Welcome to Middle School
Scared yet? You should be.
7 Secrets about your Middle School Kid
I’ve been a middle school teacher and parent for long enough that people question my sanity. Including my own middle school years, I’ve spent 14 years in middle school. My younger child just started 8th grade. I’m still functioning, and I even like my kids and their teachers!
1. Grades Don’t Matter
You may be led to believe something different. But as long as your kid is passing, grades really don’t matter. What matters is habits, skills, and personal growth. Those things are hard to measure, and grades can be an indicator. Middle school students need to screw up sometimes before they learn, and their grades sometimes won’t be great.
What does matter?
- Skills. Reading, writing, math. Your kid may know these things even if their grades don’t show it.
- School procedures, especially turning in assignments on time. Kids WILL mess this up, and their grades will suffer.
- Being a good human. Learning how to exist with other humans.
Please don’t punish your kid for bad grades. (It is okay, however, to punish for individual actions like missed assignments or breaking school rules.) And, whatever you do, DON’T WORK WITH THE TEACHER TO FIX YOUR KID’S GRADES. That does not help them. Because grades don’t matter.
2. Your Kid Will Do Stupid Stuff
Adolescent brains are strange, mysterious, changing, unknowable things. They are not like adult brains or like little kids’ brains. They are not even “in-between” brains. They will do stupid and risky stuff because they don’t know the difference between good risks and bad ones. That adolescent brain doesn’t distinguish between the risk of talking to the new kid at school, the risk of trying a new sport or musical instrument, and the risk of jumping off the roof. All we can do is talk to them about these things until they hear our voices in their heads to help them decide what to do in those moments.
While I’m on the subject, here’s a phrase to remove from your vocabulary until they’re at least high school juniors:
They won’t know. Don’t even ask.
3. This is a good time to let them fail.
Since grades don’t matter, and their brains are ready to grow by taking risks, middle school is a perfect time to practice failing. It’s not easy, as a parent, to let this happen. But in high school, everything starts to count! They’ll learn more by failing and recovering in middle school than if you bail them out and rescue them every time. Academically, let them see what happens when they miss an assignment or bomb a test. Socially, let them see what happens when other kids are jerks. Let them pack their own bag and forget things. Let them decide how to spend or save their money. When they fail, help them learn how to recover. But don’t bail them out or place blame.
My older kid and I had a ceremonial bonfire over one semester’s report card during 7th grade. No kidding. And then that semester was history and we never talked about it again.
4. They won’t believe your advice.
Go ahead and try, but they might not do what you suggest. All the more reason to let them fail!
5. Middle school is hard.
It’s hard academically. Their brains need stretching, and the teachers know it. Teachers will ask your kid to try things like critical thinking, research, engineering projects, writing, and pre-algebra. And sometimes they won’t know how. It’s okay. That’s how learning works.
It’s hard socially. Adolescents are jerks. They are self-centered and inconsiderate. Kids you knew in elementary school may seem like completely different kids in middle school. It happens at every school, too, because every middle school is populated with adolescents whose brains are developing too.
6. Your kid can do hard things.
They can learn some pre-algebra. They can learn to do research and write. They can cope with a jerk or a mean friend. They can recover after bombing a test. They can learn new sports and musical instruments. What they sometimes can’t do is believe in their abilities. “You can do hard things” is a good mantra to remember.
7. They will come back.
When my son turned 11, I was a teacher in his school. He turned into a creature that I did not recognize. A totally different kid. I had enough experience with middle schoolers and high schoolers to hope that I might see my real kid again at about age 17. Well, he turns 17 next month and is a really good kid. Interesting, smart, even — gasp — organized. But we endured a lot of nonsense while we waited. Every adolescent brain is different, though, and it doesn’t seem like there’s any way to make this happen faster.
Good luck. It’s only 3 years. You’ll both be okay.