Learning Years, 1990.

McFartland, J., and Nettles, S. lvL The Evaluation ofTouchstones: Final Report. Baltimore, Md.: TheJohns Hopkins University Centex for the SocialOrganization of Schools, 1990.

Monroe, L. "Confirm Them as Leaden."High Strida 1(1989): 3.

Moses, R.P.; Kamii, M.; Swap, S.M.; and Howard, J."The Algebra Project Organizing the Spirit ofElla. 'Harvard Educational Review59(1989): 423-43.

National Dissemination Study Group. EducationPrograms That Work. Longmont, Colo.:Sopris West, 1988.

7,

References

Open Court Reading and Mathematics. Chicago:Open Court, 1990.

Paul, R.; Binker, A. J. A.; Martin, D.; Vetrano, C.;and Kreldau, H. Critical Thinking Handbook6th-9th Grades. A Guide for Remodelling LemonPlans in Language Arts, Sxial Studies and Science.Rohnert Park, Calif.: Center for Critical Thinkingand Moral Critiqu, 1989.

Pogrow, S. "A Socratic Approach to UsingComputers with At-Risk Students."Educational Leadership, February 1990, pp. 61-66.

Presseism, B. Z. At-Risk Students and Thinking:

63

Perspectives from Research. Washington, D.C.:National Education Association and Researchfor Better Schools, 1988.

Stringfield, S., and Davis, A. "AlternativeAchievement Outcome Models Against Datafor Exemplary Chapter 1 Programs."Paper presented at the annual meeting of theAmerican Educational Res Larch A&sociation,Washington, D.C., Apri11987.

Wmfield, L F. "Do Chapter 1 PiogramsPromote Educational Equity? A Reviewand Some Comments." Journal of EducatioiwlEquity and Leadership, Spring 1986, pp. 61-71.

APPENDIX A:DIRECTORY OF PROMISING PROGRAMS

This appendix is a diredary of the promis-ing programs mentioned in the text. Wemust reiterate that at the time the review

was conducted, few of the programs had beenadequately evaluated. This means that educa-tors must review the descriptions, procedures,materials, and available evaluations of theseprograms with some skepticism, and with aneye to what might help their own schools reachimportant goals.

Three changes may be pertinent to readers:Since this review was completed, some pro-

grams may have been formally evaluated. Newand better information may be available fromthese program&

Some names and addresses in this directory

65

may have changed since 1989. Indeed, someprograms may no longer be operating and infor-mation about them may not be available.

Some programs were missed in this review,and new programs have been and will continueto be designed. They should be examined withthe same caution and hope as the programsdescribed in this monograph.

Most programs And n, _2rials will have to beadapted, rather than adopted outright. This sug-gests that school-based and school district-basedprocesses are needed to review promising pro-grams, to select or design programs, to a.ganizeand amduct staff development, and to imple-ment and evaluate program&

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Math: Promising Programs for the Middle Grades

PEW= Nag Coated sr Wen=

The Algebra Project Martin Luther King Jr. School100 Putnam Ave.Cambridge, Mass. 02139(617) 498-9262

6 - 8

1

Calculator Assisted Miith.zmatics for EverydayLiving (CAMEL)

Carolyn WilliamsThe School Board of

Vohiela CountyP.O. Box 1910Daytona Beach, Fla. 32015(904) 328-8811

9 - 10 PEP Yes

Chapter 1 Mathematics Improvement Program Annette King, CocrdinatiarAkron Public SchoolsSouth Education Center1055 East Ave.Akron, Ohio 44307

2 - 6 Chapl Yes

Chapter 1 Mathematics Project Constznce Pace,Curriculum Coordinator

School District of the Cityof Niagara Palls

Administration Building607 Walnut Ave.Niagara Falls, N.Y. 14301(716) 286-4246

-K - 8 Chapl

Chapter 1 Reading and Mathematics Veola Hymes, CoordinatorMuscogee County

School District1830 Shepherd Dr.Co hunbus, Ga. 31906(404) 322-2999

2 - 10 Chapl Yes

Classmate 88 Janice M. PutzChapter 1 DirectorSouth Bend Community

School Corp.635 S. Main St.South Bend, Ind. 46601(219) 282-4181

4 - 6 PEP Yes

Comprehensive SchoolMathematics Program (CSMP)

Clare Heidema, DirectorMid-Continent Regional

Educational Lab.12500 E. Iliff Ave.Suite 201Aurora, Colo. 80014

K 6 PEP

Appendix A

Conceptually OrientedMathematics Program (COMP)

Lynne Hall, Assistant Director161 E. First StMesa, Ariz. 85201(602) 969.4880

K - 8 PEP

The .-,:.A..: M a t h e m a t i c s Curriculum J o s t e n s L e a r n i n g C o r p.

6170 Cornerstone Court L.:.San Diego, Calif. 92121-3710(619) 587-0087

1 - 8

I n d i v i d u a l i z e d P r e s c r i p t i veArithmetic Skills System (IPASS)

R o b e r t R e y n o l d s, D i r e c t o r

Pawtucket School LieptEdward J. Creamer BuildingPark PlacePawtucket, RI. 02860(401) 728-2120

1 - 8 PEP Yes

Math Modvational Centers (M2C) Carolyn Rosenfeld orRaymond Senes

Norwalk Board of Education105 Main St.Norwalk, Corm 06825(203) 847-0481

9 PEP

Mathematics Achievement Program (MAP) John WilliamsMath Program ManagerParry BuildingNinth and Fulton StreetsOiester, Pa. 19013(215) 447-3860

2 - 5 PEP Yes

Middle Grades Mathematics Project William FitzgeraldMathematics Dept.Nfichigan State UniversityEast Lansing, Mich. 48824

6 - 8

O p e r a don Uplift Joseph H. KyleRoanoke County Schools526 College Ave.Salem, Va. 24153(703) 387-6422

1 - 6 Chapi Yes

Systematic Teaching andMeasuring Mathematics (STAMM)

Sherry Srumbacgh, DirectorProject STAMM1005 Wadsworth Ihyd.Lakewood, Colo. 80215(303) 231-2381

K - 12 PEP

Teaching Everyone About Math (T.E.A.M.) H. Dean EvansIndiana Dept. of EducationRoom 229, State HouseIndianapolis, Ind. 46204-2798(317) 232-6667

