Introduction
The movement from a certain state to another is known as a transition. The informal transitions are part of an individual’s daily life. An example of an informal transition is a movement from home to school or to work. In addition, the formal transitions are part of the individuals’ experiences. For example, a formal transition between institutions, a movement from home to a certain health institution. Another formal transition is the movement from early childhood education to school. Particularly, one of the major transitions is the transition from home to work or to school. The main reason of these major transitions is that the movement is considered as a turning point on an individual. It is a turning point because the moment he or she experiences the transition, it changes his or her role, behavior towards things, and the responsibility in the society. In addition, the transition from home to hospital is a major transition; it changes the role of an individual from a member of a family and becomes a patient. The behavior changes from active to passive as what others expect from the condition. Similarly, the transition for children or young people are interesting, especially the school transition they experience have the powerful and lifelong effects on their academic lives. Kennedy, Cameron and Greene emphasize that the Department of Education with the core purpose of the Children’s Center, the institution adopts a position on the issue of transition readiness. Particularly, for children, the transition from a secluded primary location to a secondary school geographical location affect their entire being. However, the student mobility is a sensitive issue and challenges highlighted in the transition as students face the situation. One of the changes most students face during the transition is the adjustment from their previous environment or traditional setting of the more complicated school environment where they moved in . Every transition stage demonstrates risks of different degrees for the students. In the next stage, the common risks among the children or students are the lack of preparation and readiness, respectively. Consequently, these risks resulted in the loss of progress among the children and the difficult time to cope with the issue. Moreover, the children or students who experienced the loss of progress are at risks of school disengagement or no interest to continue their schooling. The transition can contribute to the accumulating factors that can result in a gradual withdrawal from schooling if not prevented and guided by school authorities and parents. Readiness appears in children to be ready for school, the schools are ready for the rich variety of experiences, skills, and knowledge every unique child brings can have.
Normative School Transition
A school transition is the movement of students who go through different experiences as they change schools all the way through their lives. School transitions play a vital role in the development of the decision-making of young children with the guidance of their parents and it serves as a milestone that directs them in many ways. Peters presents the two kinds of school transitions: (1) the normative school transitions; and (2) non-normative school transitions. A normative school transition refers to a transition of a student from several stages in school from elementary to middle school and high school. The students’ transition involves different important matters and the students go through various changes in their academic lives. The changes include the size of the school, new classmates and friends, and the new environment. Every student has different approaches as they adapt to normative transition. Some adapt the transition easily, others see it very difficult to handle. Miller affirms that the gender, race, age, location, and academic capacity to affect the transition process of the students. It implies that the students who arrive at a new school with their expectations, it can influence on how they perform in the new environment. The students build new relationships with their new classmates and peers as a part of their collective expectations.
Non-Normative School Transition
On the other hand, Peters states that non-normative school transition is a transition wherein the students experience it when they transfer from a school to another. The transition is less common compared with the normative school transition, however, it occurs often practically. At times, some individuals end up making non-normative school transition when they participate in the school choice programs. The school choice program is part of the policy utilized by many schools, especially, providing the families or parents public funds to support their children’s education and help their children to decide the education they prefer. In particular, the school choice programs allow the participants to choose from the different types of schools that include different charter schools, tax credits for private schools, and magnet programs. The school choice programs cause an increase in advantages for private schools but have fewer improvements in public schools. The issue in public schools is a sign of the increasing issue of inequality. Evidently, the private schools benefit with the school choice programs because there is stability in terms of financial matters and allows the families to easily choose or decide where to send their children in accordance with their school preferences. However, Miller affirms that many of the low-income families do not have enough resources, money in particular. They cannot afford to send their children to private schools. Often, the lower-income families prefer to send their children within the community they are residing to avoid higher expenses. Whereas the wealthier families take the advantage of the school choice programs and send their children to private schools and higher-rated public school in the faraway city.
