Moving Up
The move from middle to high school is
one of those times when your child
needs you most, but is often too
embarrassed to ask for support. You
may have noticed that your child is
beginning to push away from you. Try
to respect this. On the other hand,
it's important to balance a respect
for your child's desire for
independence with a very real need to
stay involved in his life and
education.
Starting high
school is a major rite of passage for
adolescents, says George White,
associate professor of educational
leadership at Lehigh University in
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, and a former
middle-school principal. The social
and emotional fears that incoming
freshmen deal with can have a direct
impact on their academic performance.
Changes at
School
The difference in size of your child's
old and new schools can have a big
impact on her transition, says school
psychologist Sal Severe, author of
How to Behave So Your Child Will, Too!
Kids from smaller school districts may
face a kind of culture shock in large,
regional high schools. Larger class
sizes, more students, a bigger campus,
and teaching styles more focused on the
subject matter than the needs of
individual students can be difficult
for incoming freshmen. Parents should
expect schools to provide a protective
growth environment" for incoming
freshmen, George White says. The
developmental divide between
ninth-graders, who could be as young as
14, and upperclassmen, who could be
over 18, can be extreme. Exceptionally
bright ninth-graders can end up in
classes with much older teens and may
be unprepared socially. "There's a wide
range of social development in high
school. What you have to have is a
socially safe place for younger
individuals." Ninth-graders also face a
big step down in social status, going
from the top of the heap in their
previous school to the lowest rung in
high school.
Tips for
Parents
It's important to keep the lines of
communication open with your child
throughout this period. White likens
this to the experience of learning how
to ride a bicycle. "When I learned to
ride a bike, my father ran behind me
with his hand on the seat. When I
could ride without his support, he
still ran behind me for a while."
Although your child is becoming
independent, she needs support during
the process that only you, as a
parent, can provide. Sometimes
parent involvement drops off because
parents feel their children don? want
them to be around so much. "Kids want
their parents involved; they just want
them to be involved in a different
way," White says. For example, your
teen may not mind if you act as a
chaperone on a school trip, as long as
you ride on a different bus than him.
Excerpted
from "School Transitions: Middle
School to High School," published in
National PTA's Our Children
magazine.
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