Abstract
- This article offers middle school educators an authentic and engaging way to balance the unrealistic demands and constraints placed upon them, their students, and their curriculum by the expectations of ubiquitous, top-down mandated assessment by implementing literature discussion groups with their middle grade students. Literature discussion groups offer teachers a way to meet the social, emotional, developmental, and learning needs of young adolescents, while concurrently fulfilling their professional obligation to prepare students for the required grade level tests.