Effective Analysis of Issues and Approaches
Guidelines on good practice and formal systems evaluate the common practices of transition. With the help of the government, the educational system can deliver and provide the best options and guide the parents to decide for the best interest of their children. In fact, the government provides effective ways to assist the families in ensuring safety and comfort for the children and their parents, especially the knowledge about the preferred school. The safety and comfort of the children or students with their parents are the priorities of the educational system during the transition process. Peters presents the guidelines that include the information, materials regarding the school, conversation with the teachers, and meetings with the staff and other children. The school visit prior to the school days helps a lot wherein the students and parents can observe the new environment. Some schools structured the first day of the new students, especially in the grade 7 in order for the students to familiarize the space and facilities of the school without other students around. Moreover, Evangelou, Taggart, Sylva, Melhuish, Sammons and Siraj-Blatchford affirm that to aid the continuity of the school curriculum wherein majority of the schools used some bridging materials effectively. For example, the schools are still using the same books or workbooks in the grades 6 and 7. The usage of the same workbooks is one way of sharing the information in terms of skills and understanding levels of the children’s achievements and level of lessons.
Children’s Experiences and Learning
The Ministry of Education commissioned the transition from early childhood education to school. The system deepens the understanding of transition to school by critical analysis. A study shows that the attitudes of the students entering the secondary level from the primary level have settled well and have a positive behavior in the new school, especially in the first term. Moreover, there are high proportions of students performing well in their school works and good apprehension from the majority who are happier than what they originally expect from the start of the school year. Peter presents the core view of the real picture of successful transitions. The successful transitions, consider significant factors that strongly motivates the children to perform well and show how confident the students are in facing the transition processes. Correspondingly, those children who undergo a transition received support from the teachers and parents successfully. When children or students experience transitions, they tend to change in many ways, especially in their learning. Thus, the transitions have great implications towards the learning and development of the children or the students involved. It implies that it is worthy to allocate more attention to the level of learning of the children. However, Peters demonstrates that the academic capability of a child would have a lesser outcome when the students are discontented with their new classmates or friends. Another factor, the issues of the school facilities such as playgrounds or lavatories. The poor teacher-student relationship can affect the satisfactions of the children or students, especially when there is no proper motivation made by the teachers. Additionally, the low expectations create negative results to the children’s learning. It only shows that the success of the transition is linked to the learning outcomes of the children. The success of the transition depends on how the relationships are nourished to those who are involved in the situation. It is a fact that the peer relationships and teacher-student relationships are very important in the transition process.
Issues
Systematically, different studies show more evidence after thorough examinations regarding the transition to school. Particularly, in the issue of school transition, the complexity of it is highly recognized by using the different factors that highly influenced the learning of the children during their transition experiences. In addition, the diversity that existed in the certain group or between groups of children is acknowledged and considered as a process and not an event. In the analysis of success, the educational system works constantly and effectively and considers the long-term perspectives and the system do not settle only for the initial knowledge or skills. It implies that during the examination or evaluation of the transition success, the different theoretical views embodied the significant matters valued in due course. Additionally, the analysis includes the various perspectives considered by the educational system. In fact, the evaluation involves the children, families, teachers, school, and other participants. It is necessary to determine the success by considering the different perspectives involved.
Readiness
With regards to the review of literature or school practices, the different transitions reveal the significant developments with emphasis on the different key concepts. One of the key issues in the transition is the readiness of the children. When the children are ready, they have the capacity to participate actively and successfully in the next different school stages or where they prefer to transfer. The students who are ready possess the well-balanced range of capabilities of the different range of dimensions. Commonly, the dimensions represent the capabilities of the children with readiness in the transition period. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene affirm that those children or students are ready to possess good physical interests, socially and emotionally ready, equipped enough to face challenges in learning new things (e.g. Language and cognitive development). Moreover, the school influences the transitions, especially the results of the components of readiness. The components of readiness are the students, school, families (parents), and the community. Strategically, the components are incorporated with significant approaches to fulfill the transition objectives. In view of reality, the components are linked with the schools’ curriculum that functions effectively when all other components are the main attention of the partnerships of the major components of readiness. Additionally, when the schools offer more safety in terms of culture and environment, it means that the school is ready as well. It offers good services to support the challenges of the children and parents, welcomes everyone, and recognizes the true meaning of partnerships among the components of readiness. Above all, the entire school is ready when they have ready and competent teachers and staff.
Social and Emotional Issues
Additionally, most teachers from the primary and elementary levels describe social, emotional, and academic characteristics are necessary for the children to participate in the school activities. The key characteristics to have a positive outlook and interest in learning are the high self-esteem and confidence of the children. The social skills are essential to the students when they are ready to mingle with other students and essentially create the good relationship with their teachers. The ability to interact with others is a sign that the students have achieved the high academic capacity that helps the students to cope with some transition issues. Thus, the disadvantaged school teachers described the distance between the culture of care of the primary school and the academic and examination-oriented culture of the second level as a major obstacle to successful transfer. They believed that in many cases, students are not ready to form relationships and meet the demands of some teachers in contrast to what they perceived as the significant, familiar and more intense and caring relationship at the start. The best approach for the children, their parents, and schools is to address the important transition issues such as the social adjustment, institutional adjustment, curriculum interest, and readiness.
