I went to a large public school for 2nd, 3rd, and 4th grades. There were at least three classrooms of about 25-30 students per classroom. After being tested, the students were grouped as democratically as possible--slow, average, and gifted in each classroom. Of course, back then there was no "gifted" designation. The smarter students were expected to lead and even help the slower ones. The teacher taught to the average ability. If a student was slow, he did his best to keep up, usually with after-school help from the teacher. If a student was bright, he had to find ways to keep productively busy once he'd finished his seatwork and homework.

For 5th through 8th grade, I went to a small country school where there were three grades to a classroom, average of 8 students per grade, one teacher per classroom, and no aides. The teachers spent the school day moving back and forth from one end of the classroom to the other.

The students who were not being taught did homework or other assignments. Any student could listen in on the lesson being taught to another grade in the room. With three grades in one room, a student would probably hear (or at least have available) the same lesson three years in a row. (The students would hear the same teacher jokes or asides three years in a row too.)

Every really important and useful thing that I learned (except for Latin), I learned in grades 4-8.

What is your experience in elementary school, and how did it work for you?

For the first six years that I taught 7th and 8th grade, I had seven classes with 30-32 students each. Although there were few discipline problems and just a few more learning problems, I thought the classes were too big. Keeping up with 210 students was just too much. I never felt that I knew as much about each student's ability and personality as I should.

When I left, the administration was pushing for one teacher to teach composition to all 210 students. The classes were finally changed after I was not there to argue against it. Not a good decision--for the teacher or the kids.

I don't think classes should have more than about 20 in most schools today. Discipline is one factor, but the need for documentation of everything is another. It's a different situation than the one in which we were educated.

Fourth through eighth grades, we had two classrooms a grade with about 30 kids in each, with one teacher (not always a nun). We were there to learn. Playing was for recess, out on the playground. Lower grades got 15 minutes in mid-morning; everyone got a break after lunch, 45 minutes if you ate fast.

First and second graders sat at tables: seated four, two on each side. Third through sixth had chairs with more than a study arm (it came all the way across) and book space under the seat. Seventh and eighth graders had the old style -- this thing, almost http://www.lutzfranklin.com/Pages/LSHScalendar.htm (page down), except the desk surface itself lifted to open the box we kept books and supplies in.

The threat, and carrying out, of corporal punishment was accepted then both by the parents and the wider society, but these aspects have been wildly exaggerated over the years since then.

There was no formal separation of the brightest from the slowest, although the teachers taught accordingly as best they could.

I went on to a Jesuit Prep school and a Jesuit University, but those years in elementary school were by far the most important of my education.

I believe that classes in public schools should contain no more than 30 students, and that's a maximum. I'm afraid that many are much larger. I agree with Brenda that around 20 would be much better, and even as few as 10 to 15 would be ideal. One can have lively discussions and fewer disciplinary problems with smaller classes.

High school classes were usually about 30, I think, at least for English, history, foreign language, and math classes. Science classes were taught with everyone sitting at his lab position -- tables seating two in biology and physics, actual lab stations in chemistry -- and they were 25 or 30, depending on size of the room and demand for the course. Advanced chemistry had only 12; calculus had only 10. The only times we ever had more than one teacher was when our teacher was training a student teacher.

Nowadays, teachers are not allowed to tell students to be quiet, or to exercise any control at all. One high school English teacher I know works with half her class; the other kids are busy talking to each other about anything that has nothing to do with English or school. When I was in school, we knew the rules! Grade school punishment: copy dictionary pages exactly. High school punishment: detention (sit in that teacher's classroom from 3:15 to 4:00), get three days off school (and get a zero on all homework and tests for those three days), get expelled. And then the parents took their turn!