The Corner CAFE Podcast: Phyllis Fagell

Nikevia Thomas:

Hello everybody. This is Nikevia.

Jessica Webster:

And Jessica.

Nikevia Thomas:

From MAEC's CAFE, and you're listening to the Corner CAFE podcast.

Families, schools, and communities in Maryland and Pennsylvania are looking for strategies to increase family engagement. On this show, we sit down with family engagement experts to discuss the ideas, best practices, and strategies that they use so that the rest of us can do the same. So let's get started.

Jessica Webster:

We are thrilled to spend time talking about all things middle school with Phyllis Fagell. Whether you're a middle grades educator or a current or soon-to-be parent of an adolescent, this episode is for you. Phyllis is a nationally board-certified school counselor and a therapist who works with kids and families in private practice at the Chrysalis Group in Bethesda, Maryland. She's an educational consultant and an author and journalist. She's the author of bestselling books Middle School Matters and Middle School Superpowers. And she's also a frequent contributor to The Washington Post.

She freelances for publications, including Psychology Today, CNN, Working Mother, U.S. News & World Report, and Your Teen. And her ideas have been shared in outlets including The New York Times, The Atlantic, The New Yorker, Edutopia, MindShift, and NPR. Phyllis speaks at schools and organizations nationally and internationally on a broad range of topics related to counseling, education, and parenting. She lives in Bethesda, Maryland with her husband and her three children.

Nikevia Thomas:

In addition, Phyllis recently hosted a virtual session for our MAEC's Here Everyone Reaches Optimal Outcomes afterschool program, better known as HERO. She talked to families about middle school and how to support their children. It was such a wonderful session that we knew we had to invite her here to take a little deeper dive with us on this podcast. Welcome to the Corner CAFE, Phyllis, we are honored to have you here today.

Phyllis Fagell:

Thank you for inviting me. It's so nice to kick off the school year with this podcast.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, absolutely. That's perfect timing. I sent off my eighth grader yesterday to school, and I was thinking this is the time that we are in where we have to remember all these things that are happening to our kids. So thank you so much for joining us today.

So I'm a former middle school principal and two of my three are firmly ensconced in adolescence. And my third one's right on the cusp. He just turned 10 this summer. And I have to say that I so appreciate your love of this age group and the wisdom that your articles and your books and your website and blog share with us, because as a former school principal and someone in it, this age group can be really, really tough.

Phyllis Fagell:

It can be, and you're really in the thick of it as both a former principal and someone shepherding three kids through that phase right now.

Jessica Webster:

And somehow it's easier. I don't know if you feel this way, I feel like it's a lot easier with the kids that don't come home with you at the end of the day.

So let's start by setting the record straight on what actually is happening during adolescent development that makes this group such... It's such a unique time for our kids. So can you share with us what is going on with these kids in their brain and their development that is impacting their behavior and learning in such a unique way?

Phyllis Fagell:

So first, just to clarify, I'm really talking about kids as young as 10, as old as 15. The phase can last quite a long time, and kids are going through it at different speeds in different ways. It's why we see so many kids who go to sixth grade and suddenly don't want to be friends anymore with that same kid that their families have been friends with, that they've known forever, that they've played with after school since first grade. That can be really hard for parents and really hard for kids. And that has a lot to do with how quickly they're maturing or what their interests are at that point in time.

But what we know about middle schoolers is that they are at a point where their brain is very much still developing, their empathy is still developing. They're impulsive, they're very susceptible to behavior contagion, to wanting to do what their peers are doing. They're trying to figure out who they are, whether they're good enough, where they fit in. They desperately want a sense of independence. They want to feel a sense of agency. They can be 13 or 3 depending on the day or the hour.

I love this age because they are so funny. They can really have that child-like innocence, but they're also really smart and sophisticated so you can get all of the moods, all of the emotions, because don't forget, they're also going through puberty and have hormones coursing through their bodies and their prefrontal cortex is very much undeveloped, which is where all logical thinking is happening, which sets the stage for a lot of fun and a lot of messiness.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, messiness. That's a good word for it.

Nikevia Thomas:

That is a great-

Phyllis Fagell:

Or fun messiness.

Nikevia Thomas:

Yes, it is fun, dynamic messiness. So I am remembering in your first book, Middle School Matters, you made a very compelling case for why middle school is so important and how we can work together as educators and as families to support our children in developing their skills that they need to grow into healthy, happy, thriving adults. Research shows that family engagement between schools and families tend to decrease at this age. So with that in mind, what are some essential elements of school and family partnerships that are particularly appropriate during middle school age as opposed to elementary school?

Phyllis Fagell:

So I really feel for parents in this phase, and I remember feeling this way myself. I actually wrote that book when my first child was in middle school and my second one had just started and I was very much living the middle school dream, and I also didn't know what my role was. It seemed like they wanted me there, but not really. They wanted to be with me but not seen with me. And they wanted me to care about what they were doing and to show interest, but they didn't want me to be too intrusive, they didn't want me to interfere with that burgeoning independence. And so I think that's what a lot of parents are going through in elementary school. You can do anything, you can show up in the classroom, you can read a book, you can go on a field trip, and in middle school that becomes less easily recognizable where you can make that difference.

And so it doesn't mean you're not involved, but you're involved differently. It might be that you're joining the PTSA or whatever the school happens to call that, or the parent-teacher-student organization. Or maybe you're helping out in the office in some way that's not too intrusive in terms of your kid's daily life, and some kids will want you to come on that field trip. But really feeling out where your kids are, but recognizing that while just to take a step back, not to take too far of a step back because they care very much what you think. And I call middle school the last best chance. It's the last opportunity to really make a difference because they've started to pull away and identify more with their friends, but they haven't yet made that complete jump and you can still make a massive difference in terms of their moral development and skill development.

Jessica Webster:

I think that's true. And I also think, I don't know if you would agree with this, Phyllis, it's also as you are figuring out with your child what that balance needs to be in terms of that school partnership place, it's also the balance between helping advocate for your child while they're learning those skills and making that switch to encouraging them to do the advocacy first before you intervene with the school.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah. In Middle School Matters I broke it down this way. Let's say you've got a sixth grader and they have never sent an email to a teacher. They have no idea how to ask for help. You might be sending that email for them or making contact with the school for them, but you want to have your kid sitting next to you watching you do that, watching you use a respectful salutation, watching you think through how you want to get your point across. And then maybe in seventh grade they're sending that email, but you're next to them and making sure that they are getting their point across. And by eighth grade, you want them to be able to do that on their own so that when they get to high school they can be good, strong self-advocates.

Jessica Webster:

That's right. I think that that's very true and that's part of that balance. I think from the school side, that's a really great place. When I heard you say parents don't always know where they fit in, and how do schools really think through how we're welcoming families into this space in a way and helping them understand what's developmentally appropriate and helping them understand how to make that from walking your child holding their hand across the street, to watching them across the street, to letting them do it completely by themselves? And I think we do need to help parents understand the importance of those barriers - those milestones, is a better word than barriers - and how their role helps in service to the school, even though it might be outside of the school setting, not just the volunteering piece and the traditional ways that we do it more in elementary school because it's easier to see that way.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes. And I really appreciate schools that make it easy for all kinds of parents to get involved. Maybe some events are in the morning and some are in the afternoon or some are on Zoom, or they can watch something later. Maybe there's a book club that they don't have to go to every single session, but when they can, they can feel that connection to the school. Or maybe there's a family that is new to the country and can contribute something related to their culture to an international night or to the classroom. But making it clear that there are lots of different ways, but their input is welcome and they're welcome and their child does want them there. Again, as you were saying, just making sure they understand how it's different developmentally.

Jessica Webster:

How it's different. Right, yeah.

Phyllis Fagell:

Absolutely.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, I love that, thank you. Another one of the key themes, it's really in both of your books, is how middle school behavior doesn't always make sense to us as adults. And as you said earlier, it's like the impulse control. I'm always struck by that lack of perception, how they filter through things and their perceptions are often not always correct in the way that they perceive what is being said. But middle schoolers are likely to make at least a couple of times some significant miscalculations in their interactions with peers and adults. So what would your recommendations be for adults, both parents and even teachers in these situations? How can they identify what's happening and do you have any ideas for tools to help navigate these situations?

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah, one of the things that I love, love/hate about middle schoolers is that they can invite someone to their birthday party but then be horribly offended when that same person doesn't invite them to theirs. No one has a sense of injustice like an 11-year-old boy or a 13-year-old girl. They really are so egocentric and is developmentally appropriate too. It's not that they're going to grow up to have poor character, be selfish people, or completely lacking in empathy, they're just really self-absorbed. And what we want to be doing is identifying when they need our help and when they need our coaching and when they need our intervention and different scenarios call for a different touch.

So when I'm talking to parents about social situations, let's say if your child has zero friends and zero social skills, they're really lagging in social skills, you can't just expect them to call up a friend. That's a huge risk. Or to call up a potential friend, they're going to need some help. That might mean reaching out to the school and asking if there are any clubs or groups or adults who might take them in at lunch and invite someone else who might be an appropriate friend. If your child has friends, but they're struggling with fighting and arguments and a lot of drama, they may need help, coaching, help understanding when they do and don't need to be in the middle of something.

One of the stories that I sometimes tell when I'm talking to parents is wearing my school counselor hat, I'll have a group of, let's say eight girls and one boy, there's always one boy, who show up at my door after lunch or after any kind of unstructured time, and they're all talking at once and they say, "Wait, hold on, who is here because you know what happened and you want to corroborate this story? You can leave. Who's here because you know what happened and you want to refute it? You can leave. Who's here because everyone was walking this way, follow them?" That's always the one boy. But what I'm really trying to do is underscore for the kids that they don't need to expend their limited emotional energy on everyone else's crises. It's not intuitive at this age.

When it's meanness, they're having a fight with somebody who's saying something mean, but they're being mean too. And every kid in middle school is mean sometimes. If they have [inaudible 00:13:36] they're mean sometimes, again coaching, helping them think through what they want, whether it's a relationship that's working for them, how they want to resolve it or not, but not getting involved. When it's bullying, which is the three P's, there's an intent to wound, which is that purpose. There's a power imbalance. And there's a pattern of behavior, it's not just a one-off. Then those kids do need direct intervention. Probably in most cases, that would mean contacting the school.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. Yeah, thanks for laying that out with a good example too.

Nikevia Thomas:

Yeah, I was just thinking about... I was listening to what you were saying, Phyllis, and then putting it against the analogies. This is our next last chance. And having that in mind, also considering that in human development, this age group, your brain is developing at such a faster rate than it is if you're a toddler.

Phyllis Fagell:

That's right.

Nikevia Thomas:

It is the last best chance. This is where you can lay all of the foundations here.

Phyllis Fagell:

And the brain is different too. One of the pieces of research that really stuck with me when I was writing Middle School Superpowers is this idea that middle schoolers, unlike older adolescents, don't work harder or care more because the stakes are high. In fact, it often goes the other way, they perform worse because they think their life depends on it, their future depends on it. And so often very well-meaning parents will say, "If you don't do this, you're not going to be able to take that class in high school" or, "This will impact whether or not you can play varsity in four years." It can feel very important to the parent, but heightening that sense of importance, if anything, is just going to make the kid back off and do less.

Jessica Webster:

Wow. I feel like that was directed at me. I feel like I might've said something like that to my son the other day. Putting in a little more effort.

Phyllis Fagell:

I didn't know that for anyone listening, I swear.

Jessica Webster:

She really didn't.

Yeah, no, I think you're right. And I think part of it is as adults sometimes we're in... We can be in such a hurry because we're like... I would say, it's like you're looking down on the dance floor. We know what you're anticipating. You don't see what's coming in. And we know we experienced it and we know. And they're just like, "Let me just have fun on the dance floor. Let me just enjoy the dance." And we're like, "But wait, you got to get ready for what's next." And it rushes them through it.

Phyllis Fagell:

Completely. And I can relate. I have three kids of my own. I've definitely been in your shoes on many, many occasions and it's taken me a long time. Now my oldest is 23, and in many ways they still have the brain of a middle schooler, but an older, more empathetic, slightly more put-together middle schooler. But kids' brains don't fully mature until they're about 25 for girls and 27 for boys. So this is a long, long process. And what I want to just for my parents is that there's value in them getting things wrong. There's value in making those mistakes. Especially if they're embarrassing or humiliating because then it gets lodged in that longterm memory. They're much less likely to make that same mistake again. And they're tuning us out if we're lecturing anyway.

Nikevia Thomas:

Wow.

Jessica Webster:

You just watch their eyes glaze right over.

Nikevia Thomas:

There's value in mistakes. There's value in risk.

One of the messages that really resonated with us is your emphasis on building resilience during these challenging and tough years. So what specific skills are needed to foster resilience in middle schoolers?

