High-quality support and resources for the middle grades
Are you looking for ideas to improve your communication with parents? Check out these three tips for creating newsletters to keep parents informed about what’s going on in your classroom.
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School Climate, Culture, and Partnerships
Principle 2: Create a school environment in which mutually supportive relationships among students, teachers, and parents can develop.
Recommendation 2In math, instruction in problem solving is a vital for students to achieve college and career readiness. The What Works Clearinghouse has five recommendations for problem-solving in middle school that align with the MSM Field Guide’s research-based practices to help math teachers provide instruction in this area. This week we’ll be showcasing Recommendation 2: Assist students in monitoring and reflecting on the problem-solving process. (Safari users scroll to page 23 of the document)
Mathematics and Mathematics Interventions
Math Principle 4: Develop students’ conceptual understanding of mathematics and provide ample opportunities to improve procedural fluency.
Math Principle 6: Instructions should include strategies for solving word and algebra problems that are based on common underlying structures.
The following schema-based instruction videos refer to teaching students the different word problem types so that students can solve word problems more efficiently. Students use the UPS Check strategy as a general word problem attack strategy while using their knowledge of word problem types.
Math coaches and teachers can use this tool as a quick reference regarding appropriate visual representations for different types of problems. The purpose of the tool is to provide references that teachers and coaches can use while planning instruction in using visual representations in problem-solving.
This strategy aligns with the Middle School Matters Field Guide Reading Principle 3, Practice 1: Instruct students to use text to support answers.
Student success is greatest when students, teachers, and parents are collectively working together to enable student success. Students feel valued when they have an opportunity to voice their opinions in a meaningful way. This survey tool allows students to do just that. Secondary campus administrators can use this survey to gauge students’ perceptions of the teaching and learning at their school. The survey contains 15 Likert-type items and 3 open-ended questions to which students can respond.
Middle School Matters Field Guide Alignment
School Climate, Culture, and Partnerships
Principle 2 Practice 1: Use surveys to gather information on school climate and culture.
Developed by GradNation, this tool provides a sample survey that could be used with middle or high school students to find out why they are not coming to school, cutting one class, or are simply tardy. Developing a better understanding of current student thinking will help you develop redirection strategies.
This guide is designed for teachers and provides detailed information about some of the lesson plans used in Tier 2 intervention for struggling readers in middle school as part of the research efforts of the Texas Center for Learning Disabilities (TCLD). This guide describes each component of instruction for improving comprehension and provides instructions, sample scripts, and planning templates so that teachers can develop similar lesson plans that align with their own state standards and adopted curricula.
Middle School Matters Field Guide Alignment
Reading and Reading Interventions
Reading Principle 4: Teach students to use reading comprehension strategies;
Reading Principle 6: Guide students during text-related oral and written activities that support the interpretation, analysis, and summarization of text.
