Chapter 1

Chapter 1 of Teaching Young Adolescents was about the way schools are structured and trends in education today. I learned a few new teaching terms such as freeze time and looping. Freeze time is a scheduled time each week when teachers are required to be in their classrooms to help students with homework questions and to be available to meet with parents. I will plan my freeze time mostly for after school. Looping refers to a cohort of students and teachers that remain together as a group for several or all the years a student stays in school. Looping may be a trend in small towns. I learned that it is important to be part of a collaborative teaching team, especially in middle schools. Teachers are able to discuss their ideas for particular lessons and gain positive and negative feedback. Teachers want the best for their students; many great minds put together can help make education more valuable to the students.

There are five categories of development that young adolescents fall into: intellectual, physical, emotional/psychological, social, and moral/ethical. Having a better knowledge of these categories of development will help me understand my future middle school students and I will be able to help them with their type of development in mind. For example, if I notice that one of my future middle school students is more in the emotional/psychological development phase, I will know to be more sensitive with what I say because he or she may get offended easily and become very moody.