Phyllis Fagell:

The last chapter of Middle School Superpowers is about optimism. And that really is the chapter that to me summarizes what resilience is. It's about seeing setbacks as situational and temporary as opposed to seeing them as pervasive and permanent. Some of that involves imparting a bit of philosophical wisdom that is hard to transmit at an age when they have such little life experience and they have no way of knowing that making a mistake can be turned around, that if you put one foot in front of the other, even when things are hard, odds are, things will get better. We really just want them to try lots of different things, experiment, figure out where their strengths and interests intersect without being down on themselves, without deciding that it's a hopeless cause.

One of the hallmarks of a middle schooler, again, is that self-centeredness. And so I might have a student who is being hard on himself because he's not as strong or as athletic as a classmate, and I'm looking at the two of them, and one of them's gone through puberty and has more muscle mass and a mustache that he's trying to shave, and the other one is prepubescent. And that prepubescent kid just doesn't have that perspective, that understanding that it's not a level playing field at that moment in time. But it's hard if that friend and maybe another friend make that team that they wanted to make and they didn't.

So I see adults' job as helping them stay in the game so that they can build that resilience because resilience comes from making those mistakes, experiencing those disappointments, losing that friend, and seeing that you will regroup, seeing that you might end up doing something else you like equally as much if not more, or that you end up with better-suited friends or that, sure, that class was hard, but one of the things you learn from it is that you can do hard things or you're more likely to persevere later than someone else for whom school was always easy. So helping with that reframe for them, helping them retain that optimism.

I share a story in Middle School Superpowers about my own son. When I was writing the book, he was 14 and it was in real time. He's now 16. But he had braces and he was pretty much the last kid in his grade to still have braces. And every time we went to the orthodontist, the orthodontist would be like, "Next time. Braces are coming up next time." And he started to lose hope because he thought, "Come on, this guy is blowing smoke. He says that every time." But then we had an appointment, it was on the cusp of high school, middle of eighth grade, and the orthodontist said, "No, I promise next time they really are coming off." So he was so excited for that visit. We went and guess what? It turned out they were not ready.

So fast-forward a couple of days, he's at baseball practice and he gets hit in the mouth with a baseball and it banged up his face and it dented the braces and back we went to the orthodontist. And the orthodontist took one look at his mouth and said, "The only thing that kept your permanent teeth from flying out of your mouth were your braces." He made fun of me for really hammering home the point, but the point really was we have no way of knowing if getting what we want is a good thing or a bad thing. And to me that's a huge part of resilience.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, yeah, that's very true. I think as you're talking though, when we're talking about this part of building that resilience and our role in that, it's difficult to do if we haven't first built that sense of trust with our teens and tweens. And so advice on that: what are some good ways or tactics or things to think about maybe when we're thinking about building trust with teens and tweens as educators or as parents or family members?

Phyllis Fagell:

Sure. There was a student I had many years ago, and I shared a story in Middle School Matters about her. She came to me and she said... This was a seventh grade girl. And she said, "Can you please tell parents..." Our parents, I was speaking to their parents that night, it was a back-to-school night. She said, "Can you please tell our parents not to ask us if we're okay? Because in that moment we feel compelled to say, 'We're fine,' but then we feel like we've missed the moment that we can't go back and revisit it." And so what I tell parents is just check in on low freight topics frequently. So if they're spending more time in their room, which is normal, knock on their door, ask them if they need a snack, ask them how they're doing, what's going on, if there's anything you can do for them.

I think the tendency is for us, whether we're parents or teachers or administrators, anybody, to spend so much of our time teaching kids, imparting our expectations of them rather than giving them an opportunity to teach us something, to be the expert in their lives, to tell us what they're interested in, and asking for help, whether it's with your remote control or a printer. Can be very low level things, but just signaling that respect, talking to them as if they're a little bit older and more mature than they are. Recognizing that kids will rise or fall to the level of our expectations. Keep them reasonable and attainable and manageable, but within reason, keeping those expectations high.

Not being too intrusive. Kids will shut down if they think you're lecturing. They'll shut down if they think you're prying. They do not want drama. So try to practice that poker face. Or as one of my colleagues says, the Botox face.

Jessica Webster:

Love it.

