(introduction...)

Five innovations in multi-grade teaching over the past two decades in developing countries are presented in this chapter. The first two experiences, from Zambia and Colombia, have addressed the multi-grade reality of rural primary schools directly. The Zambian experience is less than ten years old and relatively small-scale. The Colombian experience spans three decades and is large-scale. Both have involved external agencies and support from the government mainstream. The third experience, from Peru, describes the multi-grade reality found among indigenous communities and the recent involvement of NGOs in teacher education programmes oriented towards multi-grade teaching. The fourth, from Sri Lanka, illustrates how some solutions to the problems faced by the multi-grade teacher are being offered on a small scale through the recognition that even mono-grade classes contain very wide differences in achievement and that a single grade may be conceived as a multi-grade context. The final experience draws on innovations in rural primary education in several countries. Project Impact began as a radical reform of primary education in Indonesia and the Philippines and expanded subsequently to Liberia, Malaysia, Bangladesh and Jamaica. Although not oriented exclusively to the problems of multi-grade classes, many of the features of the innovation offered solutions to them.