How many people believe that class size (k-higher education) does impact the quality of learning

[cjbgreen]

[Catshrink]

1. It sure looks unanimous so far... but who listens to teachers?

Obama and Duncan listen to politicians and business people, not educators-in-the-trenches. We don't know nothin' 'bout educatin' children.

[hedgehog]

2. I would like to see children in kindergarten through 3rd grade given one on one

teaching to ensure they learn to read. If the don't learn to read, nothing else matters.

[polichick]

3. How could it not? nt

[cjbgreen]

4. What would I pick?

I wonder how many TFA alums, ivy league alums would intentionally select a school with large class sizes? Isn't this one of the reasons parents send their children to private schools? Yet research sponsored by TFA ignores the significance of this variable?

[mzteris]

11. why would you think they would

pick "larger class sizes?

And from what I've read, the TFA readily supports the notion of smaller class sizes rendering superior results. I think what they did say that TFA teachers, do help "improve results" and, while not as much as reduced class size, TFA's cost less than the costs of implementing small class sizes.

[yellowcanine]

5. All other things being equal (quality, training of teachers and principals, etc)

yes it does. The problem is it is very difficult to show because other factors are not usually controlled and it is very difficult to do so. You are left with demographic studies and it is difficult to tease out the confounding factors.


Good Teachers.
Good Principals.
Good Support Staff.
Supportive involved parents.
Supportive stable home environments.
Good facilities and teaching materials.
Safe facilities and neighborhoods.
Small class sizes (or at least small adult-student ratios).
Small over all school sizes.

All of these are important. Which is most important? Hard to say. If I had to guess, I would say supportive stable home environment.

[cjbgreen]

6. good point!

Lets eliminate supportive involved parents, because schools have a marginal control over that variable (which doesn't mean that a school shouldn't reach out and find ways to involve parents). Some parents struggling with poverty are just over-whelmed. Kids whose parents are struggling need even more resources (breakfast, support with homework, after school safe sites.

[yellowcanine]

8. The point is, to understand why some students achieve and others don't, you have to consider all of

the factors. Even those you can't control. It just means you have to find ways around them if you can. This just shows why the ham handed way of punishing schools for low student achievement is the wrong approach.

[demigoddess]

7. adding on a pre-school to every elementary would not hurt either, some kids

have their best learning before kindergarten, and learning disabilities could be identified earlier and worked with instead of medicated later.This would be especially helpful for children who come from poverty. Especially these days with unemployment figures going up so much.

[proud2BlibKansan]

10. My district did that

This is the second year we have had PK. It's wonderful and the kids are thriving.

There is only one negative. Their attendance is horrible. And in these days when they have to track everything, the poor attendance in PK hurts some schools.

It's also expensive and the state doesn't pay for it.

[OneTenthofOnePercent]

9. Yes for most subjects and classes.

I would vote for optoin 1.5 but it doesn't exist.

[mzteris]

12. all classes, all levels, all the time. . . n/t

[LuckyLib]

13. As a long-time teacher, we would hear that there was no "data" on the

benefits of small class sizes. We always said, "We'll give you data on the relationship between teacher mental health and student learning. Small class sizes mean better teacher mental health. End of story."

[proud2BlibKansan]

14. They finally found that data a couple years ago

But now the excuse is they can't afford to reduce class size.

[cjbgreen]

15. Student to Teacher Ratio

It is also interesting how student to teacher ratio is calculated and misleading since it is calculation is not based on actual class size or actual number of certified teachers assigned classrooms.

[LWolf]

16. Of course it does. nt