reevaluating class size

I found a very interesting article from Twitter that has a lot of relevance for the educational funding debates that are happening right now in Michigan and around the country. An education columnist argues that the detrimental effects of classroom size are overblown and my in fact not exist at all. First off, he says that those debating about improving education overemphasize the effects of larger class sizes when the real problem is the mediocre teachers in some classrooms. Furthermore, he says that the only way smaller classes significantly improve student learning is when they are half the size of a normal classroom and the students are at risk students. For most other students, even slightly larger than normal classrooms do not negatively impact their learning. I have heard all the horror stories about 60 kids in a classroom in Detroit but I tend to agree with this analysis. Good teachers are able to use group work and effective classroom management to help a large group of students learn from everyone else in the room. When students are motivated and provided with engaging, differentiated lessons, the class size is almost irrelevant because the students will be following along and learning through the activities even if there are a few more of them. The only time smaller classes would help is when students have issues at home that might affect their attention or motivation at school, especially when those students' behavior is a distraction to their peers. These students need regular attention from teachers and they will not get that by simply decreasing class size from 32 to 28 so I can really see how a significantly smaller class could really help a teacher reach such students. When some of those students are worrying about where dinner is coming from, a crowded classroom can probably feel like this:

Original Image: "Crowd"
http://www.flickr.com/photos/jamescridland/613445810/sizes/s/in/photostream/
by: James Cridland

Released under an Attribution License
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/