Too Many Students and Not Enough Time

December 19, 2016

By: John McCarthy
Source: Edutopia

Differentiation provides ways to cope with large workloads and with the feeling that there’s never enough time.

Student learning and growth can become obscured by three obstacles that teachers may feel powerless to address: class size, overall workload, and instructional time. These are genuine concerns, so let’s take a closer look at each challenge and possible solutions.

The Class Size Challenge

Large classes are a difficult challenge faced by many teachers. Proponents of smaller classes point to studies that show achievement results, with the largest impact appearing to be on early elementary students. To a lesser extent, smaller classes can help English language learners and those who have large skill deficits. Critics counter that costs rise as class size falls and that the impact of smaller classes decreases for older grades. John Hattie found that small class size has “a positive but small effect” on learning. What is more important is teacher expertise in the instructional setting.

Having taught in urban, suburban, and rural schools, and having worked with teachers in these environments, I can say from experience that class size does make instruction and student learning a daily puzzle to solve.

Differentiation solutions for navigating large classes:

1. Transform whole class instruction into small learning teams. Working with 40 or 50 students at once can feel overwhelming at times. Differentiation through content can be done by dividing students into small learning teams of four or five. Provide tasks that specifically target skills or outcomes through respectful work based on students’ readiness level. Teams develop internal supports as one resource for shared problem solving before asking for teacher assistance. Strategies to help structure small learning teams:

• Jigsaw groups (and a bonus example)
• Small-group mini-lessons
• Centers and stations
• Clock partners (and bonus examples)

2. Use a variety of structured dialogue protocols to focus learning experiences. Students need opportunities to make sense of material through reflection and review. Structured protocols have time-sensitive steps with defined roles for participants. This helps learners stay focused on the topic they are processing. The result can be that more students are ready to move forward with product-oriented learning experiences. A few examples of effective protocols:

• Save the Last Word
• Affinity Mapping
• Chalk Talk
• Socratic seminars

The Workload Challenge

Workload is a different but at times related issue. A secondary teacher may see 200 students during the day in five classes, with 40 students per class. A large workload can make it difficult for the teacher to get to know all of their students. With large workloads, relationships become even more important. Knowing students’ names and something about them is necessary if student buy-in to a supportive learning environment is to happen.

Differentiation solutions that address this issue:

• Learning Profile Cards: Get to know all students from their perspective. Use these cards to thoughtfully create teams based on more than behavior.
• Learning preferences through art: A high school math teacher used this approach to group students. His students evaluated themselves based on an inventory, creating designs that represented themselves as squiggles, circles, squares, or triangles. The students identified a secondary trait that also represented themselves, which helped the teacher to avoid thinking of them as one-dimensional.
• Norms: Student-generated norms can reflect their ideas about what makes a supportive environment. Adults and students must abide by the norms. Students and the teacher can coach anyone in the room on breaches in norms.
• I Wish My Teacher Knew: The approach presented in this book empowers students to share about themselves in a private way. Students can use sticky notes, emails, or private direct postings to the teacher. The insights can provide needed perspective that informs a teacher’s actions. This ABC video shows the tremendous effect this can have:

The Time Challenge

My teaching career started in the Chicago Public Schools system, where the classes were 40 minutes long. As a first-year teacher, it was a challenge to figure out how best to manage learning in such a limited span. It felt like the period ended just when we were getting into the thick of learning experiences. Later in my career, I taught classes that were 100 minutes long. At first, this longer time frame seemed as challenging as the 40-minute span.

Studies on instructional time focus on the length of the school day and on extending the school year. Here we’ll focus on the day. We should look at how we can create learning experiences within the time frame that place students in the role of active learners instead of passive receptors.