On Class Size--Night and Day
I had a great year with both of them, to tell the truth. But they had quite different characters. The prime difference was that the large afternoon class required a lot of handling. I go quiet when I'm not happy. I stare the class down until we can continue. Every moment spent staring is a moment of instruction lost.
It was particularly tough this year because of four personalities in the PM group. None of them were bad kids, and three of them passed, but they were all problematic in their way. The most troublesome was a young woman who seemed to require my attention every minute. She had a piercing voice that could not and would not be ignored. She also had a very high average.
I tried contacting her parents, but they were pretty tough on her. She'd come in and go silent for two or three weeks. I found that even worse than being interrupted and basically put up with her for the rest of the year. It's perhaps my most significant defeat as a teacher. (Don't tell my students, please.)
Another kid basically could not sit still. Another could not refrain from speaking his first language. Actually there were two kids like that. Neither could comprehend fully that when I said the class was all English, I really, really meant it. In a way, it's understandable. Imagine yourself sitting in a foreign country with 25 English speakers and having some guy tell you that from now on you couldn't speak English. It's a hard sell, but my job is a hard sell.
Here's the thing, though--in the morning class I had a few very outgoing personalities too. In fact, one of my PM problems had been transferred from the AM class, and he was passing the AM class at the time. I knew moving him into the other class would be trouble.
But in the morning, I could let the kids say what they liked. I could let them speak as much as they liked. There was no place to hide and speak NYC Educator: On Class Size--Night and Day:
