By Mike Baker BBC education correspondent

Did you have a traumatic first day at secondary school? Mine went well - at least at first.

I escaped the grisly initiation ceremonies, survived the incomprehensibility of algebra, and managed not to be told off by the teachers for at least the first three hours.

In tribute to Harry Enfield's horrific teenage creation, it is known in our house as 'doing a Kevin'

Indeed I was just starting to think all my anxiety about transferring to secondary school had been overdone. But then I got on the wrong bus home.

As a country boy I had assumed the first town bus to come along would take me home. Instead it took me for miles in the wrong direction.

I mention this because most of us have at least one sharp memory of the move from primary to secondary school. It is a big moment.

Mentoring

These days, though, schools do far more to ease this transfer.

There are visits in each direction by pupils and teachers, and new boys and girls get "buddies" or mentors to help them settle in.

New intakes often start the new school year a day ahead of all the others to give them at least a day's respite from bullying.

All of these efforts are intended to reduce the anxiety and stress of the transformation from being the eldest in a small primary school to being bottom of the heap at the much bigger secondary school.

Missing the point

It seems these efforts are working. Research suggests fewer pupils experience anxiety over school transfer.

However, if the research is right, schools are still focusing on the social and psychological effects of school transfer when the pressing need is to tackle problems of discontinuity in teaching and learning methods.

It is the failure to keep the interest and motivation of pupils beyond the first couple of terms of secondary school which, say the experts, partly explains the "dip" in children's school performance in the early years of secondary school.

I checked this research - The Impact of School Transitions and Transfer on Pupil Progress and Attainment (Homerton College) - because this week the Education Secretary, Estelle Morris, set herself one key challenge for the current Parliament.

Lost children

Her "core mission", she said, would be to tackle under-achievement amongst 11- to 14-year-olds, or what she has re-labelled "the middle years".

Research suggests the very process of changing schools is disruptive

This focus is part of a wider government drive to tackle disaffection, and crime, amongst teenagers.

According to Ms Morris too many youngsters start on a slippery slope in these early teen years and risk "slipping into the ranks of the disappeared".

At present two-thirds of 14-year-olds in England reach the "expected levels" in the national tests in maths, English and science. This is a much lower proportion than reach the equivalent levels for 11-year-olds.

The government says this means one in three are "failing to make the grade".

Hormonal

You could argue over what exactly "expected levels" means, but there is other supporting evidence to suggest a real drop-off in pupil performance in these years.

Last year's Ofsted annual report said "the pace of learning slows" in the first three years of secondary school and "too many pupils make insufficient progress".

Now, as any parent will know, this is not all that happens to their offspring between the ages of 11 and 14.

They can turn from bright-eyed, loveable children to truculent, monosyllabic, moody teenagers in the space of a weekend "sleep over".

In tribute to Harry Enfield's horrific teenage creation, it is known in our house as "doing a Kevin".

But the question for schools is whether the performance dip is just about raging hormones or about a mismatch between schools' and pupils' needs.

Middle schools

The research suggests the very process of changing schools is disruptive.

Not initially - as pupils tend to be very positive in their first two terms at secondary school - but as they approach the end of Year 7 and continuing through into Year 8.

It could just be that schools regard the middle years as less important and target their resources elsewhere

Research in Suffolk, a county with both middle schools and areas of conventional English primary-secondary transfer at 11, suggests the change in school has a significant effect.

The Suffolk School Improvement Project compared the progress of pupils in the two different school systems.

Those who transferred to middle school (at age eight or nine) made greater progress in reading between the ages of 11 and 14 than their peers who had gone through the process of changing school at age 11.

This might appear to suggest the merits of a middle school system. But the same research also found that between the ages of nine and 11, those who stayed put in primary schools made more progress than those who had just transferred from first to middle school.

Teaching quality

If the process of changing schools is disruptive to achievement, perhaps we should consider all-through schools from five to 18. Or at least five to 14, as evidence suggests most pupils pick up again when GCSE courses begin and the exams loom.

From this autumn, the school performance tables will include the test results at age 14

Is the transfer the problem or is it that schools haven't quite got the curriculum and the teaching methods right for pupils in this transition between primary and upper-secondary schooling?

It could just be that schools regard the middle years as less important and target their resources, and best teachers, elsewhere.

Certainly Ofsted's evidence tends to support this interpretation. It found the lowest proportions of good and excellent teaching in Years 8 and 9.

Open to ideas

The government wants schools to give the "middle years" more attention. From this autumn, the school performance tables will include the test results at age 14 alongside GCSEs, GNVQs and A-levels.

There will also be an "added value" measure, which will show how much schools have raised pupils' achievement from ages 11 to 14.

These are certainly crucial years and reducing disaffection and dropout at this age is a worthwhile aim.

But the risk is that, like the leaking dyke, the moment schools shift their attention to the new target area, they risk losing sight of the last one.

Simply identifying a problem is not the same as resolving it.

The government and researchers have identified where the "dip" occurs. Now we need some practical ideas for changing teaching and learning in those years.

The government didn't come up with any. It is tempting to criticise them for this. But perhaps they were right: These ideas should come from teachers and schools, not from politicians.