6 Chapi Yes

67

Promising Programs In the Middle Grades

eam Accelerated Instruction (TAI) Team Learning Project 3 - 6The Joh* Hopkins University3505 N. Charles St.Baltimore, Md. 21218(410) 516.0370

Traner Kiddie School Chapter 1 Lab Nancy Hall 7 - 8 Chapi YesCturiculum SpecialistWashoe County School District600 Apple StReno, Nev. 89302(702) 826-7466

68

0

Appendix A

Reading: Promising Programs for the Middle Grades

Wad sr RemoAndover's Integrated Reading System (AERS) Theresa Murphy

Executive DirectorAndover Public SchoolsBart let StAndover, Mass. 01810(617) 470-3800

1 - 8 PEP

Books and Beyond Ellie Topolovac, CoordinatorBooks and Beyond Project309 N. RiosSolana Beach, Calif. 92075(619) 7554000

PreK-

PEP

Chapter 1 Reading Charles A. WeberPrincipal/Chapter 1

CoordinatorNeshaminy School District2001 Old Lincoln HighwayLanghorne, Pa. 19047-3295

2 - 6 Chapi Yes

Chapter 1 R e a d i n g a n d Mathematics P r o g r a m R o s e ChatmanDayton Public SchoolsRoosevelt Center2013 W. Third St.Dayton, Ohio 45417-2597

1 - 9 Chapi Yes

Chapter 1 Remedial Reading.We Can Help Them Read

Nancy HaleAssistant SuperintendentU.S.D. #290Ottawa Public Schools420 S. Main StOttawa, Kans. 66067

6 Chapl Yes

Content Reading IncludingStudy Systems (CRISS)

Carol Santa or Lynn HavensSchool District #5233 First Ave., EastKalispell, Mont. 59901(406) 755-5015

10 - 12 PEP

Cooperative Integrated Readingand Composition (CRC)

Team Learning ProjectThe johns Hopkins University3505 N. Charles St.Baltimore, Md. 21218(410) 516-0370

2 - 6

Cranston's Comprehensive Reading Program Roberta CostaProject CoordinatorDepartment of Reading Servicei845 Park Ave.Cranston, RI. 02910(401) 785-0400

K - 12 PEP

69

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Discoveries in Reading Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, IncNational Customer

Service CenterDowden Rd.Orlando, Fla. 328871-800-CALL-Mg

6 - 10 Yes

ESL Supplemental Program fcr LimitedEnglish Proficient Students

Diane M. KlotzNew Landon Public Schools134 Williams St.New London, Conn. 06320(203) 447-1435

K - 6 Chapl Yes

The Friendly Place In: Ltkivirison, J, andKoppenhaver, D.Adolescent Literacy: WhatWorks and Why. New York:Garland Publishing, Inc., 1988

Allages

Yes

FUTUREPRINT Charlotte LarsonPniect DirectorDeAnza Reading Center1450 S. Sultana Ave.Ontario, Calif. 91761(714) 983-2118

7 - 8 PEP

HOSTS Reading:Helping One Student To Succeed

HOSTS Corp.1801 D St., Suite 2Vancouver, Wash. 98663-3332

K - 12 PEP Yes

Individualized Prescriptive InstructionalManagement System (IPIMS)

George Criss),PEP Trainer - inms Project27 N. Cayuga St.Union Springs, N.Y. 13160(315) 252-9309

7 - 12 PEP Yes

Individualized-Diagnostic-Prescriptive Learning Lab

Bertrand Antoine, Jr.Greenwood Public SchoolsP.O. Box 1497Greenwood, Wyss. 38930(601) 453-4231

3 - 6 Chapl Yes

The Literature ProjectReading for Real Marilyn Watson orLynn Murphy

Developmental Studies Center111 Deexwood PlaceSuite 165San Ramos, Calif. 94583(415) 838-7633

PEGASUS-PACE Peggy Collins, Project DirectorTuscaloosa Cty

Board of Education1100 21st St., EastTuscaloosa, Ala. 35405(205) 759-3511

K - 8 PEP

70

7 7

Appendix A

Project Leaderprint Bruce WellenkampOntario Montclair

School DistrictOntario, Calif. 91764(714) 983-9501

7 - 8

Project R-3 Pauline E. Peru=Project DirectorHerbert Hoover Middle School1635 Park Ave.San Jose, Calif. 95126(408) 287-1111

7 - 8 PET

Read L-ig Education AccountabilityDesign: Secondary (READS)

Lynn DennisDirector Project READSCouer d'Alene Public Schools311 N. 10th StCoeur d'Aiene, Idaho 83814(208) 664-8241

7 - 12 PEP

Reading, Thinking, and Concept Development Eric CooperIn-Service Training and

Telecommunications250 James St.Morristown, N.J. 07960-1918(201) 285-7758 or 285-7700

6 - 10

Structured Teaching in theArea of Reading (STAR)

Camille AromandoDirector of Communication Arts319 E. 117th St.New York, N.Y. 10035(212) 860-5858

2 - 9 Chapl Yes

Teaching Reading and InterestingNew Stories (TRANS)

Patricia LeavensGreylock SchoolPhelps Ave.North Adams, Mass. 01247(413) 664-6568

6 8 Chapl Yes

Washington Middle SchoolReading Intervenfion Program

Donna JanovitchYakima Public Schools104 N. 4th Ave.Yakima, Wash. 98902(509) 575-3230

6 - 8 Chapl Yes

Waukegan Reading Project Fran McMullenChap.er 1 CoordinatorWaukegan Public SchoolsLincoln Center for

Educational Services1201 N. Sheridan Rd.Waukegan, Ill.. 60085

2 - 8 Chapl Yes

71

s

Promising Programs In it* Middle Grades

Wilkes County Chapter 1 Project Wayne Baker, Director 2 - 8 Chapl Yes

Wilkes County Schools201 W. Main St.Wilkesboro, N.C. 28697(919) 667-1121

72

7;f

Appendix A

Writing and Language Arts:Promising Programs for the Middle Gr ides

Program Name Contact or Reference I ii iElementary Language A r t sTeam Effort (ELATE)

