We all know that middle school was definitely the "awkward years" for most people. Even the "cool kids" we look back and laugh at for the clothing and hairstyles that we thought were so cool at the time. But somehow, looking at middle schoolers now I have realized that they aren't as awkward as I felt I once was.

Selfies

Back when I was in middle school, the cool way to take a selfie went something like this... arm extended, arm at a 45-degree angle above your head, a duck face bigger than a duck itself, and your eyes looking up at the camera but not moving your head. Your three choices of filters were black and white, sepia, or if you were feeling edgy, negative. Now the selfies are full face, most of the time a duck face, red eye edited, teeth whitened, and filter with one of the 15 Instagram filters.

Communication

YahooMessenger, AIM, and MySpace. This is how we got in contact with each other. As soon as you got home from school you went straight online until your parents made you get off to do homework. At this point, you set your status as, "gtg do hw ugh ;p message me ill b bak<333 *ilySOS<3*" and you were off. Now middle schoolers have twitter, Instagram, snap chat, and the most famous Kik. Their tweets and bio are now some kind of Taylor Swift song about loving a boy who doesn't love you back. Our parents could always manage everything we did because we did it all from the home desktop computer. Now everything is done from the middle schoolers very own iPhone making it much harder to monitor.

Clothes

Every day we would break out the Abercrombie shirt that had the logo straight across the boobs. We all wore converse every single day. I am talking bright colored neon four colored Converse with the double tongues. We would half way straighten our hair, but always miss the back. And we couldn't leave without an arm full of silly bands. Looking at a middle schooler now. I see what I wear as a 19-year-old. They wear their nice Patagonia jackets, maybe a tank top and cardigan, with Hollister or American Eagle jeans and solid white converse, Jack Rogers sandals, or the cliché pair of Uggs.

So what does this mean? Society has changed so much in the past five years we have become so much more accepting of others' ways as well as becoming so much technologically advanced. Middle schoolers are still going through that awkward stage where they don't know what to say to boys, and only keep a boyfriend for about a week, but they look so much better doing it now than I ever did!