Childhood obesity has reached epidemic levels in developed countries and is showing no signs of abating. The causes of obesity in adolescence are extremely complex, and therefore approaches to prevention and treatments must be multifaceted. Early adolescence is a developmental period when youth are becoming more independent, are influenced by…

The author describes an arts resource center, which serves elementary and middle-school teachers and students. The ARC (Arts Resource Center) provides an area for creating instructional materials, brainstorming, researching, and for conducting classes in arts and workshops for both art and classroom teachers. (KC)

Maintains that creative drama is an effective strategy for instruction and assessment in science classes. Describes a two-week summer program for high-achieving science and math middle school students which involved creative drama. (SR)

To circumvent typical public schooling restrictions, an upstate New York middle school established a Lab School that functions outside the regular program. Lab School aims to provide practice in intellectual inquiry, delve into complex, demanding topics, create an interdisciplinary, problem-oriented curriculum, and experiment with assessment…

The Work as a Topic of Study program is described as a vehicle for making academic study more relevant to the middle school student's future role as a productive worker. Following an argument for maintaining a flexible middle school curriculum which contributes to the social development of students, the five school districts currently…

Outlines characteristics of effective alternative programs for at-risk middle schools students, noting organizational, instructional, and interpersonal components. Describes a successful drop-out prevention program which operates as a school-within-a-school for sixth- through eighth-grade students, emphasizing multicultural education and…

The middle school program emerged against a backdrop of criticism, awareness of changing educational necessities and values, and new insights into the needs of the middle range of the student population. The precocity of youth mixed with the pseudo-sophistication of adulthood gives the middle school its reason for existence--the…

The multi-age teams (MATs) at one Georgia middle school fostered continuous, individual student progress unachievable in more conventional classrooms. In MAT groups, assignments to classes were based on students' interests, abilities, performance, and other maturational factors, regardless of chronological age. Opportunities for remediation and…

Two teacher participants in a Georgia multi-age project offer principles for effective middle-school practice. Teachers should include kinesthetic activities and the arts; believe in every student's learning potential; make learning fun and engaging; use interdisciplinary and thematic approaches; assess their progress; and create learning…

Renne (Oregon) Intermediate School offers an innovative program of personalized instruction to students in grades 6-8. Teachers work closely with individual students, following a continuous progress curriculum which allows cross-grade-level placement in the core areas of math, reading, and language arts. Based on cooperative district planning, the…

A project to help teachers use technology to enhance learning is tied to the Lewis and Clark Expedition bicentennial, to bring a sense of adventure to learning. A 3-day outdoor workshop emphasizing the Nez Perce role in the expedition and a mapping project tracing changes in Lewiston (Idaho) had 8th-graders using global positioning systems,…

Meeting the needs of the nation for science teachers who can prepare future citizens for a technological world requires a new curriculum. Middle school science education spans all of the natural sciences and therefore a college program to prepare teachers for this kind of assignment should include a strong background in interdisciplinary science…

Identifies environmental and economic concerns related to Georgia's coastal areas, describes the content and methodology sections of a K-12 social science and science program about coastal Georgia, and provides a sample activity on population in the coastal areas for the middle school. (DC)

The Technology Enhancing Achievement in Middle School (TEAMS) instructional model is an instructional approach in which technology plays an integral part in the curriculum. This article describes why TEAMS was developed, how instructional units are organized, presents key elements of the model, and first year results. Includes a sample sixth grade…