C e c i li a Rinaldi

Chapter 1 DirectorBemalino Public SchoolsP.O. Box 640Bemalillo, N. Mex. 87004

2 - 6 Chapl Yes

The ESC Writing Program Jostens Learning Corp.6170 Cornerstone Court E.San Diego, Calif. 92121-3710(619) 587-0087

4 andup

Ferguson-Florissant Writers Project Mary Ann EvansProject DirectorAdministration Center1005 Waterford Dr.Florissant, Mo. 63033(314) 631-4411

3 - 12 PEP

Folger Library Shakespeare Festivals Judy Kelsey or Peggy O'BrienShakespeare FestivalsFolger Shakespeare Library201 E. Capitol St., SEWashington, D.C. 20003

4 - 12 PEP

Individualized Language Arts Jeanette Alder, Project DirectorWeehawken Fligh SchoolLiberty PlaceWeehawken, N.J. 07087(201) 865-1506

1

Col.PEP

Language Development Magnet School forSecondary Recent Immigrant Students

Eva Pena-HughesMcAllen Independent

School District2000 N. 23rd St.McAllen, Tex. 78501

Jr. &Sr.

High

Chapl Yes

The Profile Approach to Writing V. Faye Hartfiel1701 Southeast ParkwaySuite 99College Station, Tex. 77840(409) 764-9765

3 12 PEP

Project Write Virginia StewartChapter 1 Regional

Department HeadDennis-Yarmouth

Regional School District296 Station Ave.South Yarmouth, Mass. 02664

6 - 8 Yes

73

L

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Reading English Rotation Project Marcelyn Hobbs, PresidentEducational Improvement Corp.P.O. Box 475Thomson, Ga. 30824(404) 595-7339

6 - 12 PEP Yes

Teachers Involve Parents In Schoolwork (I1PS)Interactive Homework in Language Artsand Science/Health

Joyce L EpsteinCenter on Families, Communities,Schools, and Children's LearningThe Johns Hopkins University3505 N. Charles StBaltimore, Md 21218(410) 516-0370

..

Ivfid.Grd.

Yes

Thinking To Write Link, F.R., and Almquist, S.Thinking to Write.Washington, D.C.:Curriculum DevelopmentAssociates, Inc., 1987

9 toAdult

Writing Is Thorough andEfficient (WR.LT.&E.)

Walter J. Vail, Project DirectorGlassboro Public SchoolsNorth Delsea Dr.Glassboro, N.J. 08028(609) 881-2290

. ...

K - 12 PEP

74

Appendix A *

Thinking Skills: Promising Programs for the Middle Grades

Prop= Nante Wad er Raftnentle

Cognitive Research Trust (CoRT) de Bono, E.,"The Direct Teaching ofThinldng as a Skil,"Pni Delta Kappan,June 1983, pp.703-08

Mid.Grd.

Higher Order Thinking Skills Project (HOTS) Stanley PogrowUniversity of ArizonaCollege of EducationTucson, Ariz. 85721(602) 621-1305

3 - 7

Improve Minimal Proficiencies byActivating Critical Thinking (IMPACT)

Phi Delta KappanEighth & Union StreetsBox 789Bloomington, Ind. 47402-0789(812) 339-1156

7 - 9 PEP

Institute for Creative Education Verne Kelly, DirectorERIC700 Hollydell CourtSewell, N.J. 08080(609) 582-7000

4 - 6 PEP

Philosophy for Children Institute for the Advancementof Philosophy for Children

Montclair State CollegeUpper Montclair, N.J. 07013(201) 893-4277

K - 12 PEP

Sfructure of Intellect (501) Meeker, M.The SOI: Its Uses andInterpretations. Columbus,Ohio: Charles Merrill, 1969

1 12

The Touchstones Project C2N1 Associates6 N. Cherty Grove Ave.Annapolis, Md. 21401(301) 263-2121

Nfld.Grd.

75

S 2

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Science: Promising Programs for the Middle Grades

Program Nom Contact or Reforms

The ESC Explorations inMiddle School Science

Jostens Learning Corp.6170 Cornerstone Court E.San Diego, Calif. 92121-3710(619) 587-0087

Mid.Grd.

Foundational Approaches in ScienceTeaching (FAST)

Donald YoungUnivPrsity of Hawaii1776 University Ave.Honolulu, Hawaii 96822(808) 948-7863

6 - 10 PE'

Informal Science Study Kelly JonesUniversity of HoustonRoom 450, Parish HallHouston, Tex. 77004(713) 749-1692

5 - 12 PEP

Marine Science Project FOR SEA James Kalb, Project DirectorMarine Science Center17771 Fjord Drive, NEPoulsbo, Wash. 98370(206) 779-5549

1 12 PEP

The Middle Grades Himian BiologyCurriculum Project

Lorraine MorganProgram in Human BiologyBuilding 80Stanford, Calif. 94305-2160(415) 723-3693

Mid.Grd.

Survival Strategies Don LisowyDirector, Project W.I.Z.E.New York Zoological SocietyBronx, N.Y. 10460(212) 220-5100

7 1 PEP

76 53

Appendbc A

Social Studies: Promising Programs for the Middle Grades

Contact in Worms

The Civic Achievement Award Program(CAAP)

Close Up Foundation1235 Jefferson Davis HighwayArlington, Va. 22202(703) 892-5400

5 - 8

Facing History and Ourselves:Holocaust and Human Behavior

Betsy CohenFacing History and Ourselves

National Foundation25 Kennard Rd.Brookline, Mass. 02146(617) 232-1595

Mid.pd. -adult

PET'

law in a Changing Society (LCS) Law Focused Education, IncP.O. Box 12487Austin, Tex. 78711(512) 463-1388

4 & 5 PEP

Respecting Ethnic andCultural Heritage (REACH)

Bettie Sing LukeProject REACHProgram DirectorREACH Center239 N. McLeodArlington, Wash. 98223

7 - 8 PEP

Teachers Involve Parents in Schoolwork (TIPS)Social Studies and Art

Joyce L Epsteinor Karen Salinas

Center on Families, Communities,Schools, and Children's Learning

The Johns Hopkins University3505 N. Charles St.Baltimore, Md 21218(410) 5160370

Mid.Grd.

