MULTIAGE AT GANDER ACADEMY

Dennis M. Mulcahy

Faculty of Education

Introduction

The first multi age learning environments were the one-room schools (Mulcahy, 1999; Chase & Doan, 1994); these were the only forms of public schooling in North America before the middle of the nineteenth century. Children of all ages learned together in a single classroom. Graded schools, which separated children by age into separate classrooms, have been the dominant and perceived "ideal" form of schooling for the last hundred years. In rural areas, however, because of the scale of schooling, variations on the one-room school continue to this day. In many rural places, children of several different age and grade levels receive their education in what is generally referred as a multi-graded (Miller, 1989; Mulcahy, 1992) classroom. In urban places, where the graded classroom has dominated, there have been over the years several experimental efforts to create alternative grouping arrangements for education and schooling. Nongraded education (Anderson & Goodlad, 1959; Beggs, 1967; Goodlad, 1987; Hunter, 1992) at mid century was a major challenge to the status quo of age/graded schooling; so too is the current interest in multi age grouping (Stone, 1997; Bingham 1994; Kasten & Lolli, 1998; Mulcahy, 2000). The combination class or split class (Craig, & McLellan, 1987; Virginia Education Association and Appalachia Educational Laboratory, 1990).) is yet another grouping practice (generally temporary, usually urban) where children of different ages are grouped together for instruction.

The multiplicity of mixed age grouping arrangements from the one room school to the multi age classrooms has created a certain confusion among educators and parents ( Mulcahy, 1992; 1999; Katz, 1990; Miller, 1996). In a previous article in the Morning Watch (Mulcahy, 2000) entitled "Multi age and Multi-grade: Similarities and Differences" I attempted to address some of this confusion.

Over the last five years, severely declining enrolments and teacher cut backs around the province have been forcing many districts and schools to combine grade levels for instruction. For some schools this is a return to a former organizational structure; for others it is something new. In the past, unfortunately, we have painted a very negative image of such instructional arrangements. This has blinded many parents and educators to the genuine educative value of multi age education. In small rural schools, multi age can enable us to make a virtue of necessity. Low enrolments force schools to combine grade levels. By adopting multi age approach, such schools can create truly responsive learning environments for children.

Perhaps the way forward is to admit frankly that we were wrong about multi-grading. Then we have to do a very good job of convincing parents and educators that creating learning environments where children of different ages and grade levels multi age, far from being a step backward, is an enlightened leap forward for schools in this province.

Collaborative Action Research

Singh et. al. (1996), drawing on the work of Oja and Smulyan (1989), suggest that "action research has recently emerged as a method which addresses both researchers' needs for school based study and teachers' desires to be involved in more effective staff development"(p.6). For the last ten years I have made the study of all forms of multi age grouping, from the one-room school to the current models of multi age education in larger urban schools, a major focus of my work as a university based researcher. An important part of that research has been time spent in multi age classrooms and extensive discussions with multi age teachers. I have learned much from the generosity of teachers who have permitted me to enter their classrooms and not only observe but also interact with their students. Because such visits were always proceeded by a conversation between myself and the teacher and were always followed by an extensive reflection, both the teachers and I felt that we were extending our mutual understanding of the theory and practice of multi age education in the Newfoundland and Labrador context.

In this current article I would like to share the latest contribution to what may be considered an emergent theory of multi age education in Newfoundland and Labrador.

In early April of 2000, I had the pleasure of spending the day with Kim and Sandra and the forty-two primary children that make up their K-2 classroom at Gander Academy in Gander, Newfoundland and Labrador.

I had come to Gander to visit this classroom for a couple of reasons. Sandra and Kim had implemented this multi age classroom not because they had to, but because they chose to. In most of our schools where grade levels are combined, the rationale for doing so is generally tied to enrolment. In these schools there isn't sufficient enrolment to justify assigning one teacher per grade level, so two or more grade levels have to be combined. Many people still believe that such an organizational structure is second best to the traditional graded classroom that has dominated schools for the last one hundred years, this despite the fact that multi age groupings are increasingly seen as an important and significant educational innovation all over the world.

I am always interested in talking with educators who create multi age classrooms not because they have to, but because they believe in the intrinsic educational value such classrooms have for children and their learning. What do these teachers know that others do not? What do they believe that motivates them to take on the difficult task of making the transition from single grade to multi age?

I was also interested in the fact that Sandra and Kim had chosen to include Kindergarten as part of their multi age set up. There has always been some discussion and debate in the literature about the inclusion of Kindergarten; I was curious as to why they had included five-year-olds and how these youngest children were working out. In addition, Kim and Sandra team-teach their multi age classroom and as far as I know they are the only teachers working this way in a multi age classroom in the province. I wanted to ask them about that as well.

