Attitudes Towards Inclusive Education for Students with Special Educational Needs: A Study on Chinese Primary School English Teachers

RESEARCH OBJECTIVE: The main purpose of this research was to assess teachers’ attitudes towards inclusive education (IE) of students with special developmental needs in the school space. The article is a comparative study in which teachers from Polish and South African schools – special and public schools – took part. THE RESEARCH PROBLEM AND METHODS: Following a pragmatic paradigm, a quantitative strategy and diagnostic survey method were applied. The specially prepared tool, the Scale for Attitudes Towards IE, was used to generate data. Confirming the normal distribution of variables, ANOVA and t-test were used for independent variables and descriptive statistics.. For post-hoc analyses, Tukey’s HSD test was used for equal or different N. THE PROCESS OF ARGUMENTATION: The own research on teachers’ attitudes towards IE was preceded by theoretical considerations on the idea of educational inclusion. Determinants supporting the inclusion of children with special educational needs in mainstream schools were identified. RESEARCH RESULTS: In the overall assessment of attitudes towards inclusive education there were no statistically significant intergroup differences between teachers in Polish and South African schools. However, clear differences emerged in post-hoc analyses of the variables such as: type of the institution and seniority. CONCLUSIONS, INNOVATIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS: The presented international comparative research on teachers’ attitudes towards IE takes into account not only the current state, but also the historical context of both nations, marked by the stigma of segregation and the fight against discrimination. The study shows how it is important to pay attention to the process of teachers’ education – pedagogues, especially, the ones prepared to work in mainstream institutions, for eliminating barriers, adapting curricula to the students’ individual needs, and building openness. It is essential to monitor the correlation between seniority and the direction and intensity of attitudes towards education open for all.

INTERNET RESOURCES FOR SPECIAL EDUCATIONAL NEEDS AND INCLUSION

This article is a descriptive review of several policy documents initiated by the government of India regarding inclusive and equitable education for students with disabilities to bring them into the mainstream education system. India has one of the most progressive disability policy frameworks for educating students with disabilities among developing countries. Over the last three decades, the government of India is taking various initiatives and policy programme to promote inclusive and equitable education for students with disabilities. The most recent policy in India, the National Education Policy 2020, focuses on inclusive and equitable education for students with disabilities. Some other major initiatives focused on inclusive education for students with disabilities at different levels of education like Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA), Inclusive Education of Children and Youth with Disabilities (IECYD), Rastriya Bal Swaasthya Karyakaram (RBSK), Inclusive Education of the Disabled at Secondary Stage (IEDSS) and Teacher Preparation in Special Education (TEPSE), Higher Education for Persons with Special Needs (HEPSN), etc. Despite all these policies, students with disabilities are facing various challenges in regular school. Therefore, India has to go a long way to achieve the goal of inclusive and equitable education for all, including students with disabilities.

Part 1: Management and Schools 1. Effective Schools and Pupil Needs Tim Brighouse, Chief Education Officer, Oxfordshire 2. Welfare and Needs in Secondary Schools Neville Jones 3. Whole-school Policies: A Question of Rights? Caroline Roaf, Peers School, Oxford 4. Guidance, Counselling and Special Educational Needs: Management and Curriculum Issues David Galloway, School of Education, Lancaster University Part 2: Integration and Learning 5. Integrating Children with Physical Impairments: The Ormerod Experience Tim Southgate 6. Integrating Pupils with Behavioural Difficulties into Mainstream Schools Jackie Sunderland, Oxford University Department of Educational Studies 7. Integration and Special Educational Needs 14-19 Howard Brayton, Advisor for Special Educational Needs, Oxfordshire Part 3: Learning and the Curriculum 8. The Oxfordshire Skills Programme John Hanson, Senior Advisor for Curriculum Studies, Oxfordshire 9. Open and Interactive Learning: the LAP Programme Patrick Leeson, Advisor for Communication and Language Development, Croydon 10. Teaching Approaches and Student Needs Nigel Collins, General Advisor for 14-18 Education, East Sussex 11. Able Pupils in Oxfordshire Schools Keith Postlethwaite, Reading University, Mike Deans, Advisor for Special Educational Needs, Oxfordshire, and Cliff Denton, Oxford University Department of Educational Studies Part 4: In-service, Microelectronics, the Community 12. In-service Education and Special Needs Frank Hodgson and Alan Trotter, both Leeds Polytechnic 13. Microtechnology and the Assessment of Communication Difficulties Pru Fuller, Director of ACE Centre, Oxford, and Tim Southgate 14. Special Needs: The Community Response Rhys Evans, Groby Community College, Leicester.