Yes

77

4

Promising Programs in the Middle Grades

Promising Programs That Combine Components

Program Name Coast If kftweine

Central Park East Secondary School Central Pak EastSecondary School1573 Madison Ave.New York, NLY. 10029(212) 860-5874, or 860-8935

7 - 12

4 S u c c e s s C o n n i e A b e l

alow Low Unified SchoolDistrict #10

500 W Old Linden Rd.Shaw Low, Ariz. 85901(602) 537-2682

1 - 5 Yes

Fresh Start MMischool McBeath, M. et al., DropoutF revention: The Nameof the Gone is Success.Symposium Papers.Symposium papers presented atthe Annual Convention of theAmerican Personnel andGuidance Association,March 1983

10 Yes

Project Promise John ShieldsJames P. Thnilty Middle School205 Roxbury StRoxbury, Mass. 02119(617) 445-3114

6 - 8

Summer Training and Education Program(STEP)

Sipe, CL; Grossman,j.B.; and Millner, J.A.Summer Training andEduonion Program (STEP):Report on the 1986 Experience.Philadelphia: Public/PrivateVentures, Aprill987

14 or15 yrs.

old

Yes

7 8

55

APPENDIX BSURVEY AND DISCUSSION GUIDE

Reaching High-C: High Content in the Middle Grades(A Self-Assessment Inventory for Impmving Academic Subjects in the Middle Grates)

Joyce L. EpsteinThe Johns Hopkins University

Tkil*.= questionnaire was designed forschool improvement committees,teams ,lf teachers, administrators,

and others welling to increase high content inthe middle grades. Each section of the surveyraises questions about topics that are coveredin the monograph, Promising Prognzms in theMiddle Grades. in addition to serving as a for-mal survey, the questions should encouragediscussions and debates about important top-ics for middle grades improvement

The questions about one school may bechanged to focus on a group of schools or atotal district The format or length of ques-tions may be revised Some sections may bediscussed by the whole staff, other sections byteams of teachers, grade level colleagues, ordepartments. Questions may be changed,omitted, or added to reflect issues and con-cerns of particular schools or districts. Extrapaper for writing full answers may be needed.

79

There are no "right" answers to these ques-tions. Rather, good discussions about schoolgoals and the present strengths and weak-nesses of programs should help teachers andadministrators begin to work together toincrease the quality of the content of educa-tion for all students in the middle grades.

Discussion Topics:Content

"Disadvantage"Components of Promising ProgramsPromising Math ProgramsPromising Reading / LanguageArts ProgramsPromising Thinking Skills ProgramsPremising Science ProgramsPromising Social Studies ProgramsConflicting Components of PromisingPrograms

X. Common Themes of PromisingPrograms

I. HIGH CONTENT (use with pages 1-4)

New Access NOW MANY SIVIENIS?

ALL MOST SOME FEW IMU100% 60-90% 30-50% 10-20% 0%

1. How many students currently experience highcontent education in all subjects?

2. How many students would benefit fromhigh content education in all subjects?

How many students need to be Oven "new access"io the high content that already exists in textsand materials in their acadmk subjects?

4. How many students have opportunities to choosehigh Prestige, highly motivating courses?

5. How many students require new or differentinstructional approaches, new texts, or othermaterials in or&er to master high content?

6. How many students in grades 7 or 8 takA full year of ALGEBRAA course in READING separate from butconcurrent with a course m EnglishTwo full yoms of SCIENCEA full year of a FOREIGN LANGUAGE(equivalent to a high school course)Thirty or more class petiods (e.g., 2 daysa week for 15 weekg of:

ARTCOMPUTERS

MINI COURSES

Other high content course you offer:(descrle)

7. How many students have these experiences ona DAILY or WEEKLY basis:

Write an essay, report, poem, or other original workEdit, rewrite, and resubmit written workConduct creative problem solving in mathConduct hands-on laboratory work in scienceDiscuss controversial issues and debate ideasin social studiesConduct group projectsReflect on and discuss profound questionsIdentify and analyze cause and effectDiscuss their understanding of others'views that differ from their own

80

57

S. Which course or unit of work in your school provides unusually high content to all students?How does it do so?

9. How well are your available texts and supplementary materials being used to provide high levelchallenges and active learning opportunities to all studentl'

10. What other questions do you want to discuss about providing all students with "new access" tothe high content that already exists in your curricula?

New Content

11. What high content courses, topics, skills, or opportunities are missing from your middle gradescurriculum for all students?

12. Who decides which students will take pre-algebra, algebra, foreign language, computer key-boarding, Shakespeare, or other advanced or high school equivalent courses that you offer? Whatcriteria are used in these decisions?

13. What are the results of your policies of assignment or selection to high content courses or classes?

81

14. How do you define "active learning?"

15. How, where, and bow often are all students given opportunities to actively apply and demon-strate their knowledge in each subject?

16. How do you monitor or measure students' interest, motivation, and active participation?

17. How "interdisciplinary" is your curriculum, and in what ways?

18. How equitable in content and quality :5 yotu middle grades program for all students?

19. Describe one important thing that you and your colleagues could do to increase the number ofstudents who are challenged at high levels in all subjects?

20. What other questions do you want to discuss about selecting or providing "new content" inyour curriculum?

82

11. DEFINING IMSADVANTAGED" (use with pages 44)

1. How do you identify students who need help to pass required skills, tests, and courses?

Meats Who Need...A lot of help?

Some help?

A little help?

Hew hisedlisd? liew/When Assisted?

2. In which subjects are the most innovative instructional practices used with students who atvslower learners or behind in grade level?

3. What forms of "educational triage" do you practice to match students' needs with available

resources and services?

4. How much Chapter 1 funding is assigned for middle grades students in your school and howare these funds allocated?

5. What other federal, state, and local funds are available to improve the content of the middle

grades curriculum for all students?

6. Can students who fail one course, or two or more courses make up the work without repeating agrade? Describe your retention policies and their effects on students' success and progress.

7. What other questions do you want to discuss about identifying students who need help or offer-

ing slower students highly motivating instruction?

83

M. COMPONENTS OF PROMISING PROGRAMS(use with pages 644)

How would you rate your school on these components of promising programs? Discuss theimprovements that could be made. Use extra paper to expand your ideas if you wish.