I was made most welcome at the school upon my arrival and was immediately taken to the classroom. I had a very interesting day observing and interacting with Kim and Sandra and the children. The atmosphere in the classroom is energetic, welcoming, open and friendly. It is a very busy classroom with myriad activities going on accompanied by the steady buzz of formal instruction and informal conversation between and among teachers and students. I had the opportunity not only to observe but also to interact with many of the children as they worked independently in mixed age groups at the various workstations around the classroom.

I was very impressed with the way this classroom worked with such a large group of children. It was clear that a great deal of planning and organization has gone into the setting up of the classroom and the day to day planning of the learning and teaching. It was also clear that the children knew how this classroom worked as well. They moved from one instructional period to the next quite smoothly and efficiently. They knew what was expected of them and went about their business with a minimum of fuss and a great deal of enthusiasm. It was a great opportunity to see theory in practice and to see it working so well.

At the end of the day, I sat down with Kim and Sandra and we had a chat about their multi age classroom. Our time together was more a conversation than a formal interview; it was more a sharing of ideas than what might be considered formal research.

I think that it is worth noting that Kim and Sandra became really interested in multi age education just before attending the Small Schools Conference in Gander three years ago. At that conference they heard a number of presentations on multi age and realized that it was an educational philosophy and a practice that had a great deal of promise for all schools and classrooms.

As a preface to the interview I have reproduced two "stories" told by Kim and Sandra. These narratives not only capture the essence of their child-centered educational philosophy but clearly illustrate the fact that multi age, for them, was not a "choice" but a "necessity."

I had a child in Kindergarten who, at the end of the year, knew very few letters, had no pre-readiness skills, and was simply not ready for Grade One. We didn't have the policy of repeating, so we had to put him on and it kind of broke my heart to have to put him on to Grade One. During the year we had spent together I had gotten to know this child. I knew he worked only in a certain kind of setting and only certain things motivated him. Only certain things would make him work and he was so complex, that it took so long to get to know him.

In June, it almost broke my heart to send him on to Grade One, because I said, for the first month and a half the Grade One teacher had to get to know him. She's not going to know how he works, how he learns or what motivates him. She has to learn all the things that I already know about this child. He was so far behind; and I have to send him off to Grade One with a greater chance that he is going to get further behind. If I could just keep him, keep him for another year, I could pick up where I left off in June. I know what he knows, what he can do and how he works, how to motivate him and support him in his learning efforts. It is a shame to waste that time at the beginning of the year getting to know the teacher, and getting into a routine and getting her to realize that, if you do this, this student will work for you. That's kind of how it started. We were reflecting on our experiences with students like this and asking what can we do.

The point is that at the primary level there is a great deal of diversity among children. Some children come to school not able to hold a pencil and some come to school able to read. We have some children that come here at five years old that have had two years of pre-school and they've done some readiness skills and they've done a lot of pencil and paper work. In that same year in that same Kindergarten classroom, there was a little girl who was a very able student. She was what we would have referred to at the time as, "enrichment material." But we didn't have enrichment for Kindergarten, our enrichment program didn't start until grade three. But here she was in Kindergarten capable of doing grade two math. This child would have been bored out of her mind with the prescribed curriculum for Kindergarten. We had to provide her with learning materials and activities more suited to her capability not tied to her official grade level.

These are the kinds of stories that Kim Dixon and Sandra Penny tell as a way of trying to answer the question, "Why create a multi age classroom?" The stories reflect an awareness of the developmental diversity that exists in every class; they also reflect an urgency and commitment to make changes in the way schools are organized so that they can be more responsive to the way children develop and learn.

Dennis: We have spent a great deal of time and effort in our province convincing parents in small rural communities that combining grade levels and grouping children of different ages in a single classroom is an educational deficient and backward thing to do. Now here the two of you are in a large urban school doing the very thing we have tried to eliminate in our small rural schools. Why are you doing this "old fashioned" kind of schooling in the 21^st century? Are the two of you crazy? Or do you feel that you have discovered something that works for children?

Sandra: Well, we felt this kind of classroom had a lot of educational advantages for children. One of the most important is the broad curricula that is available in a class such as ours that spans three grade levels (K-2). I have worked in special education as well as single grade classrooms. Over the years I have seen a lot of kids who come to the end of grade one but who haven't' really achieved the grade one outcomes. They move on to the nest grade and then they end up getting further behind. They are not really ready to move on but they do. In the next grade they become aware that they are not where most of the other in the class are. This tends to lower their self-esteem and this can inhibit their efforts to learn. But in a multi age classroom, there's always somebody at the level where that are. There is an opportunity for them to receive the instruction they need according to where they are. But in a graded classroom, a lot of the times the teacher doesn't have time to go back to these readiness skills. What tends to happen is that this child, once he gets so far behind, he has to go out to the Special Ed teacher. Although at this younger age, they like to do that, but still, deep down, they feel that they're not as good as the other kids out of their home classroom.

