As teachers, we all know that the classroom experience every day involves much more than just the material we teach. Students come to school with their own set of experiences and expectations, and that can shape how they absorb the material and interact with their peers and educators.
Some students have a stronger foundation of what we would call “real-life skills,” while others may need some of those key concepts reinforced to make them more productive in the classroom.
Teaching real-life skills to middle school students is part of what educators need to do to set students up for success. When students have the right tools and mindset, they learn more effectively and help the teacher by working at the right level.
What are Real-Life Skills?
Real-life skills are the skills many of us need to know to navigate the world, such as organization and time management. It would be difficult to function as a society if everyone did not possess a basic level of skills, and that is why teaching middle school students real-life skills is so important.
Middle school is a great time to get students on the right track to more independence in their work. Through that, they can learn about accountability, expectations, and social skills.
Teachers may often focus on the lesson at hand while trying to get students engaged and interested in the material. While this is important, it’s also important to remember the critical and influential role educators play in the day-to-day lives of their students.
Students need more than just academics, and laying the groundwork for successful real-world interactions by teaching real-life skills is something that will benefit everyone involved.
How Can Teaching Real-Life Skills Help in the Classroom?
When students have learned how to navigate real-life skills, they can become more accountable, responsible and more confident. By knowing they have the skills to manage a situation or critically think about an issue, students can become more engaged with what they are learning, and it can help them develop a stronger sense of self.
As teachers, we want our students to feel confident and academically successful. When teachers incorporate teaching real-life skills into the classroom, it can help create an environment that is beneficial to students and teachers.
When students develop real-life skills, they communicate and interact more easily with both educators and peers, which can help lead to a calmer classroom and one that is easier to manage. That is a benefit for everyone, and it can especially help take some of the stress away from day-to-day issues for busy educators.
Top 5 Real-Life Skills for Middle School Students
Time Management
This one is key. Think about how chaotic the world would be if everyone just did everything on their own schedule, with no regard for the time of others. When children are young, families often build schedules around them. As children grow older, they need to learn how to manage their time independently.
As teachers, we play a crucial role in helping students develop these skills. They will not only help students in the classroom, but also outside of the classroom. Some ways teachers can help students learn time management include helping students understand how to prioritize tasks, helping them create schedules to handle their activities and workload, and guiding them in managing deadlines.
Teachers can help students map out their time with time audits and by helping them plan out when they will work on a large assignment.
Organization
Managing life without some level of organization can be extremely difficult. Everyone needs to have some systems in place for tracking where things are, what needs to be done, and plans for how that work will get done.
Teaching real-life skills to middle school students includes helping them get organized. It can be difficult if they have never had to take on those kinds of tasks before, but it’s a necessary skill that everyone can benefit from.
Teaching organization does not have to be hard. It can be done as a routine part of regular lessons, such as having students keep a Reading Journal, and can include something as basic as having students keep track of their assignments and deadlines using a paper agenda, notebook or online space such as Google Classroom.
Students can also learn organization by being guided to organize their notes effectively. When teachers set out the structure for them as to how to bring information together in a clear and concise way, it helps students learn this important skill. To learn more about teaching note-taking skills, check out this blog post, 12 Great Ways To Teach Note-Taking Skills. You can also teach note-taking during your regular daily lessons.
If you want students to take more ownership of their learning, check out this Non-Fiction Book Report where students select a topic of interest, read the book and then create an informative lesson based on information learned in their readings to share with the class. Students take on the role of the teacher with this assignment, and it allows them to practice organizing their thoughts and sharing information with their peers.
Students can also be encouraged to keep a tidy desk or workspace so that they know where all the material they may need is located. This can save frustration for students and teachers since the goal is to be able to find the necessary tools for learning when they are needed. Showing students how much easier it can be when everything has a place and can be retrieved quickly and efficiently can be a good encouragement for helping to build good organizational habits.
Communication Skills
This is a must for everyone, and it’s something that adults can struggle with as well. Communication can be difficult in some situations, but it’s important that everyone learn communication skills and tries their best to connect with others in thoughtful, sensitive and respectful ways.
Teaching real-life skills includes helping students learn how to communicate and how to communicate better. Some students may struggle with this more than others. That can depend on the behaviour they have seen modelled for them, whether they are more introverted or extroverted, and what they have previously been taught.
