If you wonder what is going on with Middle School reform or what we consider "best practices" in teaching middle school, especially middle school health, you have come to the right place!

Starting Points

1. One place to start is the National Middle School Association - http://www.nmsa.org   Click on the "Research" link on the left side of the page.  You will find connections to RMLE (Research in Middle Level Education) Online, Research Articles, and Research Summaries.  Of particular interest is Research Summary #5, "Young Adolescents' Developmental Needs."
   
   
2. Another  place to visit is the web site - Middle Web: Exploring Middle School Reform - http://www.middleweb.com  Here is a description of the site:

   MiddleWeb: Exploring Middle School Reform is produced by the Focused Reporting Project with grant support from the Program for Student Achievement of the Edna McConnell Clark Foundation.

   MiddleWeb provides a wealth of resources for schools, districts, educators, parents, and public school advocates working to raise achievement for all students in the middle grades.

   In addition to MiddleWeb's large collection of reform-oriented materials, this site includes hundreds of articles and links about curriculum, teaching strategies, teacher professional development, parent involvement, classroom assessment, and much more.
   
   

3. The National Forum to Accelerate Middle School Reform has developed a web site called, "Schools to Watch."  Take a tour of four middle schools to watch - http://www.schoolstowatch.org/visit.htm

   Take a close look at the criteria used by the National Forum to select "Schools to Watch."  The four criteria include:

   • Academic Excellence
   • Developmental Responsiveness
   • Social Equity
   • Organizational Structures and Processes

   Forum members acknowledge that many schools excel in one or more of these areas, but it is hard to locate schools that excel in all four.  Of particular concern for health education is social equity or what some educators label inclusion or disproportionality.  Read the National Forum's description of Social Equity to be clear on the meaning of this criterion.

A Standards-Based Health Education Curriculum Approach

One approach to "best practices" focuses on the implementation of health education standards.  In 1995, the Joint Committee on National Health Education Standards released National Health Education Standards that were informed by health education theory and practice as well as curriculum frameworks and standards from several states.  Each state, including Washington, has adapted these standards.  Washington's Essential Academic Learning Requirements (EALRs) for Health and Fitness are based on the National Standards and guide health and fitness instruction and assessment.  A standards-based curriculum includes these elements:

• A developmentally and age-appropriate, planned scope and sequence of instruction from pre-kindergarten through twelfth grade, with a minimum of 50 hours of instructional time annually (Connell, Turner, & Mason, 1985; American Association of School Administrators, 1991; National School Boards Association, 1991).
• An organizing framework based on the National health Education Standards to ensure that all performance indicators re addressed at the appropriate grade level ( American Cancer Society, 1992).
• Health content and skills introduced in the early grades and reinforced in later grades (Joint Committee on National Health Education Standards, 1995).
• Student assessments that measure skill acquisition as well as functional knowledge (Joint Committee on national Health Education Standards, 1995).

(Health is Academic: A Guide to Coordinated School Health Programs, p. 48-49)

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Health Instruction Practices/Curriculum Selection

Do you ever ask yourself the question, why do we do what we do in Middle School?  When it comes to instruction and curriculum selection, "best practices" include:

• Principles of Effectiveness
• Programs That Work
• Developmental Assets
• Risk and Protective Factors
• Resiliency
  

1. Principles of Effectiveness.  Access the Principles of Effectiveness proposed by the Department of Education in 1998.   These four principles govern recipients’ use of fiscal year 1998 and future years’ funds received under Title IV-State and local programs of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act -- the Safe and Drug-Free Schools and Communities Act (SDFSCA) State Grants program. 
   
   

2. Programs that Work is a concept developed by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in response to requests from schools for effective prevention programs.  The Programs that Work project helps educators identify curricula that effectively reduce sexual risk behaviors that contribute to HIV and other STD infections, unintended pregnancy, and risk of tobacco-use behavior.  Review the programs on the CDC list at Programs that Work.
   
   

3. Developmental Assets is a concept developed by The Search Institute in Minnesota.
   

"In an effort to identify the elements of a strength-based approach to healthy development, Search Institute developed the framework of developmental assets. This framework identifies 40 critical factors for young people's growth and development. When drawn together, the assets offer a set of benchmarks for positive child and adolescent development. The assets clearly show important roles that families, schools, congregations, neighborhoods, youth organizations, and others in communities play in shaping young people's lives."