At the primary level there is a great deal of diversity among children. You can't teach the same things to all the children of a given age at the same time. The multi age classroom gives you an organizational structure that enables you to be more easily responsive to individual needs. I am not saying that you can not be equally responsive in a single grade classroom; you can and many single grade teachers in our school and other schools are doing a fantastic job with meeting children's needs. But Kim and I prefer to work in a multi age environment. This is a very viable alternative to the way we have always done things.

Kim: A multi age classroom also serves children at the other end of the exceptionality as well. Some children start school knowing how to read; many, as well, have completed most of the outcomes for Kindergarten. Should we teach these children what they already know and can do because that is the Department of Education's prescribed curriculum for Kindergarten? Why should we hold these children back if they are ready and capable of doing something more advanced? We have some children that come, like Sandra said, already reading. What do you do with those children?

After teaching Kindergarten for twelve years and seeing the wide range of abilities, I said it would be nice to be able to challenge these children. But you really didn't have a whole lot of time to be challenging and enriching because of the single fact that you had to get the curriculum done. You had so many children that you tended to think of them all as more or less normal and you felt you had to stay within the confines of a single grade level. As Sandra said, I think the multi age environment makes it easier for me to be responsive to the individual development needs of children. I am a great believer in the value of play in primary education. Unfortunately, opportunities and materials for play often disappear from primary classrooms after Kindergarten. There is a tendency to abandon play after Kindergarten because of the pressures to do more and more academic work. But children in grades one and two still need and want play opportunities. In a K-2 multi age classroom the materials and opportunity to play can still be part of the classroom experience for all the children. The different ages can play together and this is very socially beneficial for all the children. You can see the connections that they've made with one another, the friendships they've made, and how caring they are for one another, and even their siblings.

We have several sets of siblings in this classroom and they really take care of each other. This is a really interesting aspect of multi age. Many people ask, "Aren't they beating up on each other like they do at home?" But they don't because they take care of each other and they'll say, "Oh, my brother or sister doesn't have a pencil" or, "I'll go sharpen the pencil for him" or "I'll tie up her shoe."

It is not just older helping the younger by the way. Some people have the idea that in a multi age classroom it is always the older ones doing the helping with the younger ones. But it's not that way all the time. At time it is the younger one who is the helper. I remember a seven-year-old at the beginning of the year who sat by a five year old. We were talking about something and she (the five year old) put up her hand and she knew the answer, and the older child looked at her and he said, "How old are you?" She said "Five," and he said "Five! Whoa!" He was blown away that she could answer this question and she was only five.

Dennis: What I am hearing you say is that, in your view, the graded classroom and the graded curriculum does not recognize the true nature of children and how they learn and develop.

Sandra: No, no. The Department says that all children at the age of five should be able to do this. All children at the age of six should be able to do that. In reality, many can't and don't conform to grade level expectations and outcomes. You take a child who comes to school who is able to read in Kindergarten: she's bored to death. And so she starts to develop bad work habits, she doesn't like to come to school, school is boring for her. There is a real danger that such children will lose their love of learning. But in a multi age classroom these children can receive instruction that is better matched to where they are in their development. They can get paired with older kids so they're always learning something new.

Kim and I created this classroom because we believed that this type of environment fosters learning and curiosity more effectively. We came to this belief because of our experience working with children. This has been the best teaching year that I have had so far, It is a lot of work but it is well worth the effort. I am very happy to be in this classroom.

Dennis: What motivates you to do the extra work that has to be done especially in the beginning to set up multi age classroom?

Kim: As teachers, isn't that our job? To care for children and to nurture then and….

Sandra: "provide them with the best possible environment?…

Kim: …that they can have? And if the graded system doesn't provide that then we have to do what we have done , even if it is going out on a limb and having someone saying things like, "Really, are you out of your mind?" Sandra and I have a love of children and share a commitment to see them grow as much as they possibly can, and make their first years of schooling happy years.

Dennis: You mentioned earlier that this kind of classroom requires more work. Can we talk about that a little?

Sandra: You have to be familiar with the curriculum for the grade levels that are in the classroom. Yes, it takes a lot more planning. When you're setting up your themes you have to make sure that by the end of the year you have all of your objectives for all curriculum areas covered. So, it takes a lot more planning and a lot more long term planning as opposed to day-by-day planning.

