Multigrade Teaching Today.the Romanian’ Teachers Perception

Abstract

In Romania, the organization of multigrade classes continues to be a pedagogical reality, determined by multiple demographic, geographical, economic and social factors. For the primary cycle, this means combining two, three, four or even five classes and organizing the teaching process under the guidance of a single teacher. For the secondary cycle, it is accepted the coupling of two classes and the multigrade teaching of the subjects, with some peculiarities in the case of the 8th grade. Multigrade teaching is present in many countries around the world. The researchers' concern was to identify the advantages and challenges from the perspective of teachers, in order to carry out an effective teaching process and to develop supportive educational policies. This paper presents an analysis of the advantages and disadvantages of multigrade teaching, identified by teachers involved in this type of teaching in Romania, comparing them with data from other international research and identifying solutions to problems reported. We analysed data collected from 260 teachers (150 from the primary schools and 110 from the secondary schools), having at least the second teaching degree. The research tool used was the questionnaire survey. The obtained results highlight advantages and disadvantages of the teaching activity (increasing the degree of direct interaction teacher – student, but also increasing the effort and working time of the teacher), but also the effects of students' schooling in such classes (development of independent skills, development of social skills, but also frequent distraction).

Keywords: Management, multigrade teaching, skills, teaching process

Introduction

Multigrade classes are classes in which students of different ages and abilities are grouped in a single classroom, under the guidance of the same teacher (Bharadwaj, 2008). The teaching process takes place according to the same curriculum valid for monograde classes (Acatrinei, 2016). Multigrade classes define mixed classes, created out of necessity in geographically, economically, demographically and socially disadvantaged areas, distinguishing them from multi-age classes, created from pedagogical reasons, at choice, especially in urban areas (Cornish, 2010, as cited in Ronksley-Pavia et al., 2019).

Multigrade teaching was the first form of organization and development of the teaching process in state-supported schools, being common in Europe and North America. The monograde class, in which the teacher is responsible for only one age group, becomes dominant at the same time as social evolution and population concentration in cities (Ames & Ramello, 2003) after the first stages of the industrial revolution (Opriş, 2021). The nineteenth century brings the organization of classes on the levels of age and knowledge, as a novelty in education (Acatrinei, 2016). Many underdeveloped or developing countries have seen this type of education as an effective way to increase the accessibility of rural children to education, to improve cognitive skills in increasingly complex intercultural contexts (Opriş, 2019) and reduce considerably their anti-social behaviour (Babadi Akashe et al., 2010, as cited in Moeini et al., 2016).

Multigrade teaching is based on the theory of constructivism and social learning (Stone, 2009). According to this perspective, in multigrade classes, learning is social and specific to each child; the student is seen as a unique and valuable being, free to make choices, to take risks, to pursue his own interests and to benefit from his own cognitive development (Stone, 2009). Educational practice demonstrates that learning in groups of students of different ages is a favourable factor in their cognitive, social and emotional development (Stone, 1998).

The complexity of this type of teaching requires that any action taken by teachers be carried out in such a way as to make their entire activity more efficient: from arranging the educational space, selecting and using teaching aids and materials, drawing up the schedule and organizing and carrying out activities during a day, a week and a school year (Acatrinei, 2020, 2021).

Problem Statement

Numerous researches on this type of teaching have concluded its benefits, but also its challenges, both for teachers and students. Teachers and students have the opportunity to work together for a period of more than a year, which will have the benefit of knowing the child, continuity and personalization of learning, forming a positive student-teacher relationship, but also student-student. Students of different ages and abilities enjoy the opportunity to work together. Older students are role models for younger students, and through their relationships with those in the lower classes, they are practicing the skills of future leaders.

Researchers at the University of Pakistan (Ali Kaka et al., 2020) analyzed data on multigrade teaching in schools in Matiari district, a region with 550 such schools, about 63% of the total. The data were interpreted from the perspective of the challenges that teachers face, in order to identify solutions, as we show in table 1:

In Turkey, multigrade classes are maintained for local reasons (small number of students, lack of teachers and educational spaces) and for national reasons: specific educational policies, often ineffective, economic instability (Tolu et al., 2021). For these researchers from Rize University in Turkey, the teachers` training in multigrade classes is essential. To teach at such classes, they should have at least 5 years of experience and not be over 45 years of age, arguing that multigrade teaching is demanding and requires intense effort. The mentioned researchers highlight the need for thorough teachers` training for each class, their special attention to class management, the imposition of their own rules.

