My Middle School

My Middle School

A few years ago, I did something drastic. After working full time as a literacy professor, I decided to take a break from academia and go back into the teaching trenches as a literacy teacher in a middle school. A friend and colleague, skeptical about my decision, rambled on about middle school students' behavior as being outrageous, rebellious, and annoying. I, however, was a mother of an adolescent; I had hundreds of literacy strategies at my fingertips and plenty of theory to back every instructional decision. I would be the master of my newly found domain. So I resigned from my college position, and soon I was walking into my first day of teaching five reading skills classes to a group of 20 eighth grade students in each class. Rather than being apprehensive, I was confident. I was an expert in the field of literacy and thoroughly prepared. Greatly influenced by Smith (1994), I created a banner that read “Welcome to the Literacy Club” and placed it across an empty bulletin board. I took a picture of every student and asked them to place their photos on the chalkboard and sign underneath them.

I announced that they were now all members of the Literacy Club and that I would like to know what they thought about reading and writing. My aim was to create an environment that I often taught about in my college courses. I wanted a place where students would feel that they belonged and that their opinions were valued. Self-knowledge, the knowledge students have about themselves as readers and writers (Vacca, 2002), would be encouraged there. Student engagement is critical because it greatly influences student outcomes (Guthrie & Wigfield, 2000), but I knew the students would only be active participants if certain learning conditions ...