Phyllis Fagell:

Don't show your shock. That's something I have to work on with my own husband. I'm like, "Step it down, step it down." Some people have a harder time with that than others. And always giving them a runway back to being a good kid. So I like phrases like, "I'm guessing you did that because," or, "I also would be disappointed if."

And so let's say they are caught cheating at school, "I'm guessing you cheated because you were afraid to admit you didn't know what you were doing." Or, "I'm guessing you lied because you were afraid. I would tell you you couldn't go to X person's house or that I'd take away your phone." You're not saying it's okay, you're not giving them permission to do it again, but you're showing some empathy, helping them let down their defenses so they can engage in a conversation with you about it. Inviting them in rather than just, "What were you thinking? What's wrong with you? Who does that?" You're not going to actually... They're going to stuck in shame or they're going to get really obstinate and neither one of those is going to get you the results you're looking for.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, that stuck in shame is super powerful because ultimately they do want to please you. And so it's like, "I let this person down, or now they're going to..." Again, they can't get out of that in the future. It'll be okay. It's like, "In this moment, you'll never like me again because I did X, Y, and Z," or, "You'll never trust me again when I tell you the truth."

Phyllis Fagell:

And they hold on to things that we wouldn't necessarily expect them to hold onto. On many, many occasions had the student tell me that they think the teacher hates them. And when I ask why they think the teacher hates, it's usually because a few weeks ago when I asked for an extra point, they were annoyed and I could tell they were annoyed or they used a sharp tone because I was talking to somebody or distracted, and the teacher is probably forgetting about it and moving on, it happens 20 times a day within three minutes, and the kid is actually holding onto that and needs an opportunity to have a positive interaction with the teacher to let that go.

Jessica Webster:

That's right. And oftentimes the sharp tone or whatever it was, the annoyance isn't even that moment, it's like the buildup to that moment. They're not really mad at you. You're the 20th kid that they've asked to be quiet. You just happen to be number 20.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes. That's a good point.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, yeah. That's a great point.

Nikevia Thomas:

So let's talk a little bit about your second book, Middle School Superpowers. So you discuss how COVID-19 pandemic has impacted and shaped adolescent learners. Can you talk about how schools and families may need to approach things differently post-pandemic to support our kids?

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah. Just broadening it out is more being a kid today is different and it's additive. The stressors are additive. We've got everything from the advent of social media, the pervasive use of social media, and the lack of an ability for kids to take a social break. At the end of the day, the way they might have the potential for permanent reputational damage, heightens the stakes, the potential for embarrassment and humiliation. We've got several wars over the last few years. We've got identity politics, we've got culture wars, we've got everything all at once. And adults as a result are more stressed too. And then you throw in a pandemic on top of that.

And for many kids around the country, a lot of interruption to their learning, to their ability to develop social skills. All of that has contributed to what we're seeing now, which... And The New York Times wrote about this just a few days ago, the crisis in attendance, this idea that attendance is somewhat optional, that it's harder... We see that with adults too not wanting to go into the office. That's something... It's not just kids. Societally, that's something that we've been wrestling with.

What's different about kids, middle schoolers in particular versus adults, is that as adults, especially as adults who did not grow up in the social media age, we had ample time to develop our social skills, to learn how to repair damage when there's conflict, to understand that it takes several times of approaching a teacher or how to approach a teacher. They just haven't had as much practice. And so I'm not a doom and gloom person in any way. I think that rather than saying that kids are damaged, they're just delayed, there's just a lag. And I think it's going to take longer.

It's why when I was writing Middle School Superpowers, even though middle school isn't the title, and I feel like I can say this as the parent of older kids, it really isn't limited to middle schoolers, it's across the spectrum. But looking back on my own kids during COVID, my older two had driver's licenses. They had a very established set of friends. My youngest was in sixth grade and he was a boy and so face-to-face conversation was hard. He was used to playing with his friends by getting out of baseball or by playing a game of pickup basketball. It was very much in person. He now will look back and call it the time, he jokes, but he says, "That was the time I sat on the couch feeling depressed and getting fat." And I'm like, "Me too, buddy."

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. We're right there with you.

