I read Ranting Stan’s blog this morning and was fascinated by the points he made about class size. According to this passionate Brit, the solution to effective learning is not to decrease class size. Instead, teachers should be free to discipline their class when necessary.
Stan cited as his examples both his own experience growing up (class sizes of 35-40) and the current standard in countries like China & India (class sizes of 60-80). And he makes the obvious point that these two countries have won the respect of the rest of the world for the caliber of students they produce. Why should we try to achieve the same results with an opposite means? (Smaller class size, rather than increased discipline.)
I would like to sit in on a class in China or India – because, as was pointed out to me today, apparently something is being done differently there where classroom management is concerned.
What do you think? Is there an ideal class size and how far do you think class discipline would take you in a room of 70 students?
I read Stan’s blog every day, and I can tell you now that he’s rarely, if ever, wrong. Some people just talk common sense, and I think that no right-minded and logical person can disagree with what he said about class size/discipline. It is definitely political correctness to blame again for the fall in Britain’s education standards – that and an incompetent socialist Labour government, who have dumbed down the education system beyond all recognition.
Larry, thanks for confirming my faith in Stan’s opinions. I can vouch for “political correctness” being a weakness in the States as well. Seems like if we are trying to keep everyone happy, suddenly no one is happy.
Everyone knows that discipline is what’s required. That doesn’t mean that teachers should go about punching students every 5 minutes, not at all. We all know that there’s a big difference between abuse and structured discipline.
Wow. This is unbelievable to me. Even my comments are being censored on this blog, because I dare to criticise the new messiah, Barrack Hussain Obama.
Again, there is a difference between critizing someone’s actions and merely calling them a name. I cannot, in good conscience, write a blog for a company producing character-building tools while allowing someone to show dishonor toward a leader. Regardless of my or your personal political beliefs, the person who won the election deserves respect. And it seems to me that the very point Stan was making in his blog was that teachers have lost their respect in the classroom. How can we require it of our students when we are not willing to show it ourselves?
There’s a big difference between a teacher-pupil relationship and a socialist dictator who’s trying to ruin your country.
None of the liberals in the media showed George W Bush any respect. But then he was a white, christian conservative – so that makes it okay.