How does your school rate on these criteria?BMILENT ION FM POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

1. Coordination of auricula of reg,ular classeswith supplementary or pull-out classesWhat could be improved?

2 Time for remedial instruction so thatstudents do not lose time in regular classes -^What could be improved?

3. Innovative Chapter 1 or other remedialinstruction for all students who need extra helpWhat could be improved?

4. Individualized instruction for students onskills needed to pass a test, course, or gradeWhat could be improved?

4..e.

5. Efficient and comprehensive managementsystems to help teachers:

Organize instructionIdentify students' skills and needsProvide the needed instructionMonitor and assess student progress

What could be improved?

6. Clear reports on the progress of subgroupsof students, e.g., by gracle, sex, race,ethnicity, and s ',Wiling skills

What could be improved?

7. Groups with temporary memberships,floolde group assignments

What could be improved?

8. Instrucaon using a variety of approachesthat emphasize visual, auditory, andmanipulable materials

What could be improved?

84

EXIIIIRIT ROOD FAIR POOR DOEs

A MODEL NED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

9. Instruction that varies for students who donot master skills or concepts the first time

What could be improved?

10. Tc.t.- anL dter evaluations that clearlymeasure the goals of the curricula

What could be improved?

11. Involving all families in students' education with:Workshops on parenting skillsInformation on middle grades programs

and requirementshdormation on how students can work to

improve report card gradesConferences that help parents understand

how to help their own children at homeGuidance on how to monitor homeworkDirections for interactive homeworkOther links of families with student learning

(descrIe)What could be improved?

12. Student responsibility for their own learning

What could be improved?

13. Opportunities for active learaintsaliparticipation by all students in all

What could be improved?

14. Extra staff and resources to provideextra help to students who need itWhat could be improved?

15. Useful staff development activities andopportunities for the staff to develop programWhat could be improved?

15. Teacher and administrator committees thatcollect and discuss ideas for schoolimprovement and curricular reform

What could be improved?

17. District support for and commitment toschool improvement

What could be improved?

resent ractice

18. How many students each yearPail one course?Pail two courses?Pail three or more courses?Repeat the grade?Succeed after they repeat?

19. How many families know:How to talk about school with

their early adolescents?How to monitor homework?How to interact on homework?How to enrich learning with home

experiences?How to influence or assist with their

children's cou -se choices?

NIUE I BM 7 IMAIE

(fts colurms to match the grades In your school)

ryo

cyo

20. Describe your most successful academic program or unit that includes one or more of the com-ponents of promising programs to ensure high content education for all students. List the molgtimportant aspects of this program, and discuss how students participate, learn, and are evaluated.

21. How might this program be applied to other subjects or topics, or changed to includemore students?

22. WhAt school improvement processes committees, teams, courses of action do you use tomake decisions about goals and objectives, new curricula, and other new directions? How wouldyou improve these processes in the next two years?

FOR OTHER GENERAL QUESTIONS ON PROMISING PROGRAMS SEE SECMONS IX AND X.THE NEKT SECTIONS IEMAMINE ISSUES IN SPECIFIC SUBJECTS:

MATH, READING/LANGUAGE ARTS, THINKING SKILLS. SCIENCE AND SOCIAL STUDIES

86

:13

W. PROMISING PROGRAMS IN MATH (use with pages 16-24)How does your math program measure up?

1. Coordination of regular math classes withsupplementary or ut math classes

EXEUNT IOU FAM POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO RED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

-VWhat could be improved?

2. Time for remedial math instruction so thatstudents do not lose time in regular classes

What could be improved?

3. Innovative Chapter 1 or other remedialprograms for all students who need extrahelp in mathWhat could be improved?

4. Individualized math instruction for studentsin skills needed to pass a test or course

What could be improved?

5. Efficient and comprehensive mathmanagement system to help teaches:

Organize math instructionIdentify students' math skills, needsProvide math instructionMonitor and assess math progress

What could be improved?

6. Clear reports on the math progress ofsubgroups of students, e.g., Ly grade, sex,race, ethnicity, and starting math skills

What could be improved?

7. Math groups with temporary memberships,fiextlle math group assigmnentsWhat could be improved?

8. Math instruction using a variety of approachesthat emphasize visual, auditory, andmanipulable matialsWhat could be improved?

9. Math Mstniction that varies for students whodo not master skills or concepts the first time ..--What could be improved?

87

IV. PROMISING PROGRAMS IN MATH (uae with pages 16-24)How does your math program measure up?

EXCELLIAT OM FM POOR DOES

A AKIDEI. NEED TO NEMO NEED TO NOT

FOR DDSS PERROT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

1. Coordination of regular math classes withsupplementary or pull-out math classes

What could be improved?.1..

2. Time for remedial math instruction so thatstudents do not lose time in regular classes

What could be improved?

3. Innovative Chapter 1 or other remedialprograms for all students who need extrahelp in mathWhat could be improved?

.11.111.1.0.01

4, Individualized math instruction for studentsin skills needed to pass a test or course

What could be improved?

5. Efficient and comprehensive mathmanagement system to help teachers:

Organize math instructionIdentify students' math skills, needsProvide math instructionMonitor and assess math progress

What could be improved?

,6. Clear reports on the math progress ofsubgroups of students, e.g., by grade, sex,race, ethnicity, and starting math skills

What could be improved?

7. Math groups with temporary memberships,flexible math group assigmaentsWhat could be improved?

8. Math instruction using a variety of approachesthat emphasize visual, auditory, andmanipulable matmialsWhat could be improved?

9. Math instruction that varies for students whodo not master sldlls or concepts the first time

What could be improved?

87

H

Estimate...

18. How many students study:

ME I INANE MIME 8

(fix ozotinxis to match the grades In your school)

Basic conputations/basic skills % % %Problem solving - 1 step % % %Problem solving - 2 steps % %Problem solving - 3+ steps %

____%% %

EstimationStatisticsGraphs and chartsProbabilitySpatial relations, patterns

Factors and multiplesMeasurementReal world applicationsInterdisciplinary connections

Pre-algebra (full course)Algebra (full HS course)Geometly (full HS course)Other math topic

70 °le

0/0

,..,.

at,

(describe)

19. How many math students use:CalculatorsComputersMath kits and manipulativesOther math materials

(describe)

20. How many math students:Would benefit from higher content

in their math classes?Would need new instructional

approaches, texts, or materialsin math in order to succeed?

