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Chancellor Dennis Walcott and P.S. 130 Principal Lily Woo look on as one kindergarten teacher and her student read from a class assignment.

Even at an elementary school with high scores, experienced teachers, and years of A’s on the city’s progress reports, budget cuts are taking a toll.

At Chinatown’s P.S. 130, average class size has ballooned from between 25 and 28 students per classroom last year to 32, the maximum allowed.

Because the school lost about $1 million from its budget in the last two years, it had to cut teaching positions and reading teachers, according to longtime Principal Lily Woo.

As Chancellor Dennis Walcott looked on today, second-grade teacher Danielle Cannistraci gathered her 31 students on the rug around the front of the classroom in a circle two rows deep for a lesson about shapes.

When she asked the students to name a three-dimensional shape with no round edges, half a dozen hands shot in the air with the answer (in this case, a pyramid).

Cannistraci, who has worked at P.S. 130 for 11 years, said the lesson exemplified her efforts to make her teaching more engaging. But with 31 students this year, up from 27, she said she is struggling to give each student individual attention and manage the time students spend doing group work.

“I’ve always put them in groups, but now I have a whole extra group — it’s become much harder,” she said. “Normally I have five groups for reading, writing, and math. But if I have six guided-reading groups I can’t focus on one in each day anymore because that means one group isn’t going to be seen at all.” (more…)