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ATLANTA—Shortening the school week to four days has a positive impact on elementary school students’ academic performance in mathematics, according to researchers at Georgia State University and Montana State University.
The study, published in the journal Education, Finance and Policy in July, analyzed the impact of a four-day school week on student achievement by comparing fourth-grade reading and fifth-grade math test scores from the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) for students who participated in a four-day school week, versus those who attended a traditional five-day school week.
The researchers found a four-day school week had a statistically significant impact on math scores for fifth-grade students, while reading scores were not affected.
The study suggests there is little evidence that moving to a four-day week compromises student academic achievement, an important finding for U.S. school districts seeking ways to cut costs without hampering student achievement.
“What interested me about our results is they were completely opposite to what we anticipated,” said Mary Beth Walker, dean of the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State. “We thought that especially for the younger, elementary school kids, longer days on a shorter school week would hurt their academic performance because their attention spans are shorter. Also, a longer weekend would give them more opportunity to forget what they had learned.”
Read more here. (Georgia State University)
The study, published in the journal Education, Finance and Policy in July, analyzed the impact of a four-day school week on student achievement by comparing fourth-grade reading and fifth-grade math test scores from the Colorado Student Assessment Program (CSAP) for students who participated in a four-day school week, versus those who attended a traditional five-day school week.
The researchers found a four-day school week had a statistically significant impact on math scores for fifth-grade students, while reading scores were not affected.
The study suggests there is little evidence that moving to a four-day week compromises student academic achievement, an important finding for U.S. school districts seeking ways to cut costs without hampering student achievement.
“What interested me about our results is they were completely opposite to what we anticipated,” said Mary Beth Walker, dean of the Andrew Young School of Policy Studies at Georgia State. “We thought that especially for the younger, elementary school kids, longer days on a shorter school week would hurt their academic performance because their attention spans are shorter. Also, a longer weekend would give them more opportunity to forget what they had learned.”
Read more here. (Georgia State University)