21. How do you organize extra help in math for.Students who need a little help?

Students who need a lot of help?

22. Who decides which students take which math classes, and what criteria are used?

89

23.1-sow are students recognized and rewarded for.excellence in maw ?

progress in. math?

24. 'What practices help students develop and maintain positive attitudes about math?

25. 1-iow are mentors, coaches, big brothers / sisters, peer tutoring, and tutoring younger childrenorganized your math classes?

26. liow do families discuss math, encourage,learn how to and interact with their children aboutmath at home?

7. liell axe your availab2 ow -w le math texts and suppletnentary terials being used to providebigh level challenges and active learning opportunities to all students?

aside from'flow and when do students see their math teachers worlding as ma28.thematicians,when they are teaching math?

29. What other questions do you want to discuss about high content for all students in iddlemgrades math?

90

!i7

V. PROMISING PROGRAMS IN READING,WRITING, LANGUAGE ARTS (use with pages 2448)

How do ou rate our rea ro ?EXCILIBIT IMO BM POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR ONERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

(Answer these questions for the subjects of reading, writing, and English or language arta sepa-rately or combined, according to the way they are named and organized in your school.)

1. Coordination of reading/language arts classes withsupplementary or pull-out leading classesWhat could be improved?

2. Time for remedial reading instruction so thatstudents do not lose time in regular classesWhat could be improved?

3. Innovative Chapter 1 or other remedialprograms for all students who needextra help in reading/language artsWhat could be improved?

4. Individualized reading/language arts instructionfor studrts in skills needed to pass a test or course

What could be improved?

5. Efficient and comprehensive managementsystem to help teachers:

Organize reading/language arts instructionIdentify students' reading skills, needsProvide reading instrucdonMonitor and assess reading progress

What could be improved?

6. Clear reports on the reading/language artsprogress of subgroups of students, e.g., by grade,sex, race, ethnicity, and starting reading skills

What could be improved?

7. Reading zi ups with temporary memberships,flexible rea g group assignmentsWhat could be improved?

8. Reading/language arts instniction that variesfor students who did not master skills orconcepts the first time

What could be improved?

9 1

9. Tests and other evaluations that reflect thegoals of the reading/language arts curriculum

EXCILBIT SOU FILM POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

What could be improved?

10. Involving families in students' reading/language arts education with:Information on how students can improve

reading/language arts report mrd gradesConferences to help parents understand

how to help at home in reading/language artsInformation on reading/language arts courses

and their consequences for studentsDemonstrations by students for families

of reading/language arts sldlls learnedInvitations and training for useful

volunteers in reading/language arts classesGuidance on how to monitor reading/

language arts reading homeworkDirections for interactive reading/

language arts homeworkOther links with families on reading/

language arts(describe)

What could be improved?

11. Student respcnsability for their own learningand progress in reading/language artsWhat could be improved?

12. Opportunities for active learning and participationby all students in reading/language arts classesWhat could be improved?

13. Extra staff and resources to provide neededextra help to students in reading/language artsWhat could be improved?

14. Useful staff development activities inreading/large arts and opportunities for thestaff to dev op new reading/language programsWhat could be improved?

15. TeacY zr and administrator committee's thatare responsible to collect and discuss ideasfor reading/language arts curricular reformWhat could be improved?

16. District support for and commitment toimprove reading/language arts programsWhat could be improved?

92

Estimate.

17. How many students in reading/language arts study.Developmental readingLiteratureThe writir3 processExtra Junior Great Books or other

pleasure reading courseInterdisciplinary connecfionsShakespeare (one full work)Poetry (reading and writing)Critical thinldng skillsCreative thinldng skillsOther reading/language arts topic

IRAN 8 BRAE 7 HOE 8(fix columns t nab the codes In your school)

0/0

0/0

0/0

(describe)

18. How many reading/language arts students use:Basal textsPaperback booksHard cover literature books 0/0

Anthologies 0/0

Computers 0/0

Encyclopedias 0/00/0

Library books for pleasure reading %

Other reading/language arts materials 0/0 °/0

(describe)

19. How many reading/language arts students participate in:Pre-writing of weekly themesWriting one page or more weeklyEditing and rewriting weeklyReading aloudPublic speakingOral reportsWriting fairs or contestsSpelling bees

Dramatic readingDrama productionsFilm, radio, or TV productionsNewspaper writing, editingWord processing on computersGathering ideas, drawing conclusionsSynthesizing information from

several sourcesYearbook writing, editingOther reading/language arts activities

0/0

0/00/0

0/.0/0

0/0

0/0

0/0

`Yo

0/0

0/0

93

Estimate...

20. How many reading/language arts students:Would benefit from higher content in

their reading/language arts classes?Would need new instructional approaches,

texts, or materials in readingRanguage artsin order to succeed?

21. How do you organize extra help in reading forStudents who need a little help?

Students who need a lot of help?

finAgEg ME 7 alikOE 8

(fix columns to match the grades In your mho-di)

0/0

00/0

0/0

a Who decides which students take which reading, writing, and language arts classes, and whatcriteria are used?

23. How are students recognized and rewarded forexcellence in reading, writing, language arts?progress in reading, writing, language arts?

24. How do families get to listen at home to their children's reading? writing? public speaking?

25. What practices help students develop and maintain positive attitudes about reading, writing,and language arts?

26. What high-quality, high-interest, low-reading level materials do you Ilse with students who aretwo or more years behind grade level in their reading skills?

27. How are high level thinking skills built into reading, writing, and language arts activities for allstudents?

94

28. How are mentors, coaches, big brothers/sisters, peer tutorin& and tutoring younger childrenorganized in your reading, writing, and language arts classes?

29. How are connections made for all students between:Reading and writingWriting and other language arts

Writing and thinking skills

Reading, writing, and language arts with other subjects (e.g., art, music, science, social studies,

others)

30. How do teachers solve the problems of grading large volumes of written work?

31. How do families learn how to discuss, encourage, and interact with their children about read-ing/language arts at home?

32. How well are your available reading/language arts texts and supplementary m ot..::.als beingused to provide high level challenges and actdve learning opportunities to all students?

33. How and when do students see their reading/language arts teacher(s) as reader and writer,aside from when they are teaching reading/language arts?