Following the data analysis (Tolu et al., 2021), several categories of factors were identified that influence the activity in such schools:

Factors that influence the teachers’ activity: interest, time, initial training, continuing education, specialized training, experience, material resources available.

Factors that influence the teaching: the approach of the national curriculum to the multigrade class, the lack of responsibility for these schools, reflected in the material endowment, the reluctance of teachers, students, parents, community on this type of classes.

External factors: educational policies related to multigrade teaching, action plan on the migration of students from schools with multigrade teaching, management of multigrade schools.

Every teacher has got his own beliefs (Ciascai & Zsoldos-Marchis, 2016). These have a key role in teachers’ professional development. The experiences in the multigrade classes ask teachers to put into practice these beliefs and they sometimes may be changed.

The issue of multigrade teaching in Austria and Finland has been the subject of research in order to identify the value of teaching and learning in this type of classes, in order to become the subject of comprehensive educational programs (Hyry-Beihammer & Hascher, 2015). The recorded data were analyzed from 3 perspectives:

Research Questions

Through our research, we want to find out the perception of teachers who teach in multigrade classes on this type of education, to identify in particular the advantages and disadvantages identified from both the teacher's and the student's perspective, to analyse the extent of initial training programs and continue to properly train teachers for this type of teaching and what are the ways to inform and support them in the current teaching activity.

Purpose of the Study

The present study aims to identify the advantages and challenges of this type of education from the perspective of teachers, for a better understanding of teaching and learning that take place in the multigrade classes. In order to support teachers, we aimed to identify their need for training for multigrade teaching, but also to find solutions in the literature.

Research Methods

In order to fulfill the purpose of our research, we applied a questionnaire to teachers who teach at multigrade classes in Romania, in primary and secondary school, and then, the data collected were analyzed.

From the teachers who answered our questionnaire, we chose a number of 260 teachers, the main criterion being the first and the second grade teachers. We consider that obtaining teaching degrees involves a certain teaching experience of teachers and certifies their answers to our requests. The main features of our respondents are:

150 respondents teach in multigrade classes from the primary school, predominantly in rural areas - 94.7%, in structure schools - 51.3% and 21.2% work in multigrade classes grouping at least 3 classes. 87.3% are female and 52% are commuter teachers. As a level of education, 22.1% graduates of Pedagogical High School with bachelor studies, 1.4% with doctoral degrees and 80% with 1st teaching degree.

110 respondents teach in multigrade classes from the secondary school, predominantly from the rural area - 87.3%, from coordinators secondary schools - 49.1%. 72.2% are female, and 75.5% are commuter teachers. As subject taught, religion - 33.6% and modern languages - 23.6% predominates; 69.1% with the 1st teaching degree. As a level of education, 4.5% graduates of Pedagogical High School with bachelor studies and 1.8% with doctoral degrees.

Findings

In the first part of the questionnaire, the proposed items took into account the initial and continuous training of teachers in the field of multigrade teaching, using a 5-point Likert scale. In the case of the statement “”, the respondents from primary school gave points between 1- the lowest value and 5 - the highest value, as follows: 1 point - 30%, 2 points - 19.33%, 3 points - 20.67%, 4 points - 13.33%, 5 points - 16.67%. The respondents from the secondary school gave the points as follows: 1 point - 59.1%, 2 points - 16.4%, 3 points - 12.7%, 4 points - 5.5%, 5 points - 5.5%. If we add up the percentages of those who gave 4 and 5 points, we notice that very few teachers received initial training in the field of multigrade teaching; only 30% from the primary school, respectively, 11% from the secondary school.

In the case of the statement “”, the respondents from primary school gave the following points: 1 point - 46.7%, 2 points - 19.3%, 3 points - 14%, 4 points - 6.7%, 5 points - 13.3% and those in the secondary school gave the following points: 1 point - 60%, 2 points - 12.7%, 3 points -13.6%, 4 points - 7.3%, 5 points - 5.5%.

Teachers from primary school knew the specifics of multigrade teaching from direct experience: 1 point - 3.3%, 2 points - 0.7%, 3 points - 13.3%, 4 points - 21.3%, 5 points – 61.3% and inform themselves about this field: 1 point - 4%, 2 points - 6.7%, 3 points - 20.7%, 4 points - 23.3%, 5 points - 45.3%. For those in the secondary cycle, the situation is approximately similar. For the statement “, they gave the following points: 1 point - 3.6%, 2 points - 7.3%, 3 points - 15.5%, 4 points - 15.5% , 5 points - 57.3% and “”: 1 point - 9.1%, 2 points - 7.3%, 3 points - 25.5%, 4 points - 19.1%, 5 points - 39.1%.