Nikevia Thomas:

We were all there.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah. But my older two who were stressed about high school, they were in the later high school years at the time, were happy to have a break, happy to be able to get more sleep and easily able to see their peers. So I think some of the kids coming into middle school now who were in earlier in elementary school, those two were years where they didn't have the ability to spend as much time with peers. And so I think we're just seeing the same experience in many ways as when my kid was in sixth grade just watered down because they've had more time to recover from it.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, and I think when I talk to teachers, a lot of them will say... "You're right. It's like that delay, like sixth graders coming in a little more like a fourth grader because they missed a year and a half of that socialization that would've gotten them ready for sixth grade." And I think my daughter was in seventh grade during the pandemic, and she's done great. But I do think that there's some Swiss cheese skillsets that you're like, "Those are things that I know developmentally you would've been working through in seventh, eighth grade, but you had to work through them once you got to high school." You're right, it's not that you can't do it, but we need... I think teachers are very well aware of that because they see the trends coming in, but as parents, you might see it in your own kid and some of that and not realize that those are trends overall that are happening. Of course, some kids, that probably isn't the case and some kids it would be... It's a spectrum.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes. And I think stress has such a big impact on the nervous system. And so even in the areas where kids were in school, there was a heightened level of stress. And that lingers and kids feel that. I had a client who was a ninth grader, this was last year, who had been in fifth grade when the pandemic started. And for her, because so much of middle school was off online and not in the building, it was not that dramatic. She kind of was sad. She wanted to be with her friends more so they [inaudible 00:30:49] kids really want to be with their friends, but it didn't have that stereotypical middle school feel. And then she got to ninth grade and it was like all hell broke loose. And I said to her, "No one gets a pass on seventh grade."

Jessica Webster:

Right. You're going to do it in ninth grade or you're going to do it in seventh. That's right.

Phyllis Fagell:

And so that's what's happening. Whatever kids miss and different kids miss different things. To begin with, some kids are stronger in some areas than another. So one kid might be struggling with their executive functioning while another is struggling with making plans with a friend. One father called me, this was, gosh, maybe about a year ago, and he was really stressed because he felt like his kid just couldn't seal the deal. His wife were watching the texts go back and forth and it was like, "Hey, we should get together this weekend." And the buddies would be like, "Yeah, we totally should hang out", and this is going back and forth. And finally the mom was like, "Someone needs to say, 'Where are we going? When are we going? Who's driving us there?'"

So helping them recognizing that even though they might be in middle school, and I don't care if there's COVID or no COVID, this is true, recognizing that they need a lot of skill development and help that you might associate more with elementary school, to end your conversation, how to politely ask for help, how to make plans.

Jessica Webster:

Right. And you're right, because even just thinking about that, at what age do kids start making their own plans versus, "Oh, can so-and-so come over for a playdate" and it's the moms or the dads or the grandmas that are... Yeah. And they wouldn't have that skill necessarily.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes. And that's a hard transition for parents too, because especially if their kids struggled suddenly their kids are in middle school and they can't make those plans for them anymore, but their kid might need that kind of help. And so those are situations where maybe if your kids are at a sports practice, you invite them and a friend to go out for ice cream or lunch after, or maybe you have a potluck with another family with the same age kid. You can still give an assist, but you have to do it in a little more subtle way.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. A little bit more behind the scenes, I think.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes.

Jessica Webster:

And while we're talking about COVID and we're talking about these developmental milestones, one of the other pieces that you really talk about in the Superpowers book is that idea of mental health and social media and phone usage. So we know the data showing that increase in mental health challenges and their rising. How do you recommend schools and parents proactively partner to mitigate some of these risks? What do we have control over and how do we work together to mitigate those risks for these vulnerable kids?

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah. Isn't that the million-dollar question? I used to be really non-prescriptive, and I don't know if I'm getting crankier as I get older or we're collecting more data or we're really starting to see the influence on kids' mental health and their social interactions. I'm fully in favor of schools banning phones.

Jessica Webster:

Me too.

Phyllis Fagell:

I think it benefits everybody. I think it's unfair for teachers to have to constantly be telling kids to put it away. It needs to be a rule that's enforced consistently and fairly. And I know from students that when schools do that, they're relieved. What they're worrying about is FOMO. They don't want to miss out on anything. But as long as they know the school is fair and no one is texting anybody, they really would rather have that face-to-face interaction with their peers too. And they know it's hard for them to focus. It's wiring their brains differently. It's harder for them to pay attention in class for so many reasons. And there's research that I shared in Middle School Matters that kids who have a phone in the vicinity, even if it's off, will do a full letter grade worse on a test. We know that if they have a phone while they're doing homework, they not only are less efficient, they're also more anxious.

