[GeminiSix]

DD came home earlier this week with news that she will be continuing in the same composite class (1/2) next year with the same teacher. We were thrilled with this news as her teacher is wonderful, he is very engaging with the kids. A handful of kids have been moved to other classes and a few others have moved in. He has told them that next year there will be 28 kids in the class, and it will be the largest class in the school. There are 4 x 1/2 composite classes in the school.

It got me thinking how would they decide which children go into the largest class? DD's literacy skills are advanced, maths is on track too so I was thinking that perhaps they put all the children who don't need extra assistance in together.

I wouldn't be too impressed if my child was struggling and was placed in the largest class.

Any teachers who can shed light as to how classes are picked? And is 28 considered "large" compared to other schools.

[Soprano-Cat]

By QLD standards/regulations, for that age group, yes it would be a large class.

23-24 is considered more acceptable, but it does depend on numbers as to how many teachers the school is allocated, so sometimes there is no choice.

[Phascogale]

Not particularly large. The research also shows that it's the quality of the teacher, not the size of the class that influences learning. You can have a woeful teacher with only 15 kids in the class and have terrible learning or a brilliant teacher with 32 kids and excellent learning. The school may see this teacher as the one most capable of engaging all the kids which is why she has a couple of extras. If your child was struggling in one area then the school will probably have things in place to help ie a teacher to pull kids out for small group tutoring or something like reading recovery.

Ideally a class around 25 may be better. In Vic the government schools try and have P-2 classes no more than about 22. The higher year levels around the 28-30 mark (depends on facililites, number of teachers etc). This is what happened with the first school my kids attended. My daughter in her 3/4 class of 29 did better than when she was in the 1/2 with about 24 kids (different teacher). The second school they attended had class sizes capped at 25 with occasional going overs to about 26/27 (which would drop back when kids left). This was for all classes from prep. I remember when I was at school that it was regular to have 32/33 kids in a class and I don't remember an issue.

What will also likely happen is that if new kids come they won't be put into your son's class but the other classes with less kids and kids may also leave that will drop the numbers a little.

[JRA]

That seems pretty big to me.

I suspect/hope the other classes in the same group are only 1 person less. I would be pretty shocked if one class is 28, and the others 24 for instance. I suspect the others are 27. Assuming that, I would have thought 5 classes would have made more sense because that would make 109 kids which would make 22 per class for 5 classes.

[msro82]

Most schools like to cap around 25, but if needed stretch to 28.

DD goes to a catholic tasmanian school and they aim for 25 per class, but if needed will go up to 28.

As a previous poster said its likely that the other classes are 27 students.

I doubt a school would have space to make a whole other class with fewer numbers.

[PrincessPeach]

It does sound quite high, my assumption is they are a student or two off getting another fulltime teacher, so lets hope another couple enrol early next year, which will change your numbers around a bit.

[GeminiSix]

Thanks for the replies. This is a Catholic school in Vic. I'm sure the other 1/2 classes are around 25/26, so I suppose it's not such a big number compared to them. A new principal started last year who has allowed numbers to creep up, previously to that Preps were capped at 25 no exceptions, so the effect of that is starting to show. All classrooms are being utilised at the moment, the school is on 25 acres so there is room to move. Our town has many new developments with new families moving in so making the school larger is inevitable.

[mumto3princesses]

Yes for that age group I would say its a large class. I think our school tries to do something like no more than 20 for Kindergarten, no more than 22 for Year 1 and no more than 24 for year 2. And a 1/2 composite would be 22 rather than 24.(I could have my numbers slightly wrong but its about that)

But my twins are in a 3/4 composite and they have 31 in their class this year. And I think all the other primary classes (3x 3/4 composites and 3x 5/6 composites) are about 30-31 per class.

[Julie3Girls]

For that level, yes, I would consider it large.
At our school, NSW public, kinder class(FYOS) is capped at 20. Yr 1 is meant to be 22, yr 2 24.
Once you hit yr 3, the limits seem to disappear. Due to some unbalanced numbers in our school, we ended up with lovely small kinder classes this year (17 or 18), but all the yr3 and up classes were sitting on 30.

[liveworkplay]

Sounds pretty average to me. Our classes are capped at 28 from prep (FYOS) with one teacher and a part time teachers aid (x hours a day) Why 4 composite classes though and not 2 straight of each grade? That is what sounds the odd thing to me.