As adults, it is important to know how to articulate our thoughts and feelings in a clear and concise way. When students start learning these skills, it helps to set them up for success academically and into adulthood.
Communication is not just about expressing oneself, but it’s also about listening to other people and being able to process what they feel or need. This is crucial not only in an academic setting but also in personal settings, such as with friends and family. Students can practice their listening skills during lessons, like this Mars Patel Podcast Unit, which allows students to enjoy a great story while working on listening and comprehension.
Teachers can model good communication through their own actions in the classroom. They can also help students develop the tools to more actively listen and to express their thoughts clearly and calmly. This can be as simple as asking a student to rephrase what they are trying to say, or gently guiding them as they look for the words they would like to use.
It’s also important to recognize and praise student efforts around listening and communication, as this will help them build confidence and let them know they are on the right path to being an effective communicator.
Emotional Intelligence
This is a crucial set of skills that many adults are still learning and developing. This is why teaching real-life skills that include emotional intelligence is so important for middle school students. The more practice everyone has learning these skills, the bigger the benefits for us all.
Emotional intelligence includes understanding and responding to the emotions of other people and also recognizing and responding to your own emotions. It’s likely everyone knows someone who may speak too soon or too brusquely during an interaction, but it’s also likely everyone knows someone they view as in control of their emotions who helps guide difficult conversations with calmness and patience.
Students are still building their emotional toolkit on how to interact with the world, including teachers, peers and family. It’s important to recognize that helping them build these tools will benefit everyone and give them a firm footing heading into their teenage years and adulthood.
Problem Solving and Critical Thinking
Young people today have so much information available to them on just about any topic one can imagine. It’s available quickly and in abundance. While it can be great to have information and potential answers available so quickly, it also makes it that much more critical that students have the skills to process that information in a way that will make it understandable and reliable.
All adults need to know how to evaluate information, analyze situations and think creatively to solve problems. These are things adults must do on a daily basis. Teaching real-life skills to middle school students that include these skills is an important foundation for their academic and personal development.
Free Reading Strategies Graphic Organizers
Activities that involve problem-solving, fact-checking and developing thoughtful opinions can all help students develop critical thinking skills. Teachers should check out these Reading Strategies Graphic Organizers, which are designed to help students engage, connect and think critically about their reading.
Digital Escape Rooms
Another activity is digital escape rooms, where students work together or independently to solve challenges that are both engaging and interesting to students. They also encourage students to engage in critical thinking and problem-solving as they activate prior knowledge or review content learned in the classroom. You can find a wide range of digital escape rooms from 2 Peas and a Dog on Shopify CAD or Teachers Pay Teachers USD.
More Real-Life Skills for the Middle School Classroom
While there are key skills that teachers may want to focus on, there are also other real-life skills that benefit students.
These can include:
- Helping students learn about digital literacy. A great comprehensive resource is my Middle School Digital Citizenship Unit, which features lessons on smartphone app privacy, influencer marketing, common scams and more.
- Teaching effective study skills, such as summarizing information, taking notes and reviewing material. Check out Helping Reluctant Students Prepare for Tests if this is a topic you might need information about.
- Teaching basic financial, cooking, health and hygiene literacy, such as understanding money management, how to prepare a simple meal, and maintain good personal habits. My Healthy or Junk Food? Consumer Awareness Lesson can help teachers get started on discussions around health and nutrition.
- Helping students learn about their civic responsibility as members of a society and community.
- Depending on the age of your students, they might be ready to start creating their own cover letter and resume. Check out this blog post The Benefits of Teaching Resume Writing in Middle School to learn why this skill is a great thing to teach in middle school.
- Teaching students about accountability and personal responsibility. This Student-Led Conferences Lesson is a great resource for this, as it’s designed to foster ownership and accountability in middle school students.
The Benefits of Teaching Real-Life Skills
Overall, each classroom is different, and each teacher knows what will help meet the needs of their students. However, incorporating some measure of real-life skills into classroom lessons can have benefits for students and educators.
Middle school is a great time to help students develop good habits around the skills they will need as they enter high school and grow into adulthood. Teachers are a critical part of that and can make a big difference by incorporating these skills into educational work in the classroom.
Additional Resources
- How to Create a Positive Learning Environment
- Two Essential Student Skills to Teach the First Week of School
- How to Improve Your Students’ Oral Presentation Skills
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