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ultigrade teaching involves the teaching of children from two or more grade levels in one classroom.
Such contexts requires the employment of particular teaching methodologies and classroom administration.
Since Multigrade classes are smaller and can be established more cheaply than complete schools, they can be more numerous, therefore more dispersed and thus located closer to the settlements where the children live. This means both that younger children can attend and that the time children spend travelling between school and home can be reduced to an acceptable level. This in turn means that there is sufficient time outside school hours for the children to continue to contribute to the family's economic activity . Attending school is therefore likely to be more acceptable to the families concerned, and thus both increase the number of children receiving education and reduce the failure rate.
Multigrade schools, being smaller and more dispersed, would enjoy much closer links with the smaller communities that they would be set up to serve.
This would have a very positive effect on local attitudes and access to education.
The professional teacher is a key resource person in the Multigrade context. The local content is a significant part of the curriculum, it is particularly important to resolve the issue of appointing well-trained and locally-oriented teachers.
These are the examples of Multigrade Classroom:
