MIddle school student-teacher interaction

On Wednesday's class, a group presented on the book Not Much Just Chillin' by Linda Perstein. This book talks about the hidden lives of middle schoolers and what's going on in their minds, bodies, and in our society that causes them to be the way they are. Beside reflecting on my own middle school experiences, I got thinking about how I, as I future teacher, will impact the stereotypical middle schooler. I think there is currently a cyclical relationship between the middle school student and the teacher. Because of the stereotypes of middle schoolers being difficult the teachers may be more strict or not as excited about courses that they assume their students will not try at. Students see these attitudes of their teachers not expecting much of them and in return don't give the teacher much attention or effort in their classes. Teachers need to have more faith in the students and expect much of them. I think if the students see that the teacher is in invested and believes in them, then they will put forth more effort and get more educationally out of their middle school experience.

Chocolate Milk for Wellness??

Last week in class we talked about a competition that was put on by the Dairy Council in North Western Iowa: "Which school can drink the most chocolate milk:?" Decorah High School won. The prize money, around $15,000, is to be used for wellness activities/ facilities. I think this is irresponsible for a school to sponser a Chocolate milk contest.. 3 Cartons of chocolate milk (that the average Decorah high school kid consumed each day contains about 1/2 of the daily processed sugar that kids should be getting. I think the contest is a great idea to encourage milk drinking, but it should be WHITE milk! I am taking a Nutrition course this semester, and one day we discussed this event and its implications for children. By By encouraging kids to drink a few cartons of chocolate milk, we are in effect telling them that it is okay to eat that much sugar. Yes, kids are saying "At leeast it's better than pop." Sure, they may be right on that one, but there is still almost the same amount of sugar in both chocolate milk and pop. This contest just makes me laugh and cringe at the same time, thinking about how many more kids will now prefer chocolate milk to white milk.