The data show that a very small number of teachers knew the specifics of multigrade teaching before reaching the department. They have not received initial training in this type of teaching, but the offer of continuing teacher training programs does not offer them this possibility either. In their teaching activity, they take into account the direct experience gained or look for different sources of information on their own.

In order to identify the advantages and disadvantages of multigrade teaching from primary and secondary school, respondents had multiple choice questions. The advantages were identified by the teachers from the perspective of the teacher-student relationship and the student acquisitions and the disadvantages, from the perspective of the teaching activity carried out during the classes: use of time resources, students’ independent activity, students’ behavior and teachers’ effort.

Following the analysis of the data collected from primary and secondary school, the following results were recorded (see Table 2 and Table 3; Table 4 and Table 5):

Regardless of the educational cycle in which they teach, the respondents consider as main advantages (see Table 2 and Table 3) the good development of students' self-employment skills and learning with the help of others, an aspect also encountered in the abovementioned research. To a smaller percentage, there are considerations regarding the development of social skills and that of self-control and self-direction skills in learning, aspects that differ from teachers in the same educational cycle, but with different teaching degrees. It is interesting that the respondents from the secondary school (see Table 3) consider to a greater percentage as an advantage the fact that the teacher-student interaction is achieved more in the multigrade class than in the monograde class.

Regarding the disadvantages (see Table 4 and Table 5), the respondents referred both to teachers’ activity and their teaching activity.

We note that both categories of respondents, both in primary (see Table 4) and secondary school (see Table 5), consider time a great "enemy"; both the time required to systematize the knowledge and the time given to each class and each student, which is considerably reduced in multigrade teaching. Another disturbing factor is the noise during the classes, but we notice a reduction in the percentage in the secondary school, explained by the maturity of the age and the students’ self-employment skills. Both categories of respondents consider that their personal effort and the time allocated to the preparation of activities increase considerably. Those in the primary school also highlighted the difficulty of alternating subjects and lesson types; this is not the case for the secondary school, as the teachers teach the same subject during a class.

Another disadvantage of multigrade teaching is that the indirect activity of students prevents the teacher from promptly intervening in correcting any mistakes, which can lead to the misappropriation of knowledge or the wrong formation of some skills.

Conclusions

The aim of this research was to identify the advantages and challenges of multigrade teaching from the perspective of teachers directly involved in this teaching act. Viewed in relation to other intentions and research results in the field of education sciences, in countries where the multigrade teaching is a reality, many of the stated aspects coincide.

The benefits were identified in terms of positive effects on students enrolled in such classes: self-employment training, learning to learn skills, self-control and self-directed learning skills, social skills training, basic skills and in the key competencies that characterize the profile of the primary and secondary school graduate, respectively social and civic competences and learning to learn competence. Teacher-student and student-student interaction are different in the multigrade class and these make a major contribution to students' cognitive, social and emotional development.

The identified disadvantages are seen from the perspective of the teacher's activity, prior to the actual conduct of the lessons, but also during the lessons.

Time remains one of the biggest challenges for teachers. On the one hand, the time spent by the teacher in preparing the lessons increases considerably. Another major challenge is adapting the national curriculum to multigrade teaching. The curricula in force do not contain direction for multigrade classes, for this reason it is necessary the professional experience and pedagogical mastery of each teacher to go through it successfully.

In multigrade teaching, the available time resource must be used much more efficiently. From this perspective, the alternation of school subjects and types of lessons are very important.

On the other hand, the time provided for the systematization of knowledge is insufficient, most of the time, especially in the secondary cycle. The direct and indirect activity carried out with the students must be related as accurately as possible to the time available in order to avoid the occurrence of downtime and, inevitably, the appearance of noise in the classroom. This aspect was mentioned by the teachers from the primary school and less by those from the secondary school, a period in which the student has good self-employment skills and a certain cognitive maturity.

As solutions to improve the difficult aspects stated, we can mention the study of the literature, the own experience and examples of good practice offered by other teachers.

The study presented has certain limitations: the number of respondents is not significant compared to the total number of teachers who teach in Romania in multigrade classes in primary and secondary school and their low initial and continuing teacher training allows us to conclude that the positive and negative aspects cannot be considered some of the most conclusive, being reported almost exclusively by analyzing their own teaching experience.

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