Teachers' Accounts of the Usefulness of Multigrade Teaching in Promoting Sustainable Human-Development Related Outcomes in Rural South Africa

Education has an enormous role to play in efforts to promote and achieve sustainable development in South Africa. But one challenge facing the education sector is a shortage of teachers in different phases of the school system. Multigrade teaching is seen as a means to overcome the effects of the teacher shortage and, through the opening of access to basic education, to contribute towards achieving Education For All (EFA). Furthermore, with multigrade teaching there is scope for 'interactions' among learners of, inter alia, different ages, levels of maturity, grades, and abilities. Because the diversity and differences among learners is sharply increased in a multigrade class, the interaction processes and curricula aspects are affected. The multigrade teaching debate has largely ignored the possibility that aspects of the multigrade teaching process could be utilised to support sustainable human development (SHD). Using a qualitative approach, this article examines multigrade teachers' views about multigrade teaching and group-work as its methodology, and the extent to which teachers use group-work to promote measures relevant to SHD - such as peaceful social interaction, shared responsibility, and civic participation. Evidence from 10 case studies, which involved 25 multigrade teachers, shows that while multigrade teaching seems a useful medium to promote social outcomes necessary for SHD, the ways in which it is implemented, and the context in which this is done, matter. It highlights key implementation and contextual issues to address whether multigrade teaching is to contribute meaningfully to sustainable human development.