CLASS SIZE AND THE ACCURACY OF TEACHERS A SSESSMENTS

The present study investigates the relation between class size and tea cher assessment of primary school pupils' abilities. N = 6,120 pupils from 331 classes were subjected a set of tests (CFT-20, ZVT, ''Verbal Analogies'') measuring different aspects of cognitive ability. In addi tion, the teachers were asked to assess their pupils' cognitive capaci ty separately for each of the three aspects examined. The findings rev ealed no differences between small and large classes with regard to th e level of teachers' assessments. Moreover, the accuracy of the teache rs' judgments was not higher in smaller classes than in larger ones. T he teachers' professional experience and the time they spent in their classes had no influence on the findings. The results obtained may be generalized with regard to the primary school level and cognitive abil ity in general.