And so we as the adults have to be the role models. We have to be helping them take a break from that phone usage and educating communities, educating parents. It's very hard to enforce something like the Wait Until 8th pledge. I've had parents try, I've had third grade parents try to get all the third grade parents together to sign a pledge that none of them are going to allow their kid to have a phone until X age. That's not realistic. And it's also not equitable because there are families in which it's a single parent and the kid is taking public transportation. They need that phone. So that's not an expectation that we can put on families. What we know though, is that even if a good chunk of kids don't have a phone, that makes it socially much more palatable for those that don't.

And then we can talk about alternatives. You might not want to give your kid a phone, but maybe you give them an iPad that they can text on, or maybe you give them a dumb phone and they can text, but they can't use social media. Doing whatever we can to delay, delay, delay as long as we can. My 23-year-old was a... We call him the most social Fagell. And when he was in eighth grade, he was as social as he is now. And I would not let him have Snapchat at the time. And we didn't know nearly as much as we know now. And he was very upset with me and really annoyed and let me know and let me know often. And now at 23, and he even said this to me at 18, it was the greatest gift I could have given him because looking back, he will now say, "I couldn't have handled the distraction and I couldn't have handled the social impulsivity that went along with it."

So knowing your kid, playing the long game, recognizing that you might not be popular for all of the choices you make. And then the other hard and fast rule that I would recommend is having no devices in the bedroom at all.

Jessica Webster:

In the bedroom, yes.

Phyllis Fagell:

Because nothing good happens when kids are texting or posting at 10 o'clock, 11 o'clock at night, and we want to save them from themselves. So whatever we can do to operationalize that support rather than trying to depend on their wisdom and good judgment, which can get hijacked by all kinds of emotional interference.

Jessica Webster:

But I would also add to all of that, and I think you said this. I thought you were going to say this because I think you started to, is that it's so distracting and we need to help them with that. But part of the way we need to help that is also monitoring ourselves. Because that age group is nothing if they're not really into hypocrisy, pointing out hypocrisy. "So you're telling me it's not good to be on my phone." And I've tried the argument where I say, "But my brain's fully developed," and that doesn't seem to help. It didn't go so well.

Phyllis Fagell:

I think I'm hopeful. I've noticed maybe in the last year it feels like maybe people are slightly less phone focused and a little bit sick of the energy that they need to put into maintaining. I've also had kids who don't want to give up their phone even for a few days for an outdoor education trip because they don't want their streak to be broken. It becomes such a crutch in that way, but that's also a burden. And actually just as an aside, the kid who didn't want to give up their phone, the parents said, "What if the other kid you're rooming with also gives up her phone?" And she was, "I don't know if that's going to work." But the other kid, their family, the dad said, "I'll maintain your streak for you." And so the other kid, the initial kid, her dad said, "I'll do the same." It didn't end up working out that way, they both agreed to just not do it at all. But I loved the image I had in my head of these two dads each snapping each other to keep their streak going.

Jessica Webster:

I know, because it is so funny. And that does come up because those metrics are really... They translate into such importance for the kids in a way that... In a way it does for all of us. If I post something on social media and I'm like, "Oh, only three people liked it." I'm like, "What was the point of that? Did I post it for myself or did I post..." But I think that's really confusing for them.

Phyllis Fagell:

It is. And hurtful and lasting confidence killing. And that will make them take fewer risks. So we do want to help them in that way as much as we can. And I think social media, thinking back to when my son first got that phone in eighth grade, it's so different. There's such a higher level of toxicity when you go on. There's such poor role modeling even from the adults on some of these sites. Fortunately, of the worst ones are not the ones that kids are drawn to. But we see how it can impact at a broader level just what they think is okay and what's not okay. And we want our influence to be paramount to matter much more than whatever they're seeing modeled online.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. Not to mention the safety concerns interacting with strangers online. Yeah, no, I think that's really true.

Nikevia Thomas:

That's a great conversation.

Phyllis Fagell:

We can talk about middle school for hours.

Nikevia Thomas:

I know.

Jessica Webster:

All day long.

Nikevia Thomas:

So as we wrap up, we have a question, a final question that we ask all our guests. From your perspective, if a school wanted to adapt their current practices to engage and empower families as true partners at the table, where should the school begin and what can people do today to begin building relationships of trust between families and educators?

