<p>Do they have a difference with some families not realizing that the 9th grade is part of high school, and by the time the student gets to 10th grade, they are shut out of the college prep classes, unless they took the right classes in jr high?</p>
<p>Personally I like the traditional 6-8 and 9-12 groupings. I think having four years in high school helps kids form a better community. Middle school is half over before the kids even know what’s happening.</p>
<p>OP, would it help to talk up the activities available at the middle school? Perhaps she would be happier if she were looking forward to joining the volleyball team or the art club or whatever she is into.</p>
<p>She is trying out for her 1st school athletic team. Cuts are this week so that will remove some uncertainty. Once those are over she can move on to looking forward to it–provided she makes the team. </p>
<p>In our state, the traditional set up is k-6, 7-8, and 9-12. When our district built new buildings residents fought to keep that arrangement even though funding from the state now encourages 6-8 and 9-12 and many districts have moved to that. </p>
<p>This will also be her 1st experience with honors classes. I do not anticipate academic struggles for her but I know there were a lot of social implications for my son when his class was divided into levels for the first time. HS credit for some classes begins this year. </p>
<p>I will speak to her pediatrician if things do not improve significantly over the next 2 weeks. I am taking the day off for orientation. Wish me luck!</p>
<p>I believe DS might have some rough time in his middle school years.</p>
<p>Several things worked against him. We moved from a not so good school district to a better school district at that time. He left behind his old friends in the elementary school years. The administrator at the new school believes that since DS’s elementary school is not as “highly ranked” (no matter how unofficial the rank is), he must not be very good academically and originally would not allow him to be on the accelerated track. After we “had begged”, he was placed into that track unofficially on a temporary basis, and he must take several tests (one of them seems to be OLSAT?) within a few month and passed all of them before he could stay on that academic track officially. We were warned he would be pull out of that class if his test scores do not meet some standard.</p>
<p>We did not like the politically correct way (all students are gifted) of treating academically advanced students in his old, more liberal, more inner-city, school district. But the way in the newer, more conservative school district evaluates their student is an eye opener for us: show me the concrete results or else! Their “math placement” test at the end of 6 grade includes some test items in matrix operations (albeit just addition, not multiplication yet) and many parents searched high and low for tests from previous tests and “prep” for this kind of placement tests. (One parent, who is my coworker and whose parents used to work for that school district told me this!) The “good” students there routinely take SAT in middle school (for that Duke Talent Search thing.) We got our first taste on what the students and their families at so-called “good” school are like and left the “easier life” in the not-so-good school behind.</p>
<p>A “mistake” we had made was that DS joined the highest ranked orchestra at his middle school in his 6th grade. It was partly because his playing skill and partly because the orchestra teacher happens to be a close friend of DS’s private music teacher since early elementary school. He was the only six-grader there and he did not have his same age peer there.</p>
<p>In one year (7th grade), he was also bullied by a football player! Many football players just do not like those “brainy” kids in general. (I do not know whether this bitter experience influenced his opinions about those athletes for life. Even in college - which is an elite one, he once commented that those athletes are mostly in the gut courses: When you happen to be in a class where you see many peer students wearing their uniforms, you know you are likely in a gut class in which you can coast along without much work.)</p>
<p>In this new school district, many students would think an OOS trip to Disney Land/World is boring because their families had taken them there too many times.</p>
<p>I believe the middle school was a tough transition for him. I actually think he was happier in both high school and elementary school (He was fine with the college and the grad school.)</p>
<p>Hmm. Your middle school has tryouts before school starts? They cut? Our activities are all first come first served no cuts, and nothing starts until the school year is under way and all kids have a chance to learn about the options. So a lot less intense, more inclusive. If the rest of the school is like that I guess I can see why she might feel anxious.</p>
<p>" I think this is part of the problem. Everyone says this and the kids think they are going into some awful place."</p>
