Size Matters

I was having a conversation with my sister about class size and she seemed to recall having classes of up to 50 students in grammar school. At which point I told her that she was absolutely wrong and that if there were classes existing like that today that it was a disservice to both the student and the teacher and probably against the law in many states. So I started to do some research to find articles about class size and came across many. This one in the Washington Post caught my eye, especially when I saw the quote from John Dewey.

Class size is an issue that I am struggling with at the elementary school where I am teaching as many of my classes are close to 30 and very often inclusion classes, which means it could have up to 12 kids with IEP"s 

As the article addresses class size across the entire education system including Ivy League Colleges. I thought the example of the Harvard Creative Writing class was particularly ironic. I think it is important for us as educators to take the issue seriously and figure out what we can do to advocate for smaller class sizes, even right here in our own backyard.

Thanks 

All the best,

Andrew

follow this link to the article:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/answer-sheet/class-size/7-class-size-myths----and-the.html

As John Dewey wrote, “What the best and wisest parent wants for his own child, that must the community want for all of its children.” If education is really the civil rights issue of our era, it is about time those people making policies for our schools begin to provide for other people’s children what they provide for their own.