If being a teacher and attending to the diversity and heterogeneity of students in the classroom, giving appropriate help to all students, is a complex task even more so in the case of multi-grade classrooms of rural schools (Abós et al., 2021). In these schools, teaching pupils of different chronological ages, interests and characteristics together in the same classroom represents a challenge for teachers to give an adequate attention to all of them, enhancing the inclusive and pedagogical value of the multi-grade classroom. A type of school that must be valued for the active methodologies applied and the inclusive work that is promoted and carried out. Nevertheless, in many aspects rural schools still remain invisible in favor of the urban graded school (Abós et al., 2020) despite the fact that it represents 30% of all schools worldwide (Little, 2006). Moreover, there is a lack of initial and continuous teacher training that takes into account the particularities of rural schools (Abós et al., 2021; García-Prieto, 2015), which hinders teaching in multigrade classrooms. There, to respond to the heterogeneity of all students, it is necessary that teachers implement active-participative, democratic and globalized strategies of specific multigrade didactics (Bustos, 2007) and to develop specific competencies for working in rural contexts. The methodology used must be supported by teaching materials that go along the same lines and also take multigrade into account in their creation or use by adapting the teaching response to the diversity of students in the multigrade classroom (Boix & Bustos, 2014). The scarcity of existence of specific didactic resources for multigrade teaching and learning, as well as the lack of knowledge about how these resources should be (Brown, 2010; Msimanga, 2019), is a problem reported in international research (Carrete-Marín & Domingo-Peñafiel, 2022; Coladarci, 2007; Fargas-Malet & Bagley, 2021). In addition, different studies highlight the inadequacy of existing resources (Juvane, 2005) and those used in schools, as well as teachers' difficulties in developing them, despite their importance for the success of work in the multigrade classroom (Boix & Bustos, 2014). In view of this, it is necessary to see how teachers face this challenge today and show what materials teachers are using in the classroom and how, what aspects they take into account to select or design them and what their needs are in this respect. In addition, it is relevant to analyze what teachers think and what they actually do, to see if it goes accordingly. 

The first results of a research project in the Spanish context are thus presented, the central questions of which are as follows: What kind of teaching materials do teachers use in multigrade classrooms? What elements do they take into account to select them to promote inclusive work in the multigrade classroom? What are the rural school teachers’ beliefs and actions about the selection, use, creation and adaptation of materials to face the teaching-learning process in the multigrade classrooms?

Based on these questions, the goals of the study were: (1) to analyze the type of resources used by teachers and their use in relation to the planning and methodology used in the multigrade classroom by teachers; (2) detect criteria for the elaboration and selection of didactic materials in rural schools, so that they are pedagogically meaningful and take into account multigrading. 

This research is also a response to the scarcity of research on the subject, despite the need for it as reflected in various studies. This study is therefore of particular importance because it is unique on the subject and provides relevant results to take into account.

According to the goals of the study, a descriptive design based on an extended online survey was the methodology selected. This was carried out with the aim of analyzing the answers of a representative sample of teachers working in multi-grade classrooms in different schools located in rural areas of Spain. This is to reflect what is the existing reality of the type of materials used in multi-grade classrooms and whether it is in line to promote inclusive education.The population was determined by Spanish childhood and primary school teachers in schools placed in rural areas working in multigrade classrooms. The representative sample was composed of 385 teachers. Snowball sampling was the non-probabilistic method applied. A Likert scale was designed to know rural school teachers' beliefs and mastery of using multigrade teaching materials to include every learning level in the classrooms. The research instrument was composed of the following sections: personal and context data; statements related to the thinking process and the previous making decision to select, use, create and adapt teaching materials in the multigrade classroom and statements related to the actions done in their classrooms selecting, using, creating and adapt these materials. The Likert scale had a four-point scale to allow the individual to express how much they agree or disagree with a particular statement. The gathering data process started by sending the online survey to the rural school directors to answer the questionnaire and spreading it among the rest of the rural teachers of their school. Also to the schools that are part of their cluster. The fixed period of time to deliver the survey was from December 2022 to February 2023. The procedure was conducted in line with the code of good research practices of the Ethics Committee of the University of Vic-Central University of Catalonia. The rigorous analysis data plan was composed, on the one hand, of descriptive statistics (frequency, percentages, mean, standard deviation and variance) to know the rural school teachers features who has in charge to select and use multigrade materials in their classrooms and, on the other hand, of correlation methodology such as Chrombach alpha to confirm the consistency of the results obtained in every statement and the Pearson correlation coefficient to find the significance relations among these beliefs and actions. The results were calculated using the SPSS v27.01 software with the level of significance being set at p<.05

