Math Forum Discussions

Redyarrow

Posts: 29
Registered: 12/6/04

Re: ability grouping
Posted: Feb 19, 1998 2:29 AM

Plain Text

The definitive article analyzing all of the research related to grouping was
printed in the HARVARD EDUCATION REVIEW, Vol. 66, No. 4 Winter 1996, pp
797-828. The article titled, "Sustained Inquiry in Education: Lessons from
Skills grouping and Class Size" was written by Frederick Mosteller, Richard
Light, and Jason Sachs. I'll provide the text for the intro to this article,
but before I do I think that it's important to realize that the only
alternatives aren't heterogeneous groups vs. tracking. Joplin grouping which
is one variation of grouping this article describes and which is rarely used,
remains the most effective type of grouping I've personally witnessed in my 20
years in education. This article (filled with any and all referencesto studies
on grouping) is described as follows:

"In this article the authors explore the nature of the empirical evidence that
can inform school leaders' key decisions about how to organize students within
schools: Should students be placed in heterogeneous classes or tracked classes?
AWhat is the impact of class size on student learning? How does it vary?
Since tracking (or skills grouping, as the authors prefer to call it) is widely
used in U.S. schools, the authors expected to find a wealth of evidence to
support the efficacy of the practice. Surprisingly, they found only a handful
of well-designed studies expbenefits of tracking, and of these, the results
were equivocal. Witrh regard to class size, the authors describe the Tenn.
class size study, using it to illustrate that large, long-term, randomized
controlled field trials can be carried out successfully in education. The
Tenn. study demonstrates convincingly that student achievement is better
supported in smaller classes in grades K-3, and that this enhanced achievement
continues when the students move to regular-size classes in the fourth grade
and beyond. The authors suggest in conclusion that education would benefit from
a commitment to sustained inquiry through well-designed, randomized controlled
fireld trials of education innovations. Such sustained inquiry could provide a
source of solid evidence on which educators could base their decisions about
how to organize and support student learning in classes and schools."

----------------------------
message approved for posting by k12.ed.math moderator
k12.ed.math is a moderated newsgroup.
charter for the newsgroup at www.wenet.net/~cking/sheila/charter.html
submissions: post to k12.ed.math or e-mail to k12math@sd28.bc.ca