<p>I think pretending it’s not a difficult time does our children a disservice. Should we be positive when interacting with them? Of course. Should we ignore their concerns when they are totally valid? Nope. Helping them weed through the truth and fantasy of what they hear is part of our job. Helping them be prepared and offering some survival skills is important.</p>
<p>My eldest did fine in middle school. She connected strongly to the staff and considered them “her friends.” She was respected by the student body, they took her leadership and bullies found her a boring target. She still sees it as the loneliest time in her life and grateful to be done with it. My youngest found middle school absolute hell from day 1 and took great solace in knowing that his mother and father truly understood what he was going through. My kids survived middle school by having wonderful outside of school friends and activities.</p>
<p>My parents had the rose colored glasses about middle school (helps to grow-up in a tiny farming community with K-8 schools and alcoholic parents who made any time away from home wonderful.) The result for me was feeling the need to hide all the bad stuff that happened to me in school those 3 years. Nope, give your kid every reason to feel they’ll be successful in middle school but when they bring up a valid concern, don’t gloss it over!</p>
<p>Interesting point. I don’t think I told my kids MS would be rough, I think they picked it up from friends and media. I did go into it myself worrying that there would be problems, though, and was very watchful. Older son had no problems, he actually did very well because everyone else became as self conscious as he had always been! Younger son had some hiccups as friend groups shifted, but ultimately he fell away from the “bad” kids and kept the “good” kids. He had been friends with everyone and then had to choose not to be with the trouble makers as the trouble got bigger.</p>
<p>Good luck to your D, OP. There were cuts for girl sports at our MS but not for all the boy sports (football and track) which I found to be unfair. Track was the only girl sport that was no cuts and it wasn’t until the spring. If she doesn’t make the team, can she play club or even take up a different sport? </p>
<p>Junior high was awful for me back in the dinosaur days. D hated her middle school - bored to tears academically, plagued by hormones running rampant, stressed by the girl-drama. S was fine until the summer before 8th grade, when he had anxiety issues (dragged him to a counselor, who told him he was fine - that seemed to help him!). </p>
<p>No advice from me, as you can see that my experiences were not all that and a bag of potato chips. The best I can say is, it doesn’t last forever.</p>
<p>My kids attended grade 6-8 middle school. Same school, totally different experiences. D had an easy time, made lots of new friends, enjoyed the activities (there were several and they did not cut kids). She was fortunate to have had a great core group of friends who stuck together and had almost no drama.The school itself was a very positive place.
Five years later, the administration’s attitudes had changed (gotten worse), several of the activities has vanished, parent involvement had declined and many good teachers were gone. Son’s experience was awful.</p>
<p>I went to a K-8 Catholic school. Our parents all patted each other on the back for keeping their children in “grade school” and not letting them go to junior high and grow up too fast. The joke was on them - we had more drama and snarkiness than the public school kids ever thought about having, probably because we’d been together since first grade and knew how to push each other’s buttons. S1 went to a preK-8 Catholic school, but the middle school grades were like a school within a school with regular adolescent activities. His closest friends are still the ones he made at this school and I believe he was one of the few kids I’ve known who was happier in middle school than high school. S2 switched to public school in 7th grade, due to our parish school’s closing of the middle school grades. It was an adjustment but he thrived there as well. Different kids, different experiences.
ETA: As for middle school vs. junior high, IMHO it’s all old wine in new bottles. Kids are kids no matter where they spend grades six through nine. I personally don’t like middle school - I think 6th graders belong in elementary and don’t like the idea of 9th graders being thrown in with soon-to-be 18 y.o. seniors who drive, etc. </p>
<p>Several of the prep schools start at 5th grade, but the private elementaries continue through 5th.
Unless it is on of the elementaries that just continues through 2nd grade.
D attended a school that went through 5th grade, as it was such a great fit for her, I never considered changing.
I wish it had gone through sixth, but as two of the schools she applied to for 6th started at 5th & one was k-12, plus we needed financial aid, it was competitive enough applying for middle school.</p>
<p>I attended junior high, and as a young 7th grader ( I had a late fall bd), remember being intimidated by the 14&15 yr olds in my elective classes.
