Scalding the milk is an important step when using milk in any yeast dough recipes. Scalding is necessary even with pasteurized milk because of the whey proteins in milk need to be inactivated. They can weaken the gluten in dough and produce a dense final product unless the milk is scalded. After scalding you just let the milk come back to room temp. If you are looking for a high rising bread, (is that what you mean by maximum yeast growth?) Never let you dough rise beyond the double in size rule in the first rise. A big mistake a lot of people make is letting the dough just rise to its max - this uses up a lot of the yeast's energy and your second rise will never make a nice loaf or bun or roll the final bread will turn out dense.
I use a big 8 cup graduated measuring cup during the first rise to make sure I don't go past the double in size. But there are other tools available.
such as these from King Arthur Flower:
Dough-Rising Bucket
