Grade Level Transitions

For many, grade-level transitions traumatic

By Barbara F. Meltz, Globe Staff, 5/23/2002

Between mouthfuls of cereal one day, a fifth-grade boy asked his mother, ''What will happen to me next year?''

She was momentarily stumped. ''You mean, because you're going to middle school?''

He nodded, spoon in mid-air.

''What's it feel like to you so far?'' she asked.

''Scary,'' he said.

''Uh oh,'' she remembers thinking.

Remember your child's transition from preschool to kindergarten? Well, the move from elementary to middle school or middle school to high school is an even bigger deal. Most preschoolers don't get the symbolic significance of their step up; fifth- and eighth-graders absolutely do. The excitement, pride, and relief they feel often is mingled with sadness, loss, and worry: What if I'm not ready? Who will be my friends? How will I fit in?

About-to-be middle-schoolers typically see their transition as the beginning of being a teenager; they are most worried about how they will handle logistics and social issues, not academics. Entering high school, students tend to see their move as the end of childhood.

''The stakes are higher and they know it. They know they are stepping into a whole new level of decision-making, stress, expectations,'' says educator and author Rachael Kessler. She is director of the PassageWays Institute in Boulder, Colo., which develops programs for school transitions.

In this last month of school and off and on over the summer, parents may see mood swings as a student both tries on and backs off from her new identity. Just as a pre-kindergartner vacillates between feeling incredibly competent and feeling so scared of being grown up that she regresses, departing fifth- and eighth-graders are moving forward and backward, sometimes all in the same day.

''You'll see them acting less mature, less responsible, making poor decisions and acting out, and then turning around and demanding more respect and more freedom,'' says Kessler.

Needless to say, this is a tricky time for parents who often are as anxious, if not more so, as their children. ''It's important to understand the reason for the regression is that the system is getting ready for a leap forward,'' says Kessler. ''Parents have to be careful not to overreact by being too rigid and getting stuck in the moment, but also not to let go too soon and give too much freedom; even high school students need limits and rules. Finding the balance is a constant dance.''

In short, this is a time when children need a lot of support.

Gayle Vonasek is up to her ears in support. She is principal of the Hardy Elementary School in Wellesley, where redistricting means this year, she not only oversees the annual transition of fifth-graders to middle school but also says goodbye to some children in every grade.

While there is always some looking ahead to next year for fifth-graders, including a tour of the middle school and conversations with middle school teachers, Vonasek's focus is to celebrate students' experiences at Hardy. Every spring, in a rite of passage that is anticipated excitedly, she invites a few fifth-graders at a time for Friday lunch in her office. First she asks about favorite memories, favorite teachers, favorite books. Then she asks, ''Is there anything else you want to talk about?'' Always, there is this: ''I'm nervous about getting lost next year.'' ''I'm worried about how I will make new friends.'' ''I'm wondering how I will keep my old friends.''

In a survey of students entering middle school, Pennsylvania State University researcher Susan McHale uncovered a litany of similar fears, from the mundane (worry about finding their locker) to the scary: ''They're worried about getting beaten up; that people, including teachers, come to school drunk; and that people sell drugs in the hallways. Middle school obviously has a bad reputation,'' says McHale.

Unfortunately, what students hear is not altogether unfounded. ''There is less adult supervision,'' she says. ''A lot of stuff does happen in the bathroom and in hallways.'' The best way to allay fears is to air them, and the best way to do that, McHale says, is for elementary school principals to invite current sixth-graders back to school to tell fifth-graders how they handled their fears and how realistic they were.

While first-born children (and their parents) tend to be the most worried, even later-born children can be anxious. They've been soaking up information all along from a sibling's experience, whether it was a positive or negative one. In addition, McHale says, ''First-borns can be nurturing and protective of a younger sibling, but they can also tell terrifying stories to make a younger sib shake in her boots.'' Because parents may never know what one sibling tells another, she recommends also having resources from outside the family to whom you and your child can talk casually: ''Ask the child next door, `So what's your advice about middle school now that you've been there two years?'''

In any grade as school winds down, classroom dynamics can fall apart. ''Even if a group has worked well together and kids have affection for each other, when a class is about to disband, there can be acting out and meanness. It's a way for them to separate,'' says Pamela Seigle, director of Open Circle at Wellesley College, a social and emotional learning program for elementary schools.

One end-of-the-year Open Circle conversation is to ask: What's it been like to be part of this class? Another asks children to analyze each other's strengths. One of Seigle's favorite projects is for children to make a book about their year to give to the incoming class. These ideas work not just for students who are leaving a school but also for those stepping up to the next grade, which can have its own traumas: Will the next teacher be nice? Will I be with my friends? Will I be able to do the work?

''It's a way for all children to reflect and see their own growth,'' Seigle says.

Kessler tells parents to tell their child: ''This is a shift in your life. It's normal to have mixed feelings. There will be other times like this, so the more you learn how to do it strongly, by acknowledging both kinds of feelings, the better you'll be at it next time.''

The end of elementary and middle school is a rite worth noting, but McHale and Kessler urge parents and schools not to over-do it. They prefer a farewell assembly to a graduation, certificates rather than diplomas, and no caps and gowns until high school. ''It devalues what will come later,'' says McHale.

It is possible also to talk too much about the transition. ''The goal is to make them conscious, not afraid,'' says Kessler. By that, she means being honest. Yes, middle school has a different teacher for every subject. It is harder to get to know six or seven teachers instead of two or three, but the teachers are caring, friendly people, just like your teachers now.

It also means keeping yourself under control. ''Children will reflect the feelings you project,'' Vanasek says. She often sees parents who are genuinely very sad to leave the elementary school. That loss, coupled with their own, perhaps unpleasant, memories of middle or high school, can combine to make parents overly anxious.

''If you're thinking about sharing memories with your child, ask yourself, `Who am I doing this for?' Usually, it's for yourself,'' says Kessler. ''Just being conscious of your experience is often enough to enable you to connect with your child in an empathetic way.''

Afterthought: Wonderful reading for a preschooler making the transition to kindergarten: ''Tom Goes to Kindergarten'' by Margaret Wild and David Legge (Albert Whitman Co). For a first- or second-grader who gets cold feet at the end of the summer: ''I Don't Want to Go Back to School'' by Marisabina Russo (Greenwillow Books).