Phyllis Fagell:

That's a really good question, and I think you can answer it a lot of different ways. I think the first is to recognize that not all parents are comfortable walking into a school building, not all parents had a comfortable middle school or school experience. Some parents may not have had an uninterrupted educational experience, they might feel insecure. So making sure that the opportunities you're providing to families are covering a range of different activities, not just a back-to-school night, but really honoring who the families in your community are. And bringing in people who can speak to topics that they care about. Having book clubs for parents who are maybe looking to connect with other parents or could be a volunteer activity that you're doing. Any way of making sure that you are providing those opportunities. Not every parent is going to want to, but providing the opportunities for parents to come in and get involved. And then really making it clear that you're so happy that they're there and that you're welcoming them.

And then I think what administrators can do too is really think carefully about how they're communicating. Giving parents way more information, not just about things like, "Oh, we're doing this testing today," or, "We need this permission slip," but, "The entire seventh grade was dissecting frogs today, and here's a couple of pictures," and posting it online and giving them topics that they can talk about with their children when they come home, giving them those access points. Sometimes it's hard to know where to jump in and have that conversation and having it be less formal.

So maybe there's a principal in the Midwest, and she would take hundreds of pictures a day of just about everything, like what they were eating. And I'm not saying every principal needs to start taking a few different pictures or spending their entire time on social media, but could be a weekly letter home. But that doesn't only cover things that are, "Please take your time when you're going through the bus lane." But also fun facts about what the kids have been doing and making it a little bit less of an unknown because the unknown and uncertainty is very scary.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. And then you can visualize this is who my kid is when they're at school, or I see them smiling in a picture, so I know that they're feeling good today. And I also think when I'll say to my kids, "Oh, what are you learning in math today?" The response is, "Math" or, "Nothing." So those pictures and insights, like you said, open up the door to say, "I saw you were dissecting a frog today. How was that experience? Tell me more about it."

Phyllis Fagell:

That's so true. I quoted my youngest in Middle School Superpowers. I asked him, "What did you do at school today?" And he said, "I had gym." And I said, "You had gym. What'd you do in gym?" He said, "I ran." I said, "Can you expand on that?" He goes, "Around the track." It's like-

Jessica Webster:

Sounds like he and my son would be friends.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yeah. And some of it was him being funny. And you don't have to have these huge heavy conversations all of the time, the relationship is based on all of the small little moments. But that's how a school can help by really giving them fodder for those smaller moments, those unloaded moments that are lighter and aren't going to feel like there's the potential to disappoint a parent or that they've done something wrong or there's something they should be stressing about that they didn't realize they were supposed to be stressing about.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah. No, I am so glad you said that. I think that too sometimes, it's like helping with the entry points, helping parents have entry points with their kids.

Phyllis Fagell:

Yes, for sure.

Jessica Webster:

Thank you. I could stay all day, Phyllis, though. I could talk about this all the time.

Phyllis Fagell:

I love geeking out about this topic.

Jessica Webster:

I know.

Phyllis Fagell:

And the middle scores are just smaller versions of people, it's just the developmental phase that makes it different. But everything... They have that whole adage, everything I needed to know I learned in kindergarten. I really think it's middle school. Yeah.

Jessica Webster:

No, I think you're right.

I think the beauty of your books and your articles really is humanizing it and making it so that as a parent or a teacher, I can read that. And here, there are patterns to the behavior. There are things that we can anticipate ahead of time, which makes it a little less personal and makes it a little more like, "I can actually enjoy this." When you push me away, when I was about to give you a hug, it's not because you don't love me, there's other things going on there, and I can still figure out how to see how you love me in your other ways that you're behaving or when you're acting silly in class. It's not like you're trying to get under my skin, your impulse control is not there. And so I think with your anecdotes. It's just very accessible, I think, for families and for educators. So I appreciate the work that you do and your willingness to share out your expertise with all of us.

Phyllis Fagell:

Thank you.

Jessica Webster:

Yeah, thank you so much.

Nikevia Thomas:

Thank you so much, Phyllis.

Phyllis Fagell:

Good luck with the start of the year.

Jessica Webster:

Thank you. You too.

Nikevia Thomas:

Thanks.

Jessica Webster:

And to our listeners, thank you for sharing a cup of conversation with us.

We hope you enjoyed it as much as we did. So until next time, keep those meaningful relationships with families brewing. And don't forget to follow us on X @CAFE_MAEC.