Teaching methods: Teaching in a multi-age classroom

Our guest today is Lisa Seewraj, a teacher at Child Side Playgroup and School in Boyanup, Western Australia, about 200 kilometres south of Perth. Child Side School is an independent, co-educational school covering Kindergarten to Year 10.

The school was founded in 2002, with a focus on relationships, engagement and connectivity. The school’s founders and co-principals Karron McDonald and Leonie O’Connell say they strongly believe that each person’s story matters to them and should matter to the students themselves; they help children value their own story and communicate and advocate it’s worth over and above any reports, grades, scores and other stats and data.

Lisa Seewraj teaches a multi-age class of 23 students across Years 7-10. She does this with a co-teacher who teaches maths and science, and the two teachers are in the class for most of the week. Lisa also teaches these students for the four years they are in this year range. In today’s episode we discuss how she manages the classroom on a daily basis, the range of abilities that she caters for, and how she provides each student with the appropriate level of challenge to progress in their learning.

Guest: Lisa Seewraj

Host: Rebecca Vukovic