>     Not one single kid in your classes of 14 ever had
 > to repeat the grade?  Were you teaching gifted kids
 > only?
No, and no. But I *was* teaching at a Christian school in that instance. 
However, I've had other experiences with small classes.
In Alaska, I had a class of 17 6th graders. Each of them passed on to 7th 
grade. One family decided to hold their 6th grader back - they didn't feel 
she was emotionally ready for junior high (and later they came to me and said 
that it was the best decision they'd ever made; I stress that this was a 
parent decision - not mine.) The following year, I moved down to 1st grade. I 
had 22 1st graders. Everyone of them moved on, and were ready to do so. Most 
of them read very well, because I had time to work with them individually. 
These were not GATE kids either. I did have one that might have qualified for 
GT (we didn't test til 3rd grade for that).
OTOH, I taught Kindergarten in California. I had 32 in my class. It took so 
long just to do informal testing to see where each child was at, and I had no 
less than 8 in each little "reading" and "math" group, and not much time for 
each little group due to group size and whatelse had to go into the school 
day. I don't think I ever knew any of my kindergarteners as well as I knew 
those kids in the smaller classes that I taught.
Maybe statistics don't prove that class size and achievement are related. 
Statistics aren't everything - personal experience and comfort levels prove 
that they *are* related.
                                 -donna
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