Turning Points 2000: Chapter 1 synthesis

Chapter 1: Turning Points: A Decade Later

Abstract:
The opening chapter discusses in detail what the Turning Points document/model is and the reasons why it needs to be implemented in schools. The list consisted of eight points: create smaller communities, core of common knowledge, organized to ensure success, that teachers and principals need to have a major responsibility and power, staff your school with expert teachers, promote good health, structural change, and it is crucial to get together and synthesize the lessons learned with most current research. This list was formed in the early 1990s and was then implemented in schools across the country; looking at the research and data, the schools who made changes to the system had markedly increased scores in reading, writing, and math. The chapter also talks in great details about the problems that middle school students are going through these days such as: teen pregnancy, teen STDs, and drugs. These are all major problems that teachers need to deal with on a daily basis. The chapter also does a great job of point out how middle school students are going through a period of great change whether it is biological, psychological, or social. The chapter leaves the reader with a sense that middle schools and middle school students have been neglected and much more focus must be placed on their growth and achievements.

Reflection:
One of the overwhelming themes of people’s reflections was that they learned quite a bit about middle schools in general. I got the sense that more than a couple people would be more interested in teaching middle school after reading this chapter. Many people acknowledged that the middle school years are one of, if not the most important, time in a kids life; at this stage, they are rapidly changing physically and emotionally yet they are completely capable of learning a great deal of information while dealing with all these “issues”. The vast majority of people commented that the Turning Points ideas were great and should be implemented in all schools because they are “cheap” changes, which benefit poorer schools, and because Turning Points has a track record of success. There were a couple people who agreed with the Points but wanted to also mention that there needs to be a fundamental shift across all schools – they mentioned that just making these changes are not enough; the teachers and administrators have to change their held beliefs on certain issues, namely whether or not EVERY student can learn, in order for the program to work. I also thought it was very interesting that many people brought up the idea of breaking the schools into communities either because they have heard how great that works or because they had those communities when they went to middle school. I think that is something we should definitely look at as a class when we are designing our middle school.