STUDENT ASSIGNMENT IN THE MIDDLE GRADES: TOWARDS ACADEMIC SUCCESS FOR ALL STUDENTS

Real World Examples

Members of the National Forum include current and former middle-level educators who have had direct and personal experience with issues of student assignment and ability grouping. Our members have offered these examples of ways in which their schools have worked to make heterogeneous grouping the norm, striving to diminish disparities in students' learning and achievement. If you would like to suggest other examples, please write us at mgforum@edc.org

Student Assignment Practices: Granite Junior High

Student Assignment Practices: Jefferson Middle School

Granite Junior High (Urban district in Michigan)

In an article published in 2000 by Teachers College Record, researchers Bruce Wilson, Dick Corbett, and Belinda Williams, documented the pedagogical changes that took place from 1996 to 1998 at the pseudonymous "Granite Junior High School," a school serving a low-income, racially diverse community. Despite being the poorest of five junior highs in the district, Granite scored among the top in the eighth grade writing assessment and their scores did not reflect any difference in the performance of its African American and Caucasian students.

The driving principle of Granite is simple: students will complete every assignment at a level deserving a "B" or higher. However, the instructional staff also understands that not all students learn and complete high-quality work in the same amount of time. Both schoolwide and classroom practices at Granite help students to learn at their own speed while still demanding high standards. For example, the school has arranged their scheduling in a unique way. Each student is assigned to a small group for a reading period during which aides help many students catch up. The last 30 minutes of the day at Granite are reserved for "Reteaching and Enrichment" - a time when some students go back to their teachers' classrooms for extra help and those students who are caught up in their subjects explore enrichment options and work on extra assignments.

Granite's classrooms are grouped heterogeneously, so teachers have developed many ways to encourage students to achieve quality performance while learning at different speeds. The school provided the teachers with intense training in cooperative learning. Teachers found that cooperative learning can both lighten the load placed on them and give the students a rich learning experience. Teaching in teams of four or more also helps many of the teachers, as it allows them to enforce consistent expectations, work jointly with students having trouble, support each other's efforts, and consult others when they redirect a lesson. The school also uses special education teachers to team-teach some classes in an effort to have inclusive classrooms. This approach eases the burden for both teachers: one teacher can lead the class while the other is free to offer students individual attention.

To accommodate students who learn faster than the majority of their peers, teachers develop extra work that builds on an applicable topic or skill set. To give this work purpose and make sure it is not "busy work" the completion of these assignments leads to an "A" grade. Many teachers realize that working with diverse needs means anticipating students' problems, rather than only offering help after a lesson has been introduced. Teachers are careful to plan the introduction of material. They don't instruct their students to read and answer questions individually as many students are not ready to do so. Instead teachers lecture for a short time with a question and discussion period, lead the students in reading as a class, or supervise cooperative learning groups.

To read the article by Wilson, Corbett, and Williams, click here (one-time registration with the TC Record website may be required).

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Jefferson Middle School (Champaign, IL)

Full Inclusion. At Jefferson Middle School, 22% of the student population is classified as having special needs. It is common to see a special education teacher co-teaching with a regular education teacher. The presence of the special education teacher in the classroom benefits all students, not just those with identified special needs. These teachers bring unique insights and employ instructional strategies that also help slower learners who have not been identified as having special needs.

Considerable attention and time has been spent developing a master teaching schedule that gives special education teachers time to plan with their regular education counterpart. However, it is not possible for all situations. Even without a scheduled planning time, teachers make time to collaborate. It's not unusual to see co-teachers planning in the teachers' lounge during lunch or to see them meet before or after school. Co-teaching is done in the areas of language arts, reading, math, and social studies. Due to limitations with special education staffing, we currently do not have co-teaching in science. With the exception of a resource class for some special education students or special classes for severely mentally or physically disabled children, there are no self-contained classes.

Unified Arts Block Scheduling. Jefferson teachers acted quickly to resolve a situation where the scheduling of unified arts classes resulted in de facto ability grouping. When a large group of 8th grade students signed up for both full-year band/strings and a full-year foreign language course, the remaining unified arts classes were left without many higher ability students and, furthermore, became racially identifiable. This situation also prevented almost 40% of the students signed up for band/strings and the foreign language course from taking other unified arts electives.

After exploring various options, we decided to change the 8th grade unified arts schedule to an alternate day schedule where each school day would be designated as an "A" or "B" day. With this schedule, foreign language and band/string instructors would no longer teach their 8th graders 5 days per week, but instead would teach them every other day in classes that were approximately 15 minutes longer. On the days when they did not receive instruction in foreign language or band/strings, the 8th graders could attend other electives. The net result: race or ability no longer distinguished the other unified arts classes.

Jefferson's strong commitment to having heterogeneous class assignments comes with the realization and understanding that teaching practices will have to be adjusted and adapted to accommodate any change. For example, foreign language and band/string instructors had to alter their instructional plan when they no longer taught their 8th graders every day of the school week. Educators had initial concerns about the loss of daily continuity and teacher contact, and whether students would retain the material presented in class every other day. However, various assessments indicate that student achievement levels have not dropped since the alternate day schedule was adopted, thus reinforcing the success of heterogeneous assignments at Jefferson.

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