Vivian Magalhães

If you teach a class in which there is a noticeable difference in language level among students or where students have a clear difference in either aptitude, background knowledge, pace of learning or motivation (sometimes all of these), you can say you teach a mixed-ability class.
We all know of the strains and hard decisions such a situation can impose on teachers. Should you pitch your lessons at a basic level so that the slower students can follow, or at a more advanced level to make sure the stronger ones don't get bored? How can you keep the weaker students from feeling frustrated and the proficient students from feeling under-challenged? What to do with students who try very hard but still get bad marks, or with those who tend to dominate because they know more? And finally, should you speak the mother language in class so that you don't lose anyone along the way, or try to speak English in spite of the protests from those who guarantee they can't understand a word?
There are no final answers to any of those questions, but the good news is you are far from being alone on this boat. In fact, mixed-ability classes are the norm in public and private schools throughout the world, not the exception. And there are plenty of teachers developing and suggesting strategies to face a problem that is not about to disappear. These strategies may include:

• Devising graded tasks, i.e., designing activities on the same topic but with different levels of difficulty. Of course that could create two new problems: extra work for the teacher and the possibility that some students feel labeled as weak while others resent having to work "harder". As a possible solution for the first problem we suggest you create a bank of activities, so that your work can be re-used with other groups or exchanged with other teachers. As for the way students may feel about the grading of tasks, first of all try to color-code the activities, establishing, for example, "group one will receive a blue worksheet, group two a yellow worksheet and group 3 a green worksheet." Vary those colors the next time you have a similar activity, so that there is no association between the color of the activities and the level of the sub-groups. Also, make sure there are advantages in belonging to the group of the most advanced students, so that everyone in class will make an effort to progress. Such advantages could be, for example, allowing the students to do their work outdoors, visit the computer lab or explore songs more often than the rest of the class. With a smaller group in the classroom you will also be able to work on specific difficulties which don't apply to the group as a whole.
  
  
• Preparing self-access materials: when the syllabus forces us to move forward and we feel there are students who are not yet ready to go on, one of the alternatives is preparing self-access materials to enable such students to do on their own and at their own pace the extra effort that will help them overcome their difficulties. Self-access materials should contain a very clear explanation of a given topic, followed by exercises and an answer key. Again, preparing extra material for the students may be an extra burden on the teacher at first, but not all of this material has to be made from scratch: a lot of textbooks that we receive from the publishers can be used as sources of materials, and a bank of activities (preferably organized by a group of teachers) will save a lot of work on future occasions.
  
  
• Favoring cooperative tasks that demand specific abilities, other than linguistic performance: after Howard Gardner claimed that there is not one, but in fact 8 different types of intelligences, teachers have become more aware of talents their students have that are not necessarily related to the subject they teach. A student who doesn't have a born aptitude for languages, for example, can be a gifted artist, an exceptional musician or a great athlete. That's why, as much as possible, teachers should promote cooperative games and activities in which good linguistic performance is not enough to win and the weaker students can contribute in the group with other talents or with their knowledge of the world.
  
  
• Evaluating differently: within the guidelines imposed by the schools, teachers should always take into consideration the students' progress when assigning a grade. As we have already mentioned, and you probably noticed in your own practice, there are students who try very hard and still don't reach the same academic level of their classmates. This effort just cannot go unnoticed. Although we many times have to conform to written tests imposed by the schools, the students should be encouraged to keep portfolios in which their work is filed and their progress can be easily checked. The assignment of projects is also a great way to evaluate mixed-ability groups, and short quizzes covering single topics should be preferable to cumulative tests or "finals".
  
  
• Taking advantage of class management techniques: and we don't mean only moving desks around. Of course a nice seating arrangement (better than the usual single rows of students, anyway) can help a lot in improving group interaction, but in fact there is a lot more teachers can do. First of all, make sure you vary class dynamics, having a fair share of pair work and group work along with individual tasks. When you have students working in pairs, choose when it's best for weaker students to work with stronger students and when the match should be somewhat homogeneous. Use the board neatly and wisely, since a lot of the students rely on it to catch up on what you are saying. Make a conscious effort of not letting the stronger students dominate by keeping eye contact with all students (not only those near you) and, as much as possible, call all students by their names. Pedagogically speaking, class management is the opposite of improvisation: you simply have to think every single detail ahead, from the way you give instructions to the way you give feedback on what the students have done. Thinking ahead: that's what class management is all about.
  
  
• Regarding the proficient students as a positive influence, not a threat. In other words, let them help. Of course you won't sit back and let the so-called "good" students do your job, but you can encourage them to use their extra knowledge of the language to help their classmates in their work. Peer teaching can be a nice alternative to teacher-guided reviews, for example. Stronger students can also be assigned to check other classmates' assignments before they turn them in-which would not only keep them busy after finishing their own assignments, but also give them a sense of pride for performing such a helpful task and educate them on a cooperative behavior that we know is not very usual in our schools.