While providing choice can be a powerful way to personalize learning for young adolescents, there is also evidence that choice can be challenging for learners. This study investigated middle school students' (N = 72) feelings about making choices in how they learn during a personalized project. Findings include students' self-reported enjoyment and stress associated with choice within the project as well as five student vignettes illustrating some of the variations across student experiences. Informed by this variation, we offer several implications for research and practice related to supporting students in making choices in their own learning.

This study investigated the goal-setting approaches of 11 middle grades teachers during the first year of their implementation of a statewide, personalized learning initiative. As an increasing number of middle level schools explore personalized learning, there is an urgent need for empirical research in this area. Goal setting is a critical aspect of personalized learning and, thus, an important instructional area for researchers to investigate. This qualitative study found five dominant trends in teachers' approaches to goal setting. The researchers analyzed the key features of each approach and then analyzed them using three key elements of personalized learning. The authors offer implications for practitioners and researchers engaged in teaching and research related to personalized learning environments in the middle grades.

This study investigates the hands-joined learning framework as an approach to personalize and provide instructional scaffolding within project-based learning. The authors include a case description of hands-joined learning in a middle school social studies classroom and critically examine middle school student feedback in relation to two aims: (a) personalizing learning, and (b) providing adequate scaffolding. Student feedback indicated that the hands-joined learning project was largely successful in these two areas. Learners appreciated having choice and control in what they learned and created in the project but also pointed to the need for greater opportunities to make decisions in how they learned. Some learners also wanted more peer interaction. These findings are used to propose practical implications as well as future research directions.

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