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As featured in Parentdish

Thursday 24 February 2011

Class sizes


I don’t think it was a surprise to many when the TESS reported on January 7th that 13 out of 32 councils have scraped the maximum 20-pupil class size target for early secondary English and maths. Despite the SNP's pre-election pledge to reduce class sizes in primary schools, it has never materialised with the goal posts having been moved.

We would all like smaller classes. It’s a nice idea, but in my opinion there is much more to worry about. Good quality teaching and children who can be disciplined are much more important factors. Speaking to teachers who have been in the job for a long time, I am told that things are much worse nowadays and that discipline is a huge problem.

Now I have read the argument that in high achieving countries such as South Korea and Japan class sizes are large but that is hardly comparing like for like. The culture is different there and education is deemed more important by the vast majority of families. They also don’t have our behaviour problems.

There may be research which proves that class size does not impact on educational attainment, but we all know that research is not always accurate. What about common sense – the more chance a child has of receiving one to one, the higher the chance he will do well.

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