5th Grade - Middle School Transition Lesson

Middle school is just around the corner for our 5th graders!  We know our students are prepared academically for the next level, but we want to make sure they are prepared in every other area of their life as well. This lesson focuses on giving students a chance to express feelings they have about going to middle school, ask questions they have about middle school, identify strategies for being successful in middle school, and determine organizational strategies they can begin implementing NOW so they will be better prepared for middle school

We accomplish these goals in two ways. First, students watched a short video entitled Making the Most of Middle School.  In the video, students hear from high school students who talk to them about the do's and don'ts of middle school. The importance of balancing academics and social activities is addressed as well as the importance of being organized.

Second, students rotated around the room and worked with small groups of students to answer these four questions:

• What are you most excited about?
• What are you nervous or scared about?
• What questions do you have about middle school?
• How can you keep yourself organized in middle school?

 

At the end of the rotation, we discussed some of the things students were nervous or scared about as well as the things they were most excited about. We discussed organizational skills and the students completed an organizational self-assessment to see just how organized they currently are.  At the end of the lesson, students identified one thing they can start doing today to be better prepared for middle school. I challenged the students to really work on their organizational goal for the remainder of the school year so they will be ready for middle school in the fall.

At the end of the lesson, I collected the posters and will type up the students' responses. I will send the student-generated list of questions to the principal at HTMS for her to use as a guide when talking to the students on our middle school field trip on May 5th.

I know most of our students are excited about middle school but some are hesitant about the whole transition. If your student is worried or overly-anxious about going to the middle school, please do not hesitate to contact me. I would love to discuss their concerns and share some strategies with them for dealing with worry and anxiety.

4th Grade Lesson - Careers

What do you want to be when you grow up? This is a question our children have been asked since they were toddlers, but it is time for our students to begin thinking seriously about this question. In just a few short years, our students will have the opportunity to choose classes directly related to their chosen college and career path. We want our students to be ready when that time comes!

The purpose of our 4th grade career lesson is to expose students to a variety of different careers and help students match various careers to their interests and abilities. We achieve these goals in two ways.  First, students complete an interest inventory in which they respond to 42 statements with either "yes" or "no". They tally their yeses in each category of the inventory and then receive a list of jobs that they might be interested in based on their totals in each category. Second, we play a Career Jeopardy game in which students learn about the educational requirements for a variety of jobs and learn more about the types of jobs out there. We are only able to explore a sampling of jobs so we encourage our students to explore further on their own.  We stress the fact that people are often happier with their career choice when they are interested in their job and can do their job well. We want our students to become happy, successful adults!

There are many resources out there to help your children explore careers. Below are just a few I have found that may be of interest to intermediate age students.

• Kids.Gov: A Safe Place to Learn and Play
• Bureau of Labor Statistics
• Kids Work

Ask your child about our lesson and about the career they are thinking of pursuing. Many of our students want to be professional athletes, singers, actors, and actresses. We encourage them to continue pursuing their dreams but to also have another plan just in case those careers don't pan out. It's never too early to prepare for the future!