I'm curious...how many students do you have and where are you?
I have 28 - I'm in Indiana.
All other grades have 4 to 5 sections, then kids hit fifth grade and they go down to 3 sections. Why is it that 5th graders get dealt this? In middle school they're closer to 20 in a class! Arghh!
I'm also departmentalized teaching social studies on a 4 person team, so that averages to about 20 per class - some have a couple more, some a few less.
I'm in Northwest Ohio....in a WONDERFUL community school--
I have taught for 12 years in both public and community schools, good and bad, and I have to say my school is one of the nicest I have ever been in!
I have 24 fifth graders and we are a school for the Arts--we have both band and choir, and an active Art program. We take arts related field trips on a regular basis. We also have a Friday Art Series where local performing groups come to our school. We are a feeder school for a Performing Arts high school.
I teach 5th grade in Missouri. We normally have 3 classes, and started the year this way...However, due to low numbers, there are only 2 of us now with 24 and 25 each.
I have 24 and the other fifth grade teacher has 25. Last year there were three of us teachers so we had 17 each! I'm finding those 8 kids DEF make a difference... lol!
I am in Texas and my class load this year is 27 students, as of yesterday. They keep coming. We need around 7 more students to build another class. I believe the limit is 31.
I teach in a public school district in the suburbs of NYC in New York.
Due to budget issues, our district cut teachers last year. We went from 15 to 13 sections in our fifth grade. I currently have 29 students--including 3 "gifted" and three with IEPs, 11 with remedial math and/or reading services.
Last year, fifth grade had 24-25 students in our school. Thankfully, our contract limits class sizes to 30, cause we are bursting at the seams!!
I still love my class, fo course, but the increase in numbers can be daunting...space-wise, paperwork, p-t communications, and on and on....
In my particular school in California (with the terminator as our Governor) our 5th grade classes are impacted with 36 students and a 5/6 combination with 31.
I'm from Indiana, too. Lots of cuts in our corporation... I teach 25 students in a 5/6 split class (including 5 inclusion kids and 1 E/H) and I do have them at the same time! I get no extra prep time or help. Very frustrating!
I am in Indiana and I teach a split class of 18 fifth graders and 10 fourth graders.... Two students are autistic and one is MIMH.... It's a challenging year!!!
It's apparent that good ole' California has some of the biggest class sizes for 5th grade. Ugh. This year I only have 30. Last year I had 37! This is regular ed, public school, in LosAngeles County.
I have 11. I'm at a small private school in Oakland, CA.
Most of our families are low income and on financial aid, and many of my kids from teaching fourth last year were struggling to pay and aren't back this year. While I love having only 11 kids, the less-than-full classes mean our school is beyond broke. (The board was even talking about cutting salaries. Yikes!) I would take a few more kids if it meant keeping my salary and getting new white board markers. :P
How are your kids' low income families who are on getting financial aid even begin to afford a private school? I'm surprised they were in a public school to begin with.
I don't mean to sound ignorant, but I really don't know much about the workings of a private school. I just know I've always heard it costs a lot to send your child to one.
BTW, if you need those new white board markers, let me know. I'll help you out. Possibility of cutting your pay? Not cool!
I teach in South Carolina, and we have 7 classes of 5th grade with about 24-27 each. Our fourth grade teachers have 8 classes of 29-30 each, so we'll have to add another 5th grade next year.
I teach in a Catholic school in SW Florida. Classes have always been large, up to 35. Numbers are down and I have the largest class in the school with 26 5th graders. Great place to teach, great school, great kids, but it's a lot of work.
I teach 5th grade in a metro-Atlanta school. My class was 16 students and would have remained that for the rest of the year had I not lost anyone. However, I just lost 2 students, so I'm down to 14. I'm an EIP class, which means my class size will remain small. I'll also be the one to get the next one or two students. It will eventually be back up to 16 (or more, if the EIP balance is changed).
We have 6 fifth-grade classes, and all are under 20 students.
I have 32 students! It's so crazy in my district this year...they got rid of class size reduction. Some kindergarten classes have 32 students in them, it's so crazy!
We have 8 5th grade homerooms. Teachers have 23-25 students. We are departmentalized.
I am a reg. ed teacher who teaches an intervention class. Too complicated to explain .
1st period - I am an inclusion teacher in a homeroom with 23 students, 11 of whom are sped, 3 504.
6th and 7th period (double block) - Inclusion here also, 3 sped, 3 504, and 6 gifted.
4 periods per day I teach intervention in my own room to a total of 37 students.
I have a Homework Club for 30 minutes as students are arriving in the mornings which basically is another intervention period, and have 12 students there.
I think I might get the prize for the smallest class size after reading everyone else's posts.
We're a very small inner-city community school with just under 200 students in grades K-5.
Each grade level has 2 classes. I teach both 4th & 5th grade science.
My smallest class has 10 students and the largest class has 15.
All in all, I teach about 50 students daily because we block.
We are a 4th/5th grade center. We have eleven classrooms for 4th graders and ten 5th grade classrooms. We all have around 24 students this year, but if enrollment goes up (and it sometimes does after the college and the airforce base have new entries after Christmas) we can go as high 27 or so.
Due to budget cuts, my 5th grade team has gone from 6 teachers with 23 students each to 5 teachers with 27-29 students each. We are known for having high test scores, but I'm afraid that will be difficult to achieve this year. My heart goes out to the teachers in California with high class numbers. Good luck to all of us in highly impacted classrooms this year.
I am in Oregon, because of cuts last year, they moved me to a new school ,new grade a 4/5 blend.10-4th graders,19-5th graders,1autistic,5 LD..its been a real challenge trying to teach all subjects...........I have 2 good male teachers as my 5th grade team, 4th grade does their own thing...It will be interesting to see if we have to keep the blend next year,yikes! But I do love the age better then teaching 1st grade
I teach 5th grade in a NYC public school. I have 34 kids in the "IEP" class. I have all of the kids with IEP's in the 5th grade plus 2 ELL's and 2 Inclusion kids. Put it this way, when we have our NYS SS test on Monday, more than 1/2 of my class has testing modifications.
They are a great group of kids, I love them, but grading a math test takes hours
There are 2 other 5th grade classes. Mine is the lowest functioning and the largest.
11-02-2009, 04:41 PM
teaching social studies on a 4 person team, so that averages to about 20 per class - some have a couple more, some a few less.
)
While I love having only 11 kids, the less-than-full classes mean our school is beyond broke. (The board was even talking about cutting salaries. Yikes!) I would take a few more kids if it meant keeping my salary and getting new white board markers. :P
Not cool!
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