Responding to David Elkind's article in the May 1988 issue of "Principal," this article reexamines classroom rotation for elementary students, challenges Elkind's argument against this practice, and proposes rotation as a way to increase students' options through team teaching. Includes two references. (MLH)

This paper recounts the history of nongraded elementary schools. After the American Civil War, there arose an uncoordinated effort to question graded practices. By the end of the 19th century, schools which sought to be more sensitive to differences in children's learning styles were established. Notable among these schools was Dewey's Laboratory…

Graded school concept, born of administrative practicality and puritanical traditions, has promulgated its lockstep curriculum, its simplistic child development assumptions, and its sexist, isolationist teaching methods since the mid-1800s. Most natural learning environment calls for heterogeneous multiage groupings, within which other groupings…