Chapter 2: A Design for Improving Middle Grades Education

This chapter mentioned the seven recommendations for improving middle grades schools. These recommendations, I thought, were similar to suggestions to high school teachers. For example, it’s suggested that teachers teach the curriculum on bases where the students should know and be able to perform the tasks related to the content. This is very similar to the idea of the Know, Understand, Do (KUD) process that is presented at a high school level. The seven recommendations mentioned in the text are very informative and have great potential; however, if there is no structure for these accommodations, the results will be unsatisfactory. Richard Elmore made the suggestion of “dividing teachers and students into teams, modifying schedules, and creating decision-making teams” (pg. 29), but if these processes are not carried out all the way through, then the teacher will not get his/her desired results.