Most people think I am absolutely bonkers for teaching middle schoolers, but I think it’s great! So much happens during these middle school years especially with the brain. Let’s learn a few brain facts about middle schoolers.
Between the ages of 10-15 the brain growth that will occur is the greatest during a human’s life! This means not only are middle school students going through puberty and other life changes but their brain is growing the most during this time.
Adolescents need at least 9 hours of sleep at night to be able to function best. I think most adults would laugh at that number and wish they got 9 hours of sleep every night. However as we just said the brain growth is the largest during this adolescent time therefore encouraging our students to get as much sleep as they possibly can will prove better in the long run.
Middle schoolers learn best through interaction and activity. Therefore constantly doing direct instruction will not help these students learn (especially when they can only focus for 10 minutes at a time), but doing projects and interactives and letting them work with peers with aide in the growth of knowledge.
Teens misinterpret emotions up to 40% of the time. Students these days are constantly used to texting, but being able to read someone’s emotions through a text is difficult even for adults. With less and less facial interactions occurring, teens will have an even more difficult time understanding the emotions of their peers and be even worse at properly conveying their own emotions.