Within chapter one, I learned the
differences between a middle school and a junior high school. When discovering this difference, I soon
realized that I went to a middle school.
The first major differences is the age group they serve. The middle schools will typically serve the
ages 6-8; whereas, the junior high schools will serve the ages 7-9. I remember back when I was in elementary
school, the school district I was in was making the shift from junior high
schools to middle schools. I noticed
this because when I started elementary school, there was a sixth grade, but it
was soon moved out of the school. I didn’t
realize at the time what changes were being made.
Another
significant difference between the two types of schools is how they handle subject
organization. Junior high schools will
departmentalize their subjects, but middle schools tend to integrate them more
with interdisciplinary strategies. Also,
within the curriculum, exploratory classes in middle were commonly given to all
students, instead of students just having a free choice to choose what classes
they wanted. The classes varied in that
junior high schools followed the traditional lecture of drill-and-kill
strategies, but middles schools encouraged discovery learning. For example, in middle school, the curriculum
might include reader’s theater for an English class or a museum day for a
history class. Athletics were handled
differently in that in junior high schools, sports are offered up as
competitive, but middles school promote more intermural participatory sports.
Some of
these differences are noticeable, but others may be subtle. As I said above, I believe that I went to a
middle school because most of the differences listed above for the middle
school, were present in my school.
However, we still have competitive sports such as basketball and
baseball, but we still had intramural sports as well. I liked it this way. I found it to be a nice happy medium on the
spectrum.
Thank you, Cole:)
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