The results indicate that the majority of rural teachers are women. Their teaching experience ranges from 11 to 25 years. Almost a quarter of this time (between 6 and 10 years) has been spent teaching in rural schools and most of them have obtained full-time positions. Responses have been obtained from all the Autonomous Communities ensuring the representativeness of the study and its relevance. Accordingly, the conclusions are as follows: 1) The teachers in rural schools in the sample are sufficiently experienced and are not in an unstable situation that prevents them from knowing, selecting, using and creating multigrade materials adequately to include all pupils in the classroom. 2) The lack of confidence in the use of multigrade materials could be explained by the non-existence and inefficiency of specific teacher training programmes in the pre-service years. Also due to the expressed need for more resource repositories that take into account the rural school or the contact between teachers from different schools. 3) Despite being convinced of the benefits of multigrade materials, they tend to select standard materials such as textbooks, individual worksheets and printed or edited materials created for graded classrooms and which are far from the approach and methodology used. 4) Teachers in rural schools try to adapt these standard materials themselves. 5) Most of them want to adapt these materials to include all levels of learning and competence of pupils in multigrade classrooms and also to promote collaborative work in spite of the difficulties encountered. 6) Teachers in rural schools tend to use the same materials for each of their pupils and then try to adapt these materials by creating different ad-hoc teaching-learning tasks according to the different learning levels.

Abós, P. (2020). La escuela ubicada en territorios rurales: una escuela diferente, un reto pedagógico. [The school located in rural territories: a different school, a pedagogical challenge]. Aula, 26, p.41–52. https://doi.org/10.14201/aula2020264152. Abós Olivares, P., Boix Tomàs, R., Domingo Peñafiel, L., Lorenzo Lacruz, J. & Rubio Terrado, P. (2021). El reto de la escuela rural: Hacer visible lo invisible [The challenge of rural schools: Making the invisible visible] (Vol. 54). Graó. Boix, R. & Bustos, A. (2014). La enseñanza en las aulas multigrado: Una aproximación a las actividades escolares y los recursos didácticos desde la perspectiva del profesorado [Teaching in multi-grade classrooms: An approach to school activities and teaching resources from a teacher's perspective]. Revista Iberoamericana de Evaluación Educativa, 7(3), 29-43. Brown, B. (2010). Multigrade teaching. A Review of Issues, Trends and Practices: Implications for Teacher Education in South Africa. Centre for Education Policy Development. Johannesburg. Bustos, A. (2007). Enseñar en la escuela rural aprendiendo a hacerlo. Evolución de la identidad profesional en las aulas multigrado [Teaching in rural schools by learning to teach. Evolution of professional identity in multi-grade classrooms]. Profesorado. Revista de currículum y formación de profesorado, 11(3). Carrete-Marín, N. & Domingo-Peñafiel, L. (2022). Textbooks and Teaching Materials in Rural Schools: A systematic Review. CEPS journal, 12(2), p. 67-94. https://doi.org/10.26529/cepsj.1288 Coladarci, T. (2007). Improving the yield of rural education research: an editor’s Swan Song. Journal on Research in Rural Education, 22 (3). Fargas-Malet, M. & Bagley,C. (2021). Is small beautiful? A scoping review of 21st-century research on small rural schools in Europe. European Educational Research Journal, June, 1–23. https://doi.org/10.1177/14749041211022202 García-Prieto, F. J. (2015). Escuela, medio rural y diversidad cultural en un contexto global: currículum, materiales didácticos y práctica docente de Conocimiento del Medio: situación, límites y posibilidades en centros onubenses [School, rural environment and cultural diversity in a global context: curriculum, didactic materials and teaching practice in Environmental Knowledge: situation, limits and possibilities in schools in Huelva]. http://rabida.uhu.es/dspace/handle/10272/11440 Juvane, V. (2005). Redefining the role of multigrade teaching. Paper presented at the MinisterialSeminar on Education for Rural People in Africa: Policy Lessons, Options and PrioritiesAddis Ababa, Ethopia. Little, A.W. (2006). All Together Now. University of London. Msimanga, M. R. (2019). Managing the use of resources in multi-grade classrooms. South African Journal of Education, 39(3).