This course focusses on understanding the needs of young adolescents, which involve identity formation, agency, self-discovery, and relationships. Signature pedagogies for middle school learners as well as current trends and recent research, for organizing and planning curriculum, transitions, and for structuring classrooms as learner centred spaces of intentional design are core content areas. Specific topics include characteristics of 10- to 14-year-olds and the implications for learning; curriculum integration through inquiry; building student-teacher, teacher-parent, and student-student partnerships; evaluation and assessment in the middle years; and balanced literacy and numeracy methodologies..