How many kids are in your DCPS 3rd grade class?

[Anonymous]

We just got class lists at a well regarded WOTP school and our kid’s 3rd grade class for next year has 26 students and one teacher. That’s almost a 25% jump from 2nd grade.

Is this high for one teacher at this grade? And what happens if more IB kids enroll over the summer?

[Anonymous]

Not high. One year we had 31

[Anonymous]

My kid's 3rd grade class had 24 but then two students joined mid year so was 26 by the end of the year.

[Anonymous]

Seems super normal. Mine was 27 and then went up to 28 mid year.

[Anonymous]

We are at a title 1 school and it was 26.

[Anonymous]

DCPS does set different targets for K-2 (20) and 3-5 (25), so that seems totally normal. One of my kids had 22 and the other 24 which became 25 mid year.

[Anonymous]

It sounds like your school must have fewer 3rd grade teachers than 2nd grade? Some schools do that in order to provide more intensive reading instruction in K-2nd, since it's so foundational, and then once kids can read well the school can increase class sizes because the kids can work more independently at that point.

Also if you are at a well-regarded WOTP school I'm guessing a decent number of red shirted kids, which means 3rd grade will have a lot of 9/10 year olds.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:It sounds like your school must have fewer 3rd grade teachers than 2nd grade? Some schools do that in order to provide more intensive reading instruction in K-2nd, since it's so foundational, and then once kids can read well the school can increase class sizes because the kids can work more independently at that point.

Also if you are at a well-regarded WOTP school I'm guessing a decent number of red shirted kids, which means 3rd grade will have a lot of 9/10 year olds.

Uh, do you have a kid in DCPS? Redshirting is not a widespread thing in DCPS (even in WOTP schools, where I am) - they're quite strict about not doing that.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:DCPS does set different targets for K-2 (20) and 3-5 (25), so that seems totally normal. One of my kids had 22 and the other 24 which became 25 mid year.

Wow I wish our school followed this. Even our K classes at a title 1 were big, but at least they did have an extra teacher.

[Anonymous]

Regrettably, it's not abnormal. Yes, classes closer to 20 than 25 generally function much better.

[Anonymous]

We had 23-25 depending on the time of year this past year at Hyde Addison. Varies as kids move in and out (we have a lot of international and military families).

I find it more remarkable that you get class lists for next year already! We don’t find out until the week before school.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had 23-25 depending on the time of year this past year at Hyde Addison. Varies as kids move in and out (we have a lot of international and military families).

I find it more remarkable that you get class lists for next year already! We don’t find out until the week before school.

This. We never hear these numbers in June.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:It sounds like your school must have fewer 3rd grade teachers than 2nd grade? Some schools do that in order to provide more intensive reading instruction in K-2nd, since it's so foundational, and then once kids can read well the school can increase class sizes because the kids can work more independently at that point.

Also if you are at a well-regarded WOTP school I'm guessing a decent number of red shirted kids, which means 3rd grade will have a lot of 9/10 year olds.

Uh, do you have a kid in DCPS? Redshirting is not a widespread thing in DCPS (even in WOTP schools, where I am) - they're quite strict about not doing that.

Yes I have kids in DCPS, including one just finishing 3rd grade. There are around 10 redshirted kids in the grade. My sense is that more people were given leeway to do so due to Covid closures. My kid isn't redshirted and is one of the younger kids in the grade, so it's actually a source of annoyance for me.

I do think they have become more restrictive about it recently, but only the last couple years.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:We had 23-25 depending on the time of year this past year at Hyde Addison. Varies as kids move in and out (we have a lot of international and military families).

I find it more remarkable that you get class lists for next year already! We don’t find out until the week before school.

Agreed, never heard of that. Especially since most schools do add new IB kids over the summer and this might necessitate moving kids around a little. Also some parents are kind of intense (I'm being very polite, the reality is less polite) about their kids' teacher assignment and peer group, and most schools want to minimize the time parents have to complain about this before the school year starts.

[Anonymous]

Which school?