If I had all the time in the world, I would read for at least four hours a day. Actually, I would read all day, but we all know how unrealistic that would be! Novels are my favorite reading, but I have been branching out to read non-fiction of various genres. One genre I’ve been trying to focus on is books that help me as a professional. I have a bookshelf full of these books that I have read or want to get to, and I plan to share short reviews with you, my colleagues. I won’t be posting the reviews in my blog but rather on a Book Review page on this website: BOOK REVIEWS. Please check back for future book reviews or like my Facebook page for updates.
The first book I want to discuss I won’t actually put in my reviews. It tangentially discusses topics related to teaching. I’m a Malcolm Gladwell fan, and I love how his mind works. I’ve read several of his books, and the latest is David and Goliath: Underdogs, Misfits, and the Art of Battling Giants. The chapter I felt related most to music teaching was Chapter Two: “Teresa DeBrito,” which tackles the impact of class size. Many of us will laugh about the class sizes he discusses because many of us have ridiculously large classes. My largest class ever at Billinghurst Middle School was 64 students in Advanced Orchestra, which is 8th grade. We barely fit into my orchestra room, and sadly, I felt like I didn’t get to know my students that well. My smallest class was 17 in a Beginning Orchestra class of mostly 6th graders with a sprinkle of 7th graders. The students made incredible progress, but, oddly, many of them did not continue into Intermediate Orchestra. Gladwell talks about how a class with too few students lacks the richness and diversity of a larger class. Teachers report that students don’t express themselves, and it doesn’t allow quiet students the luxury of being quiet. A French-language teacher remarked, “The momentum just isn’t there” with too small a class. Too large a class and teachers “can’t maintain the magic all the time.” We music teachers may have just a little different view of class sizes. For me, the term “critical mass” has impact. In January of 1992, I took over the direction of the local Suzuki program. It was a small program, and the group class had about 5 students total. The students were of similar age and ability level, but they didn’t interact. They walked into class quietly, got out their violin, and waited for me to start. It was chilling! I wanted chaos. I wanted the kids running around and laughing. I wanted to have to get after them to get ready to start class. You may think I’m a little crazy for wanting this, but it was too quiet; there was no energy. For years, I worked on expanding our program, and eventually, it was the vital, energetic Suzuki program I wanted. In 2008, I transitioned into classroom teaching. Again, critical mass means something to me, and I wanted a larger program to have that energy, focus, and charisma. I started with 125 students and quickly expanded. Thinking about the points in Gladwell’s book, for me, a small class size is perfect for the first year. I can give all students individual attention and give the students a solid setup with good note reading skills. The downside of smaller classes is that you have fewer students to recruit for the next-level class. A larger class size is better in the following years because the more advanced students effectively drag the slower students along. For me, a perfect size second-year class, 7th grade for my school, is about 30 students. With this number, I usually have several strong players, which help the more meek players along. If we have less than 25 students in second and third-year classes, we may have very few leaders. It is so obvious when those students are absent! For my third-year class, I find 30-45 to be a good number. The 8th graders need that hyper-social environment of a large class and the full sound of the orchestra with big numbers. For a math or social studies teacher, these would be huge numbers. Unfortunately, in my district often our class sizes near the 40 student mark in middle school. I could jump up on my school funding soapbox, but I’ll spare you for now. What are my numbers for this coming school year? Post-COVID, they are definitely lower. I usually have 180-220 students in my orchestra program for grades 6-8. This coming year I will have 140 students with 31 and 28 in my Beginning classes, 25 and 27 in my Intermediate classes, and 39 in Advanced Orchestra. Not perfect, but not bad either. In addition, I teach an eclectic ensemble, Golden Strings, with an enrollment of 42. These students are also enrolled in their grade-level orchestra classes. While the Beginning classes are a little large and the Intermediate classes are just on the shy side of perfect, and the Advanced is close; I think this year will be able to set the stage for getting back to where we were before the pandemic. On the Book Reviews page on this website, I list some of the books I will review in the coming weeks. This blog will continue to discuss general ideas and thoughts about teaching music to students in the school setting and in private studios. I would love it if you left a comment about the ideal class size for your teaching situation. See the comment link below. Cheers! Caryn
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