ABSTRACT
For the past three years we have been working on a U.S. federal grant with a group of content area teachers in a local school district. Five middle schools1 are involved in the project and 26 content area teachers. We meet with the teachers for inservice workshops (six hours) about every eight weeks to help them implement an instructional model designed to improve reading skills for at-risk learners, including English language learners. We are in the second semester of the project, and today I am visiting classes for the first time at one of the middle schools. I must admit to being a bit shell-shocked! I worked in a middle school years ago, so I know that today’s experience was quite normal for middle schools; in fact, this is an exceptional middle school. No students are really misbehaving; nevertheless, the sheer level of noise is overwhelming in hallways between classes and in classrooms before instruction begins. It feels like everyone in the entire school is speaking at the same time. And, there is constant interpersonal drama in the hallways between classes-girls slamming lockers, boys rough-housing with each other, boys bopping girls and other boys on the head with books and pencils to get attention, boys bumping into girls and knocking everyone in nearest proximity to the event slightly off balance, including me on one occasion. The energy level is both exhilarating and exhausting.
