Ch. 2 of Turning Points 2000: A Design for Improving Middle Grades Education

Ch. 2 Turning Points 2000
A Design for Improving Middle Grades Education

The design begins with an average 15 year old and contributions he or she should be able to bring to society. They chose a 15 year old primarily because that age is the transforming age from young adolescent to adolescent. Everything an adolescent obtains would have been learned by this point in time. The average 15 year old should be an intellectually reflective person who is on the right track for a lifetime of meaningful work. This 15 year old is a good, caring and ethical citizen who is mostly of good health. To ensure all adolescents grow up in this standard model of the 15 year old, we must first obtain a goal of success for every student. These goals are backed up by a list of 8 principles or recommendations (pg 23-24). The two that stood out was to (1) be proactive instead of reactive, meaning every teacher should look for the silver-lining, the good in the students and (2) collaborate, meaning that everyone (students, teachers, parents, administrators, and the community at large) should be on the same page. This collaboration helps bounce ideas back and forth and make students feel important and attainable. With collaboration there forms a mutual respect for one another. Turning Points is also used to help us teach a core of curriculum knowledge that ties in to adolescent concerns. When the materials interest the students’, they are more apt to be engaged and focused on the learning as a whole. Therefore, the main goal with teaching by the Turning Point Standards is to ensure that every student fulfills Turning Point vision of becoming an intellectually, reflective person, a person en route to a lifetime of meaningful work , a good citizen, and a caring/ethical individual as well as being a healthy person. Turning Points should work as an intangible method in young adolescent life; it is stagnate whereas everything and everyone around us is changing. It helps pressure this ability that we need something steady in our lives for success and obtaining our goals as individuals. This should start at home, but for those less-privileged the school and the teachers must provide a base and that is where Turning Point takes a role in young adolescent’s lives and well-beings.