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Raise Awareness
It is important to raise awareness among our school community on the benefits related to reducing class sizes especially in the literacy subject areas. How to raise awareness:
- Open house
- PTA
- Posters and multimedia -
Professional Development
Faculty and staff will need professional development to ensure that they understand individual student performance. Clearly understanding student skill levels and progress will provide teachers with important information necessary for planning and how to propoerly group their students. How to train faculty and staff:
- Incorporate common planning time across grade levels and subject areas -
Resources
Identify and allocate approprate resources focused on prevention rather than remediation. Resources include:
- Classroom materials (books, technology equipment, etc...)
- Teacher training in the use of classroom materials.
- Give all adults (specialists, administrators, volunteers, librarian, etc...) explicit roles in supporting student learning -
Funding
Shifting resources away from ineffective educational interventions can minimize the cost of smaller classes.
- Look over what is currently available at the school and make decisions to move away from funding ineffective resources. Extra teachers in a school who do not have regular
class assignments are costly and may not have the same positive impact on achievement as shrinking class size.
- Rethink staff roles: have the largest percentage of teachers orking in the academic focus area
