We recently read an article for Dr. Mullins' class that I thought was especially applicable to our situation. The author mentioned the standards movement and how it revealed inequality in schools. She went on to profoundly reveal that students in schools with large populations of disadvantaged students perform the worst on standardized tests... duh. I find it very unfortunate that my honors students are constantly brought down by their peers... and it's no fault of their own. This is an issue that has been thoroughly discussed among my classmates. Reducing class size seems to be an obvious solution.
Before reading the article, I had been told by several people that research suggested that class size had no effect on student performance. Like most things related to education, I really had no opinion on the matter until this year. Because of this year, I have a very hard time believing that class size doesn’t affect student performance. My average class size is about 28 students, and on the random days when students are pulled out for testing I am left with a mere 12-15 students. I wish there was a way to adequately articulate how much more engaged the students are on those days. Their hands shoot up to answer questions... maybe it’s because they know they have a better chance of being called on... but once I get them started on the day’s activity, I have no problem getting to every one of them for some individual attention. Of course they retain more information. I'm not sure why research says that class size doesn't matter. But I simply have a hard time believing it.
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