The Search Institute has identified 40 assets - 20 internal and 20 external.  The work of the Institute focuses on how assets can be built and how communities can become "asset rich."  Visit The Search Institute at http://www.search-institute.org/.

4. Risk and Protective Factors research offers another approach to prevention of risks and improving and strengthening kids' lives.

"What is prevention science?
Just as we know the predictors of heart disease, and the effective prevention strategies to combat it, we now know the predictors of health and delinquency among young people -- and effective ways to influence kids' development.

There's common agreement among researchers that we can improve kids' lives -- and the climates of our schools and communities -- by focusing efforts on:

• increasing protective factors and
• decreasing risk factors.

The result? Children who grow up to be productive citizens... who live free from violence and substance abuse... and who have strong families, strong friendships, and strong community bonds."

Research on risk and protective factors was completed by Social Development Research Group (SDRG) in Seattle, WA by Dr. David Hawkins and Dr. Richard Catalano, pioneers in prevention science.  Visit the work of SDRG at http://depts.washington.edu/sdrg/.

5. Resiliency, especially in at-risk youth, is one more focus on developing strong youth to consider.  Several documents from the North Central Regional Educational Laboratory (NCREL) clarify this approach.

"Resilience should be viewed as something we foster throughout students' development by strengthening protective processes for students at critical moments in their lives. When you view resilience as a developmental process that can be fostered, then strategies for change can be directed toward practices, policies, and attitudes among professional educators. It is important to realize, however, that even when you change practices, policies, and attitudes within schools and communities, your work is not done. You will not automatically end up with a school full of resilient children. Within every young person is a delicate balance during those critical life events between the protective processes and risk factors that originate both internally and externally. Protective processes have to be reinforced constantly so that the potential for young people to be resilient when faced with risk factors and vulnerabilities remains intact.

The three characteristics of the process of fostering resilience are as follows:

1. The process is long-term and developmental.
2. The process views children with strengths rather than with deficits/risks.
3. The process nurtures protective processes so that children can succeed, by changing systems, structures, and beliefs within schools and communities."

For more information, see:

NCREL Monograph: Developing Resilience in Urban Youth - http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/educatrs/leadrshp/le0win.htm

Critical Issue: Providing Effective Schooling for Students at Risk - http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/students/atrisk/at600.htm

Resiliency - http://www.ncrel.org/sdrs/areas/issues/envrnmnt/drugfree/sa3resil.htm

 
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Classroom Instructional Strategies That Get Results

Researchers at Mid-Continent Research for Education and Learning (McREL) have identified nine instructional strategies that are most likely to improve student achievement across all content areas and across all grade levels.  These strategies are explained in the book, Classroom Instruction That Works by Robert Marzano, Debra Pickering, and Jane Pollock.  The strategies are also outlined in the article, "Getting Acquainted with the Essential Nine" in the Winter 2002 issue of ASCD's Curriculum Update.

What are the "Essential Nine?"

1. Identifying similarities and differences
2. Summarizing and note taking
3. Reinforcing effort and providing recognition
4. Homework and practice
5. Nonlinguistic representations
6. Cooperative learning
7. Setting objectives and providing feedback
8. Generating and testing hypotheses
9. Cues, questions, and advance organizers

If you are an ASCD member, you can access the full text of this article in the Reading Room on the ASCD web site - http://www.ascd.org   If you are a non-member, you can access the article through ASCD's Articles on Demand feature.

Resources to Keep you Up-to-Date

Two more resources that you may want to follow or subscribe to email updates include:

Connect for Kids - You may want to subscribe to Connections.  Connections is a monthly bulletin highlighting original articles, profiles and interviews from Connect for Kids. Feel free to forward this information. Please attribute the source to "Connect for Kids (http://www.connectforkids.org/), published by the Benton Foundation."

Center for Health and Healthcare in Schools - http://www.healthinschools.org  The Center offers three listservs you may subscribe to: 1. Email notification when the Center's monthly E-Journal goes online, 2. Email alert when new information goes on the Center's web site, or 3. SBHC Net for individuals and organizations interested in school based health centers.

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This page was created by Margo Harris for the Seattle Public Schools.  For comments about this page, contact Margo at margo@pnwhealth.com  This page was last updated December 30, 2003 .