The Pigeonhole

By Peter Sumpter

A scientist was researching cockroaches.  He trained one to jump out of a petrie dish each time it heard the command “Jump”.  He then removed its legs and repeated the experiment.  On the command “Jump” it stayed motionless in the dish.  This proves scientifically that if you take the legs off a cockroach it will go deaf.

Most high schools have larger classes for their high achieving and well motivated students, allowing the school to have smaller classes for low achieving students or students who require learning support.

Enter New Zealand’s leading educational researchers to survey the students.  The statistics clearly show that the highest achieving students came from a class of 30 taught by teacher A, while the lowest achieving students come from a class of 18 taught by teacher B.

“Minister, we have completed our research!”
“What have you found?”
“We found that class size does not positively correlate to student achievement!  In fact we found that larger classes actually improve student achievement.  It is the teacher who has the biggest effect, not small classes at all!”

“Well done.  That will silence the call for more teachers in schools. Performance pay is the answer!  What is your next project?” “We have been contracted by Ag Research to investigate hearing impairment in cockroaches.”

(No cockroaches were harmed in writing this article)