Kim: And even day-to-day planning has to be comprehensive. We have to actually look at children on an individual basis almost daily and certainly weekly. We have to ask of each child, "Have they mastered that concept?" Have they really handled that concept well and if they haven't, well maybe we should spend a few more days on that concept, and then the groups change and then you're on to something else. So you see we are always juggling but with the two of us it makes it a little bit easier because we can divide up the work in some ways. The planning is the key and it is what takes time.

Dennis: Many teachers view the multi age classroom with some apprehension. However, the point is that there are probably many teachers, frustrated by the graded system, who would actually enjoy being in a multi age classroom if they gave it a chance.

Sandra: Yes, if they got in there! But the thing is, the fear of something different, right?

Dennis: Lets talk about evaluation. How do you assess and evaluate your students? Do you evaluate by grade level or in terms of individual student progress?

Kim: We evaluate students on what they are able to do regardless of age or grade level. If a child is achieving beyond their official grade level, we indicate that in our evaluation report. We indicate what the child can do, and in many cases that is beyond grade level expectations.

So we would indicate to parents that their child has not only met the grade level expectations but has gone beyond them. If a child has not, we would indicate that. Parents want to know where they're to in relation to the Grade level. They'll come and they'll ask you, "Well where are they in relation to other kids in Grade Two?"

Dennis: One of the reasons I wanted to visit with you is the fact that you have included Kindergarten in your multi age classroom. As you know there are different views as to whether or not Kindergarten should be combined with other primary grade levels. Some people think it shouldn't be, others are all for it. Why did you include Kindergarten and how has it worked out?

Kim: We just couldn't see doing this without including Kindergartens. As we said earlier there is such a wide range of children coming into Kindergarten, we felt that there would be a real benefit for them in a multi age classroom. The hardest past was getting the schedule figured out so that they would have the required number of hours of instruction and these would be consistent with the other Kindergarten classes in the school. We decided to have them come al mornings because we couldn't see juggling them back and forth. By having them come all mornings, it allows us to have a consistent and workable schedule.

Dennis: One of the concerns some people have with including Kindergartens is their immaturity and how they might be on the one hand disruptive to the older students and on the other hand they might be lost or intimidated by the older students. Have you had any concerns or problems of this kind?

Sandra: Not at all. In fact the opposite is true. The family atmosphere of a multi age classroom is supportive of the younger children and at the same time encourages the development of their work habits. We mentioned earlier to you the number of siblings we have in our classroom. This has proven to be very beneficial. We found that in September it was really helpful to some of the really quiet five year olds coming into the classroom to have their older brother or sister in the classroom. It made it a lot easier for them. We also found it helpful that the older ones knew so many of the classroom routines and they could help the younger ones. They knew how to go get the milk coupons and they knew where to get the milk and it was just so easy for them to just blend in and "Oh, I'll show you where that is" or " I can tell you where this is." There was one child, who for about a week was a bit intimidated, but now you would never say, you would never pick him out in here, that he was one like that.

Dennis: So in other words, that concern, or that fear, is really unwarranted, that the littler ones would be lost?

Sandra: Yes. In September many of the five-year-olds had a very short attention span. But after observing the older children working diligently, they began to settle in and focus more on their work.

Working and playing with people older and younger than yourself is a natural thing to do in all kinds of activities outside of school. Non of us sticks just with people our own exact age. I'm sure that you work with people younger than yourself and older than yourself. It doesn't even make sense to segregate kids by age. They go to Brownie's, and Sunday school and play with neighborhood kids in mixed age groups.

Dennis: Another interesting aspect of your program is the fact that you team teach this class. Was it always your intention to work in this way?

Sandra: From the very beginning we said we wouldn't go ahead on this unless we were able to do it as a team teaching unit. We had known each other for quite a while and both of us had done considerable research on multi age. Since it was something new we felt it would be more beneficial all around to do it as a team.

Dennis: If you hadn't gotten enough students to warrant the team approach, would one of you have implemented multi age on your own?

Sandra: I don't know if we would have or not. It would have been harder I think because it's so new, so different.

Dennis: Most of the literature on multi age endorses and even recommends team teaching (Stone, 1996; Bingham, 1994; Chase and Doan, 1994). At the same time there is recognition that this is not always possible or even desirable. In fact, in most places in Newfoundland and Labrador teachers would be working on their own in multi age classrooms. In your view can this kind of classroom work with just a single teacher?

