It is hard not to worry when kids transition to middle school! And so much of this depends on the individual teachers/schools involved. We are a bit further along in what seems to be a similar scenario to yours. Our twins were in a Title 1 school for K-5, and from there moved into one of the academically strongest public middle schools in our state. They are now finishing 7th grade. We worried about a lot of things when they started middle school, but in hind sight the transition was quite smooth, even though most of the elementary schools feeding into the middle school had higher average standardized test scores, etc.. In fact, paradoxically, we think the Title 1/Special Needs 'R Us elementary worked remarkably well for our kids. Differentiating over a huge range was routine in the elementary, and this helped them to both recognize our kids' differences and prepare them well for middle school.
If anything, we've found the focus at the middle school to be on supporting the kids in becoming more independent and responsible, sometimes sacrificing academic depth in the process. (And this is a school that routinely wins academic team competitions in a variety of subjects at the state level.) I get the feeling this high level of student support is pretty standard in middle schools (I believe I've read that this was a consideration in the switch from "junior high" to "middle" schools a few years back.)
Best of luck!
Last edited by amylou; 05/29/13 07:39 AM.
