I too will be facing the Jr. High scene this fall. I have heard of some of the local schools that provide a 4 week summer program for about $80 in which the new 6th graders attend the Jr High school from 8:00am to 1:00pm 4 days a week. They get used to changing classes, (bell rings)finding their lockers, without the fear and pressure of the older students around. Many parents are taking advantage of this program to ease the stress a little.
It is so great to get some input. I believe our jr. high also hosts a "get together" activity for our children. However, after reading your email I see that your jr. high starts with 7th grade. The situation we are in is our jr. high starts with 6th grade. Our parents are very concerned about the transition at this age. The parents, as do I, feel that 6th grade is a very crucial age for our children. Not only are they discovering their personalities, they are trying to see how they fit in and are going through personal self changes. We feel if we, as a strong parent base, could find a way to get these children together early in elementary, and continue throughout elementary, there will be less of a "social shock" when they get to jr. high. As with your school they have no idea they are 1/3 of their graduating class.
Perhaps some background info. will be helpful. Our neighborhood alone has 3 elementary schools with 2 different school zonings. 2 elementaries go to 1 jr. high, the third goes to whole different district. Our 3rd elementary zoned to our jr. high is about 15 miles away. By the way our jr. high is brand spanking new - 2 years old as a matter of fact, and has reached it's capacity and then some. After attending a district board meeting concerning district growth, we were informed, in order to keep up with the continual growth in our area the district would have to build 1 elementary school per year for the next five years. Egads! We should also expect to see temp. buildings outside the new jr. high school for classroom overflow. There seems to be some discipline problems as a result of the close quarters and the age difference between 6th and 8th graders. As someone put if very well to me, 6th graders still run to lunch, 7th and 8th graders are WAY TOO COOL FOR THAT!
We do have a bond vote coming up, but we're not sure how that will turn out - we are trying to be pro-active versus re-active. We are working on informing our community about the importance of voting for the bond to attain a seperate 6th grade school, but are also concerned with how to react if we do not obtain one.
BIG ISSUES FOR A NEW PRES. ELECT. but I'm certain we can overcome them.
Too much info, or helpful for input?
let me know what you think.
We have 4 elementary schools that feed into one jr high school. In May, the jr high sponsors a visitation for all incoming 7th graders and their parents. The parents go to the auditorium for info sessions and the kids are split up into "search parties" for a scavenger hunt. Each group is comprised of students from each of the elementary schools and they have to find their way around the jr high and find different objects (a certain microscope from the science lab, gym teachers stopwatch etc.) It gets them familiar with the building and they meet kids from the other schools.
Our elementary schools are so spread out in town that the only kids that seem to know each other are usually the ones that play little league or soccer. Many don't realize that the 60-70 kids they know from elementary school are just 1/4 of the almost 300 kids that will be in their high school graduationg class.
Although this is sponsored by the district, the Jr/Sr high PTSA provides snacks and has a sign up table in the cafeteria were students and parents meet up at the end of the night. It is a good time to recruit parents to get involved at the next level when it seems this is when parent involvement tends to drop off. It has worked out quite well and seems to get bigger every year.
Also, the "search teams" are led by Key Club volunteers and the competition to find the most items on the list has become a little intense amongst the key clubbers.(all in good fun of course)
Our PTO is in the process of finding/creating ways to ease the transition from Elem. School to Jr. High. Some things we are considering are teaming up with the 2 other Elem. that will flow into Jr. High with us and perhaps having special events/programs with them. I guess what I'm asking is has anyone done this before, and are there any ideas on how to get it off the ground?
Thanks for any input!