Role of Parents
The parents play a vital role during the process of school transfer of their children. However, the idea of the parents’ role is less discussed in the literature study. Accordingly, the role and experiences of parents during transfer have been neglected in a discourse that has reflected the dominant professional perspective construing transfer as an experience that affects only teachers and children. Similarly, Miller emphasizes and highlights the difficulties that most parents experience at the time of transfer, particularly parents from the lower social class groups with less formal schooling. It only entails that the literature on the social class and education suggests that the parents who left school without completing the second level do not have the same cultural capital as parents with more formal qualifications and cannot engage with the system. As a result, the children are at a disadvantage when their parents are not familiar with the more specialized and technical knowledge of second level schooling. In addition, their parents are unfamiliar with the system and culture at second level. At times, the parents are unaware of the significance of institutional practices in the school, consequently, are less interested in the schooling of their children. Thus, starting school is an important moment for most children and their families.
Role of Teachers
In the first year of life, the transition from home to early year’s settings, or from early years setting in school, is increasing interest to policymakers in the different part of the world. In Europe, the Government-commissioned reports highlighting the significance of a child’s early years of intervention or help when difficulties are first identified. Kennedy, Cameron, and Greene demonstrate that the Department of Education on the core purpose of Children’s Centers highly considers the different issues of transition readiness with the different skills, knowledge, and experiences. Further evidence of this expectation includes:
The new focus of the Department of Education in the major areas of learning in the Early Years Foundation Stage. The children are ready and can learn new things at the school where they transferred. The department has created a website that most parents and teachers can access and learn best recommendations to ready themselves for school. Lastly, the new introductory progress evaluates children as early as two years old through educational assessment performed by respective practitioners of the field of expertise. The assessment served as an assurance that the related issues of the children’s learning and development are being addressed and identified earlier .
The perspective of transition ranges with different psychological theories that can be applied to understand the transition. For example, the transition from nursery to a school, it is viewed that the physical relocation from home or early years setting in a school changed the specific role of a child to becoming a student.
In enhancing readiness, the teachers play a vital role as models and leaders to develop the positive relationships. Through their guidance, the children can develop their skills and can interact better with others, and children can enjoy the new and supportive environment. The teachers are expected to be more responsive to any situation and attend the needs of the children. They passionately facilitate the needs of the families who are engaging their time with the children in the school. The teachers should conduct proper connections with the community prior to the school setting in order to achieve the best interest of the children. Particularly, the effective and knowledgeable teachers are the keys to enhancing a better school transition. The teachers are the frontliners of the educational system. They help the students to face different challenges and aid the students to develop the readiness they need at every stage of learning. The school culture and leadership of the teachers acknowledge and support the students in learning different things activities in the school. The teachers assist the entire objectives and plans of the school and consistently work to maintain and sustain the effective strategies for the engagement and learning of the children. Moreover, the teachers should focus on the best interest of the students by applying the effective strategies in order to meet the needs of the children or students, especially those who are struggling from the effects of the transition process.
Conclusion
The schools that possessed readiness have created a positive environment that welcomed those children or students from other schools who experienced transition issues. The fundamental characteristics of the school culture are highlighted to show that every component of readiness is linked to the success of the transition. The outcomes of the successful transition reflected the improvement of the children and students with the help of the teachers and staff. Most schools and their competitive teachers demonstrated quality leadership, especially the school heads performed the critical role in improving student learning. Thus, the strong leadership of the teachers and with the help of the parents contributes to the transition that is more effective. The school readiness is important for the success of the children’s learning and development. It demonstrated that the school readiness has multiple dimensions. The parents, especially the teachers have their own definition of school readiness. The parents defined readiness as an academic readiness while the teachers defined it as a social sphere of influence. Overall, the study emphasized that the social and well-developed abilities provide a foundation for academic success. In conclusion, the success of the students and the school are the product of the contributions of ideas and knowledge and the positive relationships created during the transition process. Moreover, the support and attention of the children’s families contributed many things to the safety school environment.
Reference
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