There’s a lot of talk these days about adding days to the school calendar, or minutes to the day.

However, as the new Hechinger Report article, Could more time in school help students after the pandemic?, points out, not much research suggests it’s a very effective strategy.

You can find similar results at The Best Resources On The Idea Of Extending The School Day.

The big problem is that when that kind of extension happens, it usually means that schools just do more of the same thing that didn’t work very well in the first place.

It’s similar to the reason why so called “data-driven instruction” isn’t often very effective.  Researchers have found that it doesn’t result in teachers changing instructional practices (see Studies Find That Teachers Analyzing Data Is No Help To Students If It Doesn’t Result In Different Instructional Practices).

I’d suggest that if districts are serious about improving student outcomes, they might want to consider reducing class time and, instead, provide teachers more planning, collaborative, and “lesson study” time – like they do in many other countries.