34. In the future, how would you like to organize reading, writing, and language arts as separatesubjects, combined in one or more class periods, and/or integrated with other subjects?

35. What other questions do you want to discuss about high content for all students in middlegrades reading/language arts?

95

2

VI. PROMISING PROGRAMS IN THINKING SKILLS(use with pages 38-45)

I. In what subjects are critical thinkingskills developed with all students?

Z In what subjects are creative thinkingskills developed with all students?

MAU SCUM LAME SOCIAL SIMIAN DNBARTS VIM MKT

00.6.nweem.rmIne

3. How do you evaluate students' development and progress in creative and critical thinldng?

Estimate...£MDE6 GRADE 7 GRADE 8

(fix columns to match the wades In your school)

4. How many students are systematically taughtthese thinking skills?

MemorizationPuzzlesPerception skillsSimple applications

Scientific reasoningDivergent thinkingDeductive logicDebating skills

Gathering ideas anddrawing conclusions %

Synthesizing informationfrom several sources %

Probability %

FlexibilityOriginalityDesigning/inventing/creatirV

generating ideas and materialsInterdisciplinary connectionsOther thinking skills

0/0

0/0

0/0

0

'7/0

0/0

0/0

0/0

0/0

0/0

0/0

(describe)

96

5. Should all, some, or no students be taught to extend their critical and creative thinking skills?Explain.

6 How do yo z organize thinking skills and activities that require reading for students who arestarting from different reading levels?

7. How well are your available thinking sldlls materials being used to provide high level challengesand active learning opportunities to all students?

8. How do families learn how to discuss, encourage, and interact with their children about thinkingskills at home?

9. Should thinking skills be taught in all subjects or as a separate class or course? Explain.

10. What other questions do you want to discuss about thinking skills for all students in the middlegrades?

97

VII. PROMISING PROGRAMS IN SCIENCE (use with pages 45-48)

How do you evaluate your science program?

1. Individualized science instruction forstudents in skills needed to pass a test or course

What could be improved?

2. Efficient and comprehensive managementsystem to help teachers:

Organize science instructionIdentify students' science skills, needsProvide science instructionMonitor and assess science progress

EXCEIENT BOOB FAIR POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

What could be improved?

3. Clear reports on the science progressof subgaoups of students, e.g:, py grade, sex,race, ethnicity, and starting skills

What could be improved?

4 Science groups with temporary memberships,flexillle science group assignments

What could be improved?

5. Science instruction usin,g a variety of approachesthat em hasize visual, auditory, andmanipulable materials

What could be improved?

6. Science instruction that varies for studentswho do not master skills or conceptsthe first time

What could be improved?

7. Tests and other evaluations that reflect thegoals of the science curriculumWhat could be improved?

8. Student responsthility for their ownlearning and progress in science

What could be improved?

9. Opportunities for active learning andparticipatian by all students in science classes

What could be improved?

98

LENT WOO FAM POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR OTERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

10. Involving families in students science education with:Information on science programs

and requirementsInformation on how students can work to

improve science report card gradesConferences that help parents understand

how to help their children in scienceInformation on science courses

and their consequences for students

Demonstrations by students for families ofscience skills learned

Invitations and training for usefulvolunteers in science classes

Guidance on how to monitor science homeworkDirections for interactive science homeworkOther links with families about science

.110.

001.

(descrthe)

What could be improved?

11. Useful staff development activities in scienceand opportunities for the staff to developnew science programs

What could be improved?

12. Teacher and administrator committees thatare responsNe to collect and discuss ideasfor science curricular reformWhat could be improved?

13. District support for and commitment toimprove sdence programsWhat could be improved?

99

1 6

Estimate...

14. How many students study:Adolescent developmentBiologyEcologyHealthOther life sciences

811AIE 8 ORME 7 GUDE 8

(fix columns to match the wales In your school)

%

5PaceChemistry (level OL

Physics (level -1°Other physical sciences 0/0

Statistics 0/0

ProbabilityMeasurement 0/0 0/0

Real world applications - 0/0

Interdisciplinary connections oz,-Other science topic (describe)

15. How many science students use:

Supplementary materials % on, %

Calculators % % %

Computers/science simulations % %

Science kits and manipulatives_

% % %Sophisticated lab equipment % oh, %

Films

__% on, %

Encyclopedias % % %Other science materials (descrile) % % %

16. How many students participate in:The scientific method % %

Lab work for active learning ___% %

Lab work at high school level_

% %

Science projects in community 0/0

Science fairs or contests % %Film, radio, TV productions 0/0

Gathering ideas anddrawing conclusions %

Synthesizing informationfrom several sources

Other science activities (describe)0/0 0/0 0/0

0/0 0/0

100

7

MIME I MEE 7 IRAN II

17. How many science student&

(tbi columns to !WO tte grass in your school)

Would benefit from higher contentin their science classes % % %

Would need new instructional approaches, texts,or materials in science in ordez to succeed % % %

18. How do you organize extra help in science forStudents who need a little help?Students who need a lot of help?

19. Who decides which students take which science classes, and what criteria are used?

20. How are students recognized and rewarded forexcellence in science?

prvgress in science?

21. What practices help students develop and maintain positive attitudes about science?

21 How are mentors, coaches, big brothers/sisters, peer tutoring, and tutoring younger childrenorganized in your science classes?

23. How are reading, writing, math, health, art, and other subjects integrated into the science cur-riculum?

1 01

1

24. How do you organize science work that requires reading for students who are starting from dif-ferent reading levels?

25. How are critical thinking sldlls, creative thinking skills, and reading and writing skills inte-grated in science?

26. How well are your available science texts and supplementary materials being used to providehigh level challenges and active learning opportunities to all students?

27. How do families learn how to discuss, encourage, and interact with theix children about sdenceat home?

28. How and when do students see their science teacheis working as scientists, aside from whenthey are teaching science?

29. What other questions do :7 ou want to discuss about high content for all students in middlegrades science?

102

PROMISING PROGRAMS IN SOCIAL STUDIES(use with pages 48-50)

How do you judge your social studies program?

1. Clear reports on the progress in social studiesof sitps of students, e.g7,.by grade, sex,.irace, and starting

EXCEL= MN MR POOR DOES

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

FOR ONERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

.1.1100..

What could be improved?

