This study focuses on differentiation in the pedagogy of small multi-graded schools. Heterogenic mixed-age classes challenge teaching in small schools. This study asks which and how teaching practices are used to differentiate pupils in multi-grade classes. As empirical data are used narrative teacher interviews (n=14) and ethnographic teaching observations that have been collected in two small Finnish primary schools during 2010–2012 and three small Austrian primary schools during 2013. The data is analysed by using content analysis and narrative analysis (Riessman 2008). The analysis is supported by Cornish’s (2006) defining of teaching strategies in multi-grade teaching and Scholz’s (2010) ideas of differentiation in teaching. According to preliminary research results, teachers use different strategies and materials to answer the calls of different learners in their classes – e.g. a subject stagger and a parallel curriculum (Kalaoja & Pietarinen 2009); group working or peer tutoring and individual working plans; frontal and computer-assisted teaching. On the basis of the data, teacher education students have had only a little or not at all instruction concerning differentiated teaching in multi-grade groups, so we can expect that those teaching skills are mostly learned through practice.