Why multi-class education can be good education

Multi-class teaching is challenging. A teacher must concurrently satisfy the demands of two different grades in the same classroom. In spite of the increased teacher workload and the reduced time for direct instruction of each grade, student achievement in a mixed-grade class has consistently been shown to be similar to ahcievement in a single-grade class. In this paper I examine why this might be so by examining current ideas about learning and how they are related to some of the strategies routinely used by effective multi-class teachers. Issues and challenges for multi-class teachers will also be discussed.