“Walker’s is [what] strengthened my passion and devotion for community service.”
Your Middle Schooler Has Superpowers
Below, read comments from Middle School Program Coordinator and Math Teacher Lee-Ann Harris during the Middle School Open House on September 22, 2011.
Welcome to the Middle School Open House. We are so pleased to have you here tonight and proud that you trusted your daughters to us during this year. We have had a wonderful time getting to know them.
I want to talk to you tonight about middle school girls. As you probably have discovered, your daughter is changing more in these years than in any time of her life since infancy. You may have noticed that middle school girls make the best babysitters. Why? Because they still love to play — engaging their charge — yet are mature enough to make some responsible decisions. Yes, middle schoolers are a case study in contradiction. In the next few years you will see your daughter be sweet and sassy, responsible and rude, cuddly and stand-offish, needy and independent, kind and sometimes mean. And they can display these different attitudes in a matter of minutes.
Your daughter is growing and changing. And I have a secret that as a middle school teacher I probably should not tell you, but as a recent graduate of middle school parenthood, I feel a loyalty and duty to share with you. Your daughter has superpowers. You may doubt this. But if you talk with her when she comes home from school you can gather this evidence for yourself. Here is what you should be on the look out for:
- She can read minds. Your daughter now has the power to determine the thoughts of her peers, teachers, and yes, her parents, without a single word. What is the evidence? She will tell you facts such as, "Mrs. So-and-So doesn’t like me," or "Suzy hates my clothes."
- She can recall events for which she was not present. What is the evidence? Let's pretend she cannot find her math book. Your daughter will know that someone took it and hid it on her. She will also know why that person may have committed such an act. Unfortunately, this power is still developing so she will not always successfully recall where the book was hidden for a few days. It is amazing how many "stolen" items are "hidden" in the victim’s own locker.
- She is an Oscar-worthy actress. This is probably the one you will notice first. She may blush and stammer on stage, but she can cry on cue on the field and persuade you to buy an unnecessary item because she truly will die without it.
Those are just a few of her powers. I am pretty sure that presidential campaign managers have infiltrated a myriad of middle school cliques to learn the secret of planting a nugget of information and watching it morph and grow into a widespread rumor with the power of a category 5 hurricane to destroy.
I have often told my own children as well as my students to "use your powers for good." These "powers" show that your daughter is developing empathy, learning responsibility, showing leadership, and understanding friendship on a different level. She is developing an awareness of the needs and thoughts of others, a strong empathy that is allowing her to form stronger and more important bonds with her peers and her social group (an interesting research tidbit: studies show that a ten-year-old's greatest fear is being separated from her parents. A 14-year-old's greatest fear is that of separation or being ostracized by her peers).
As parents and teachers it is our responsibility to help our middle schoolers navigate these years of change. We can model for them that disagreements are not always personal attacks, that we are responsible for our words and actions, that doing the right thing may not be easy, but necessary. We can help them decide when to take care of something on their own and when to get an adult involved. We can assure them that seeking advice from an adult rather than a peer helps slow the growth of false information.
Now having said all this, I must tell you that the people standing here have all chosen to teach middle schoolers. We enjoy the play time and the serious time, even if we cannot always schedule it. We love that these girls have the carefree attitude of younger children. That gives them the freedom to take risks in the classroom. We are confident that you are not really going to kill her if she doesn’t do well on a test and we appreciate that as a middle schooler she is more likely to try harder after a failure than to give up. We know that she is going to laugh hard and cry hard without understanding why. We get that if we say, "I love your hair bow," she may take it as a compliment or interpret it to mean, "I haven’t liked any of your other hair bows." It is a chance we are willing to take.
The teachers that you see here have a passion for their subject, but we understand that these years are for skill building. We will guide your daughter to build study skills in the classroom, social skills in her friendships, and cooperative skills with team and group work. Tonight you will hear what each teacher is doing in his or her classroom to leverage your daughters’ power and help to "empower" the girls to do great things.
It is a safe time and we are a safe place for students, your daughters, to mess up, fail, disappoint and know that they will continue to be encouraged to overcome and move forward with confidence. I get very choked up at promotion when I see our rising ninth graders stand on the altar with grace and pride.
I am proud to be a middle school teacher. I am proud to share our program, designed to challenge your daughter to become the best teenager she can be, with you.
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Walker's Centennial
– Friya, ‘11
