Describes Project Friends, a mixed-age classroom of kindergartners, first graders, and second graders, including its beginnings, significant features (such as use of integrated thematic curriculum and "clubs"), and outcomes. Asserts that the program has empowered children for learning and encouraged helping relationships among children.…

For the past four years, a multiage class in Maine has been involved in a pumpkin-growing and -marketing enterprise--a project involving real work and problem solving. Begun with a seed grant, the project raises money for field trips and nonessential teaching materials. Working cooperatively forges strong bonds among children, teachers, and…

Describes how an undersupported rural elementary school in Mississippi became a model school with the unique Voyages curriculum. Under the dynamic, professional leadership of its principal, the school and teachers involved the entire community, local legislators, and others to gain support and funds for its innovative program that created an…

Recognizing that primary education needed to be changed in order to make it research-based and developmentally appropriate, a group of teachers in Wyoming developed a multi-age, team-taught class, called the Primary Education Program. The first year's class included 3 teachers and 60 students in kindergarten through first grade, and the second…

In June 1990, the state of Kentucky passed its innovative Education Reform Act, which totally restructured the finance, governance, and curriculum of its public schools. One of the major provisions of the act was the mandate for Kentucky's primary schools to change from the traditional placement of children of the same age in kindergarten, first,…