They were very sophisticated seeming, and as several of them had even older sibs, they introduced the younger kids to all sorts of interesting activities.</p>
<p>Compared to my elementary school, my junior high was huge, and even if I hadn’t been sexually assaulted after school by a group of older boys, I still prefer the middle school model.</p>
<p>I didnt tell either kid about my experiences and theirs was much better than mine.</p>
<p>Yes, she can likely play another sport if she is cut. I am not sure she will want to. She may make some excuse out of embarrassment. She is used to doing things well. I have not heard good things about the 8th grade coach so maybe those stories have been shared with her as well. </p>
<p>Emeraldkity4. I am so sorry to hear of your horrible experience. It had not occurred to me that 8th graders might be quite that mean. I hope you have had some help dealing with it. </p>
<p>More tears last night when we needed to go to an awards dinner for DH. I lost my patience and told her she needed to stop using tears to try to get her way. We only stayed out 2 hours and she was fine when we got home but I did nothing to encourage good communication between us. </p>
<p>Oy! I say things like that sometimes. “I know you don’t want to x, but you have to. It is important to y. This is not negotiable.In a few years you will be out of the house and can do what you want.” My kids don’t cry, but there will be passive aggressive behavior and a massive slow down of getting ready. When I do blow my top, I go apologize later. I have an easier time apologizing to the kids than anyone else fwiw. I think it is because I am trying to set a good example for them so I try harder. </p>
<p>Thanks cheering section, i did tell my mom who told a school counselor, but as the boys were " popular", nothing as far as I know was done.
It then followed me to high school, which took me a while to figure out. I was being bullied because I was a curiosity ( I was more developed on top than some & I had red hair in a school where that was unusual)
I eventually transferred to an alternative school.</p>
<p>(((emeraldkity4))). I was an early bloomer too and I suffered for it, although I was never actually assaulted. People, especially kids, think because you have to a have a bra in third grade, you’re sexually precocious. When I was 12 I could easily pass for 15. Adults expected me to act with the “maturity” of a 15 y.o. and kids thought I had the “experience” of a 15 y.o. It was rough. </p>
<p>Results of tryouts will be shared tonight. Wish my DD luck!</p>
<p>Bestfriendsgirl. My D also gets the “you look so much older” comments. I feel I have to warn her about situations I never had to consider with DS. Good news is lots of the older guys at our school know her as DS’s little sister so she has lots of “big brothers” looking out for her. </p>
<p>I was the oldest in my family and never had anyone looking out for me and that made things even harder. </p>
<p>Ignoring is the best medicine. Paying attention will tell her that she is doing the right thing to pull your attention. No drama was ever allowed in our house, including kids and gradkids. I told everyone that crying means severe pain and the trip to emergency. If they do not want to be taken to emergency, then they better not cry. Of course, it is not easy to contain your PMS at certain age. But if they do not learn right from the beginning, then they will have to learn much harder way. D. thanked me many time over after witnessing certain behavior in HS. She never approved any type of drama in anybody.
However, you need to make sure that there is nothing really tragic is going on. If this is the case, then you need to correct the situation.<br>
And in regard to being busy, all of mine were and are very very busy. I mean busy to the point that every day is from 7am unitll 10pm without stopping at home. That is very helpful if activities are completely unrelated. It also has helped my D. tremendously at college, where they are pulled in difference directions - time managment skills that she has developed starting at 5 y o, ability to put everything into priority list and take everything one at a time without panic attack, this skills are the most importnat for the rest of their lives. And, yes, absolutely no time for drama, none, cannot do sport, cannot play piano and absolutely cannot go to college interview at the very selective program in a middle of drama. Got to swallow it down, put the smile and go on. This skill does not come naturally to anybody, it has to be developed.</p>
<p>She made the team!!! One stressor removed. Now she just needs orientation to go well and her class schedule to include at least a few friends and all will be well, I hope!</p>
<p>My DS2 started 8th grade at a new school today. He did not make GPA to stay in his magnet program and did not want to appeal. He had straight D’s in Math and Language Arts and some social drama, so I’m hoping a change of scene will be a good thing. </p>