Soon after it became public that math EQAO scores did not improve despite spending $60 million on its renewed math strategy, Ontario’s Ministry of Education announced a “curriculum refresh.”

An expert panel is to make recommendations on a host of issues, including report cards, transferable skills and the role of standardized testing. Mathematics is to be a focus. But educational issues are not so easily disentangled.

Consider something as seemingly simple as reducing class sizes.

In his book, David and Goliath, Malcolm Gladwell discusses small class sizes — generally considered an educational advantage — in a section called “The advantages of disadvantages (and the disadvantages of advantages).” He found no statistical effect in policies that lowered class sizes and wondered if the effect of lowering them might be represented by an inverted U-shaped curve. If class sizes were really large, lowering the sizes might have a positive effect on classroom achievement — but only to a point. Once a certain point has been reached, lowering it further actually has a negative effect. He even noted that in Singapore — a country often cited for its academic success — “we can rule out any noteworthy causal effect of class size on student performance.”

It would seem reasonable to think that fewer students in a class results in more individual attention for each student. However, research shows that teachers often instruct the same way regardless of the number of students in the class so smaller class sizes don’t usually result in more individual attention.

What we do know is that it is very costly to reduce class sizes.

As Ontario embarks on this latest review, it may be instructive to consider the possible disadvantages of factors that have traditionally been perceived as advantages. And there are plenty to consider.

Classroom teachers know many factors affect classroom achievement, even when related to something as seemingly simple as class size. It’s not always obvious what the best number for a class is because it depends on the age and makeup of the class, the grade and course being taught and the personalities and skills of the students and teacher. But smaller is not always better. Classes that are too small have their own challenges.

This became clear to me the year I was assigned to teach two classes of Grade 8 mathematics as part of my timetable. The first was a regular class with about 35 students. The other was a special education class for students with learning disabilities. It had less than a quarter of the students and another teacher to assist. We found that with so few students, the mood of the class changed quickly. Things could be going well one moment and then one student would know exactly how to provoke another in order to disrupt the class because they knew each other so well. Some days the students seemed to take on the roles of siblings annoying each other on a long car ride.

The learning needs of the students in the special education class varied so greatly, the small size didn’t make up for the complexities. Even though there weren’t very many of them, I found myself working just as hard to meet the needs of the smaller class as the larger. Would it have been better to mix the students and have two classes numbering in the low 20s? I’m not sure. But it would have been unlikely to have the extra teacher in both classes.

Another hot button issue closely related to class size is combined grades. Most teachers I know would willingly teach more students in a straight grade than less in a combined one because they don’t feel the smaller class size makes up for the complexities of multiple grades in the same class. Even though some research points to potential advantages of combining grades, they too depend on how a teacher organizes and teaches the class. Too often, the perceived advantage is actually a disadvantage.

Those convened for the expert panel will need to keep an open mind as they study the issues and try to untangle the evidence. Are there perceived advantages that are actually disadvantages in their thinking?

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But no matter what they recommend, there will continue to be math review at home in my son’s future.

Catherine Little is a Toronto-based educator, consultant and writer.