Debate Continues Over Effectiveness Of Smaller Class Size

Salon (8/8, Tyre) writes on the ongoing debate about how important class size is to student learning. Right now, 32 states have either voluntary or mandatory class size reduction measures. While teachers unions have endorsed smaller class sizes, others in the field disagree. Recently, Michelle Rhee suggested that "with the right preparation, bigger classes, not smaller ones, would be an effective way to raise test scores and save money". The article goes on to examine two studies from the Early Childhood Longitudinal Study, Kindergarten class of 1998–99. While one study concluded "small class size had no effect on student learning in reading or mathematics", the other "found that kindergarten and first-grade children who attended classes that were seventeen kids and one teacher or less learned about three weeks more than kindergartners and first graders who learned in large groups -- greater than twenty-five students."