Explain what is meant by a class method in object-oriented programming.

A class method in Python is a method that is bound not to an instance of the class, but to the class itself. It is declared with the @classmethod decorator and takes the class as the first parameter (usually named cls). Such methods can modify the state of the class, rather than a specific object.

Example:

class MyClass:
    count = 0

    @classmethod
    def increment_count(cls):
        cls.count += 1

MyClass.increment_count()
print(MyClass.count)  # Outputs 1

Here, increment_count modifies the class variable count, not an attribute of a specific object.