Sandra: Yes it can, but a team teaching approach gives it more variety and diversity I think. It adds another dimension to it that you wouldn't have working alone. There is so much more you can do with two teachers and the support you can give each other is really important. When we're planning, we have that other person to say, "Kim, what do you think? Do you think this would work?" And she says, "No, I don't think we should do this. Maybe we'll try it this way." You're always bouncing ideas off of each other, and end up doing a combination of what we both thought, so it's good in that way.

We have a large group of students (42). That's why we are a team teaching unit. In a smaller school with much smaller numbers one teacher may be able to manage quite well.

Dennis: Let me just give you this scenario and get your opinion on what you would do. Suppose you two found yourselves in a smaller rural school and the principal came to you and said, "Okay Kim, you're going to have a multi-aged K-1 class. Sandra you're going to have a multi-aged 2-3 class." Would you suggest to this principal, let us work together and create a K-3 class and we'll team-teach those four grade levels?

Kim: If the numbers were reasonable, say around thirty, we definitely would ask to team teach the four grade levels.

Dennis: So it is possible even in very small schools to create team teaching situations. I think this would be very beneficial to the teachers and the students. As you have discovered there are so many advantages of having a partner to plan and teach with in a multi age classroom.

Sandra: This is true. However, successful team teaching is not an automatic thing. With team teaching you have to make sure that you're with somebody who has the same philosophies as you do and someone that you're going to be able to get along with. One member of the team cannot dominate the other. You have to have comparable people and that's a big thing. We became a team because we shared an educational philosophy, a mutual concern with the limitations of the graded system, and an enthusiasm for multi age as a solution to those limitations. Teaming won't work if a principal simply says to two teachers you will team-teach this multi age class. In that situation I might say, "Well no, I don't think so." Because I know that person's philosophy is not the same as mine.

Dennis: Before you implemented multi age at your school you did extensive research. I know you read widely and visited a number of classrooms around the province in Corner Brook, Centerville, Coley's Point, and Charlottetown. You saw a lot of different models. When it came time to begin yourselves, did you simply adopt one of the models that you researched or did you create your own?

Kim: We created our own. We learned a lot from our reading and we are really grateful to those teachers who welcomed us into their classrooms and shared their ideas and practice. But we couldn't find anything that was exactly what we wanted. We took lots of ideas; we grabbed ideas from everyone. If you look around our classroom and watch us work you will see what we have borrowed, begged and stolen from other people. But what we do is really what works best for us and reflects our particular views.

Dennis: Do you think that's what all-new multi age teachers should do: do some research, learn from others, but in the final analysis create your own approach?

Sandra: You have to do what appeals to you, what suits you. What someone else is doing, part of it may appeal to you, but in the back of your mind you are saying, if I were doing that I would do it this way. That's like with everything; you always add your own personal touch. We just couldn't find any model where we could say, "That's exactly what we are going to do."

Dennis: So to look for a recipe or a one right or best way to do multi age is probably not a very good idea. If one understands the basic principles of multi age and is in tune with the underlying educational beliefs, a wide variety of approaches and practices are possible, desirable, even advisable. That's why teaching will always be more of an art than a science. As artists we must be free to create our own approaches, our individual learning environments.

Before we finish I have to ask about the administrative and parental support you have for your program. I understand that the principal of the school, Wayne Witherall, has been very supportive of your work. How important has it been to have the backing of the principal with this project?

Kim: We would never have gotten this far off the ground without Wayne's support and encouragement. The multi age concept is new to many people and not always understood or appreciated. We often get the comment, "If it is not broken, why fix it?" But our point is the graded system is not working; it is broken. And we think we have found a very viable fix. Multi age is a real alternative that we think is very promising. But without the support of Wayne Witherall, this classroom would simply not exist at all.

Dennis: Have the parents of the children in your classroom been supportive of multi age?

Sandra: The parents have been very supportive of the work we do.

Dennis: Have you proven to yourselves that multi age classrooms work?

Kim: Oh yes! We are blown away sometimes. We are always amazed at what is happening in the classroom. We are constantly amazed at how the multi age structure supports learners. We are amazed what younger children are capable of when given the opportunity. We are delighted with the spirit of cooperation and caring that the family like atmosphere creates. This works; this works very well indeed.

Conclusion

I want to thank Kim and Sandra for inviting me into their classroom and allowing me to spend some time with them and their students. I learned much about how their classroom works from my interactions with them and their students, who were ever ready to explain to me what was going on. It was a very educational experience for me.

I also want to thank Wayne Witherall for facilitating my visit to his school and Randall Mercer, the Director of Education for the District. You can pay a virtual visit to Gander Academy at: http://www.k12.nf.ca/ganderacademy/index.htm

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