Teach Effectively!

In an article entitled “Regents back McWalters on special-ed class sizes,” Linda Borg of the Providence (RI, US) Journal reported about a disagreement between a teachers’ group and an administrator about the number of students who could be assigned to a classroom. The administrator wanted to increase special education class sizes from 10 to 12 students per room, and the teachers’ group countered that move was predicated on financial concerns, not educational reasons (see some relevant paragraphs appended here).

This sounds a lot like an age-old disagreement, and in some ways it is. However, there are some other relevant points to be made about it.

1. Class size has effects on students’ outcomes, to be sure, but they are not as great as the effects of other variables. For example, consider this: The overall effect size (ES) for class size, as reported in Glass and Smith’s (1976) classic study, is 0.31. The overall ES for using formative assessment in teaching students with disabilities, as reported in another classic study (Fuchs & Fuchs, 1978), is 0.70. As this crude comparison illustrates, class size makes a difference, but what teachers do makes a bigger difference. (From illustrations of these two findings, see here and here, respectively; sources are available here.
2. The effect of class size differs when classes are quite small (e.g., < 15) in comparison to common class sizes (e.g., ≈25); when sizes get small, such as either the 10 or 12 students apparently used in RI, the effects are much more dramatic, and they provide a good rationale for protecting special education resources.
3. Although I don’t have the data at hand to assess whether a change from 10 to 12 students would have a measurable impact on outcomes, I have to wonder about it. I hasten to note, though, that the popular idea that tutoring is the optimal situation has not been supported by research; although the results are based on a limited number of studies, Batya Elbaum and colleagues found greater support for small-group instruction than tutoring. [source: Elbaum, B., Vaughn, S., Tejero Hughes, M., & Watson Moody, S. (2000). How effective are one-to-one tutoring programs in reading for elementary students at risk for reading failure? A meta-analysis of the intervention research. Journal of Educational Psychology, 92, 605-619.]
4. Some intervention procedures produce more substantial benefits when they are implemented in smaller-class settings than they do in larger-class settings. Stage and Quiroz (1997) found that procedures designed to decrease disruptive behavior produce ESs of For setting 0.65, 0.86, and 0.97 in regular, resource, and self-contained settings, respectively. (See illustration and get reference.)
5. I am impressed that RI still has special education classrooms! With all the emphasis on inclusion and response to intervention, I had the (apparently mistaken) impression that self-contained special classes were mostly a thing of the past.

So, the RI disagreement may be a bit of tempest in a teapot, but it opens the door to some pretty important discussions, in my view. For example, why aren’t more schools providing effective instruction in environments that produce better chances of improved outcomes for students?

PROVIDENCE — The state Board of Regents for Elementary and Secondary Education has agreed that the state education commissioner was justified when he granted a School Department request to increase the class size for special education students.

The regents voted on Wednesday to support a ruling by an appeals committee of the regents.

The appeals committee upheld a decision by Education Commissioner Peter McWalters, who granted a request by Supt. Donnie Evans to increase class size from 10 to 12 students, provided the district complies with a number of requirements aimed at improving the quality of special education.

“While monetary issues may have been the motivation for the Providence school district’s request,” the appeals committee wrote, “the commissioner’s response to it was, in our opinion, motivated by the need to fulfill his obligation to improve the performance in the district in a manner not constrained by dogged adherence to an arbitrary number for class size.”

The Providence Teachers Union argued in a suit in Superior Court that the School Department decided to increase class size in a last-ditch attempt to close a $3.4-million budget deficit, created in part by the General Assembly’s decision not to award a 3 percent school aid increase to cities and towns.

The union argued that there was no educational justification for increasing class size, adding that special education children would, in fact, be harmed by such a move. After hearing testimony in the case last fall, Judge Allen P. Rubine sent the matter to the regents because, he said, they set education policy for the state.

In his decision, Rubine said that the regents would have to determine whether McWalters granted the district’s special education waiver because of valid educational reasons or whether his actions were motivated by a budget shortfall that an increase in class size would correct.

Link to Ms. Borg’s article.