Saturday, April 30, 2011

Class Size Matters


Nine kids showed up for tutoring this morning, not a big turnout, but a worthwhile one.  A group of ESL girls, girls who have only been in this country a little over a year showed up.  And, while I don't speak Chinese,  sitting with them, explaining with words and pictures and then letting them explain to each other made a big difference in what they knew coming in versus what they knew when they left.

Yesterday I had the pleasure of talking to Leonie Haimson from Classsizematters.org and I only thought about my lowest level kids and how smaller classes would benefit them.  Today I saw how smaller classes would really help all kids.

Millions of dollars are being spent on technology and methods to evaluate teachers.  Nothing is being spent to lower class size.  Thank goodness for people like Leonie who work non stop to try to get the children of NY what they really need.

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