The Nongraded Middle School: Can It Improve Life for Early Adolescents?

Although teaming is used in the middle school, it is most often organized around grade level teams and not cross grade teams. Eisner (1990) states that not only does an explicit curriculum shape a student's experiences, but the kind of place the school is and the way the school is organized also impacts the student. Ease of administering or planning has too much to do with teaming and not what is best for students in the middle school. Like all groupings of students, this age level has its own unique personality. They are in great need of self-esteem building (Theobald, 1995), developing socializing skills, and are at a point of development in which their psychological development must catch-up with their emotions and physical bodies (Clark & Clark, 1993; National Middle School Association, 1995). These students need an environment, even if unconventional, that allows these unique characteristics to fully develop along with their physical and psychological metamorphosis (Williamson, 1993). The nongraded middle school allows students to find their nitches in the world around them, to explore unknown worlds that await them, to develop security in an often frightening environment, and challenge their creative and intellectual interests. Students at this age are coming out of a cocoon much the same as does the butterfly. But, unlike the butterfly, the metamorphosis only begins with puberty and for some extends well into the high school. The changes in physical features and bodily functions causes this to be a time of tremendous pressure for nearly all middle school students (Carnegie Council, 1990). Faculty are often part of the problem, seeing only students who make the transition quickly and easily, forgetting that others seemingly make little or no progress. Not only are the students' bodies seemingly against them, their interests are also. Many seem to be caught in a myriad of changing conditions and positions with wildly varying interests and needs. If ever there was a time to forget about ages/grades and begin to deal with students as loosely amalgamated individuals, it is the middle school years. Here is the first real opportunity to allow students to begin to make decisions for themselves (Holland, 1995) about how they want and need to organize themselves for "the lonely crowd" walk into high school and on into adulthood. If students fail to make the transition in middle school, especially in the area of social adjustment and maturity, they may well be socially immature for the remainder of their lives (Hough, 1995). It is critically important that planning for the structural changes of the middle schools are made so that future generations of early adolescents do not have the same up-hill battle to face again and again. The principal can help with that change by reconceptualizing the middle school to more closely match the needs of this age group of students. Collectively, the principal and teachers have a grand opportunity to change the settings in which middle school students mature. They can make a difference if they choose to. But to do this, they need to open their minds and begin to look for new paradigms, new ways of living and working in the middle school. How to Develop a Nongraded Middle School A well functioning nongraded middle school allows students to participate in a subject area for a specified amount of time. It allows students to take specific subjects based on needs and interests regardless of their age or designated grade level. For example, an 8th grade student who lacks the mathematical foundation to be successful in prealgebra would be allowed to. Take the appropriate class where he/she can build on his/her skills and become successful. However, classes would not be designated as 6th, 7th, or 8th, but as, for example, beginning math, intermediate math, or advanced math. There would be a contiuum of learning between classes and across grades. …