2. Social studies goups with temporarymemberships, flexible social stucfiesgroup assignments

What could be improved?

3. Social studies instruction using a variety ofapproaches that emphasize visual, auditory,and manipulable materialsWhat could be improved?

4. Social studies instruction that varies forstudents who do not master skills or conceptsthe ars* time

What could be improved?

5. Tests and other evaluations that reflect thegoals of the social studies curricuhim

What could be improved?..

6. Student responsibility for their ownlearning and progress in social studiesWhat could be improved?

7. Opportunities for active learning andparticipation by all students in social studiesWhat could be improved?

8. Useful staff development acfivities insocial studies, and opporttmities for thestaff to develop 9=41 studies programsWhat could be improved?

1 03

OMEN MOO FAIR PON Does

A MODEL NEED TO NEED TO NEED TO NOT

OR OTHERS PERFECT IMPROVE DEVELOP APPLY

9. Involving families in students' social studies education with:Information on social studies

programs and requirementsInfomtation on how students can work to

improve social studies report card gradesConferences that ,iw4 parents understand how

to help their childsm in social studiesDemonstrations by students for families of

social studies skab: learnedInvitations and training for useful

volunteers in social studies classesGuidance on how to monitor

social studies homeworkDirections for interactive

social studies homeworkOther links with families about social studies

eaa..11.

(describe)

What could be improved?

10. Teacher and administrator committees thatare responsible to collect and discuss ideasfor social studies curricular reform

What could be improved?

11. District support for and commitment toimprove social studies programs

What could be improved?

Estimate...

11 How many students study:

BLUE 8 OWE 7 RUE 8(FIX COLUMNS TO MATCH TNE GRADES IN YOUR SCHOOL)

GeographyHistory

% % %% 0/0

0,

Citizenship 0/. % %EconomicsHuman rights

0,00/0 %

0/0 % %

Conflict resolution % % %

Anthropology % 0/0%

% % 0/0Psychology% % 'YoSociology

0% %Multicultural education

Law/law enforcement % % %

104

12. How many students study: (continued)Careers/career explorationSocial issues important to

early adolescentsInterdisciplinary connectionsOther social studies topic

88118E 8 NIDE 7 88i8E

coiumns to match the grades In your school)

0/0

(describe)

13. How many social studies students use:Texts Yo % cY0

Supplementary materials % % %Original source documentsFilms % % %Computers % % %

Encyclopedias % % %Other social studies materials % % %

(describe)

14. How many social studies students participate in:Public speakingOral reportsCommunity serviceCommunity actionFilm, radio, TV productions

0/0

0/0

Gathfzing ideas anddrawing conclusions

Synthesizing information fromseveral sources 0/0 0/0

Other research activities 0/0 0/0

Other social studies activities

(descrthe)0/0 0/0

15. How many social studies students:Would benefit from higher content

in their social studies classesWould need new instructional

approaches, texts, or materials insocial studies in order to succeed

0/0

0/0

16. How do you organize extra help in social studies for.Students who need a little help?

Students who need a lot of help?

105

17. How do you organize social studies work that requires reading for students who are startingfrom different reading levels?

18. How are critical thinking skills, creative thinking skills, and reading and writing skills inte-grated in social studies?

19. How am students recognized and rewarded for:

excellence in social studies?

progress in social studies?

20. What practices help students develop and maintain positive attitudes about social studies?

21. How are art, music, science, anthropology, sociology, psychology, or other subjeas integrated4

in social studies?

22. How are multicultural perspectives organized in social studies ir struction?

23. How well are your available social studies texts and supplementary materials being used toprovide high level challenges and active learning opporhmities to all students?

24. How do families learn how to discuss, encourage, and interact with their children about socialstudies at home?

25. How and when do students see their social studies teachers as historians, geographers, or socialscientists, aside from when they are teaching social studies?

26. What other questions do you want to discuss about high content for all students in middlegrades social studies?

l Oo

IX. CONFLICTING COMPONENTS IN PROMISING PROGRAMS(with pages 53-55)

How would you resolve these dilemmas?Discuss these dilemmas to identify the problems that must be solved and the compromises that areneeded to meet important but conflicting goals in middle grades education.

Should middle grades educators:

1. Provide a common curriculum or meet individual needs? Do you provide all students with a "com-mon" curriculum or different courses or levels of work to meet individual levels of readiness?How does this differ by subject? How do these practices affect the quality of students' educationand their chances for the future?

2. Require the same time for learning and testing or allow flexible time for students who needmore time tolearn or demonstrate knowledge? Do you require all students to learn information in the sameamount of time? Do you require all students to demonstrate their knowledge on tests in the sameamount of time? What problems do your practices raise or solve? How might time for learningand testing be differently organized?

3. Assign failure (F) or no-fail, in progress (IP) grades on report cards to motivate students to wen* harder?Do you assign Ps or do you allow students to work toward a standard without "failing"? Howdoes your present grading system affect student motivation? What improvements would youmake in your evaluation or grading procedures?

4. Retain students to repeat a grade or accelerate instruction and requirements so that students can make uplost credits, courses, or grade levels? What is your policy on retention? Can students make up one ortwo courses without repeating a grade? If students repeat a course or grade, do they experiencethe same or different teaches, instructional approaches, and tests? What problems are raised orsolved by your retention policies, and how might they be improved?

5. Instruct all students in basic skills, advanced sldlls, or both? Which students receive instruction inhigher-level thinking and problem-solving skills in each subject? How are basic and advancedskills evaluated? How might your program be improved?

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6. Proceed with whole-school change or demonstration programs? What benefits or problems resultwhen the whole school adopts a new or innovative program or when a few teachers (in a gradelevel, team, department, or other group) conduct trial or demonstration programs? How wouldyou make the change process more effective?

X. COMMON THEMES IN PROMISING PROGRAMS(with pages 56-60)

How do your pnwtices reflect these themes? What practices should be strengthened or changed? Howare students affected by practices that express these themes? Use extra pages to expand your ideas.

1. All students can learn.

2 Commitment counts.

3. Pull-out programs are not all bad, but they are not all good either.

4. The school is a community of learners students, teachers, administrators, parents, and othersin the community.

5. Prevention and treatment programs both are needed in the middle grades.

6. Evaluations must be conducted to determine whether goals that are set are reached.

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