Inclusive education (IE) has widely been recognised as a philosophy to facilitate the goal of Education for All (EFA) worldwide. One important aspect of IE is that it can serve as one of the most pragmatic strategies to respond to student diversity in developing countries (Ainscow and Miles, Developing inclusive education systems: How can we move policies forward? Available at http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/COPs/News_documents/2009/0907Beirut/DevelopingInclusive_Education_Systems.pdf, 2009). Bangladesh, as part of the developing world, has undertaken several initiatives including policy reforms, awareness creation and teachers’ professional development for addressing inclusivity in regular schools. In particular, in secondary education, the IE initiative is being implemented through government development projects such as Teaching Quality Improvement in Secondary Education (TQI-SEP). Teachers have been trained on various aspects of IE including pedagogical knowledge, curriculum flexibility, and disability and diverse learning needs under TQI-SEP largely since its adoption in 2005. Research, however, has identified the ‘pessimistic views’ of teachers as one of the major hindrances to IE in secondary education in Bangladesh (Khan, Critical Literacy: Theories and Practices 6(2):102–118, 2012). In this chapter, our aim is to better understand the factors embedded in the views of secondary teachers regarding the inclusion of students with special educational needs (SEN) in regular classrooms. Based on a semi-structured, one-on-one interview approach, we collected data from 15 purposively chosen teachers from 5 secondary schools in Dhaka city. Following a general inductive thematic analysis procedure, we found that although most of the teachers held favourable views on the inclusion of students with SEN, they seemed to lack the pedagogical knowledge of IE, which resulted in inadequate provision of pragmatic teaching practices. We also found a generally sympathetic view rather than a spirit of access and equity in the responses of the majority of the teachers in relation to the need for IE for students with SEN. We discuss the findings in line with other studies as to how secondary education teachers can be better prepared for addressing more in-depth inclusive practices in their classrooms.

Strategies and approaches to inclusion in the classroom are important in developing a high quality, inclusive experience for students with Special Education Needs. Generally, strategies are not geared towards specific exceptionalities, but are instead designed to be implemented across exceptionality categories. Pavone (2014) and de Anna, Gaspari, Mura (2015) determined through their systematic literature review and research results that co-operation among staff, commitment and accountability to the teaching of all students, differentiation of instruction, and recognizing “that social interaction is the means through which student knowledge is developed” are key to successful inclusion of students with SEN. This paper looks at the issue of school inclusion by referring to the most recent laws about the inclusive education of students with special educational needs in Italy. Inclusive education means that all students attend and are welcomed by their neighbourhood schools in age-appropriate, regular classes and are supported to learn, contribute and participate in all aspects of the life of the school. Inclusive education is about how we develop and design our schools, classrooms, programs and activities so that all students learn and participate together. So ICT should be considered as a key tool for promoting equity in educational opportunities, that is using ICT to support the learning of learners with disabilities and special educational needs in inclusive settings within compulsory education. The paper also argues how the Italian teachers can realized good practices for inclusion through the use of ICT.

The report of the Special Educational Needs Training Consortium – Professional Development to Meet Special Educational Needs – was submitted to the Secretary of State for Education. It also reaffirmed the role of parents as partners in this process as well as recognising the expectation held by parents that children with special educational needs (SEN) should have appropriate support from teachers appropriately skilled and knowledgeable in this area. Even in the early 1990s no nationally recognised programmes of training existed for special needs coordinators (SENCos) in mainstream schools, and opportunities varied widely between LEAs. Thus it was that in 1993 they agreed to form a consortium, under the aegis of the Council for Disabled Children, which is itself an umbrella body for parents, professionals and others working on behalf of children with SEN. They were concerned not only with the numbers of trainees, but also with monitoring the quality of specialist courses nationally and trying to ensure their consistency.

The purpose of this study is to explore the school life of middle school students with special needs, focusing on general classes, special classes, and peer relationships, using the photovoice research method. Based on this, the study aims to examine the educational needs and supports needed by students with special educational need in middle school. To achieve this, five students from a special education class in the second year of middle school were selected as the research subjects. They participated in the photovoice study for four months from March to June 2023. Participants took part in orientation once, nine interviews on the topics of general education, special education, and peer relationships, photovoice exhibition once. Eleven individual and group interviews were conducted over a period of about four months, and the collected qualitative data were analyzed according to Wang & Burris’s the three steps of photovoice analysis. The analyzed data were categorized into four major categories, 11 sub categories, and 40 semantic units: “Half-hearted school life”, “My lonely day at school”, “Moments when I'm happy to have a friend”, and “the future I dream of”. The names of each category are based on the words, sentences, or parts of sentences expressed by the research participants themselves. The research process yielded the following findings: First, students with special educational need in middle school were experiencing both difficulties and pleasures in their academic performance during school. Second, students with special educational need in middle school had difficulty forming peer relationships and social interactions in the general classroom. Third, students with special educational need in middle school were experiencing intimacy through positive social interactions at school. Fourth, students with special educational need in middle school had expectations for those around them in school and dreams of what they wanted to be in adulthood.

Special education is a field dedicated to supporting and educating individuals with various disabilities. These individuals may include children from birth, school-aged children, or adolescents and young adults who are still in education. Its focus is on ensuring needs-based, individualized education for people with special educational needs or disabilities. The primary goals of special education are the optimal development of personality, the promotion of autonomy, and the facilitation of social integration and participation. Special education is an individualized instructional approach designed for individuals with special needs (e.g., intellectual, auditory, physical, visual impairments; autism; learning difficulties). A child or young person is considered to have a special educational need when it is determined that their development is significantly limited or at risk, or when they are unable to meet regular academic standards without additional support. Moreover, special education applies to children and adolescents who demonstrate substantial challenges in social competence, as well as in cognitive and performance-related abilities. In Switzerland, the responsibility for the education of children and young people with special educational needs lies with the individual cantons. On behalf of the EDK, the Foundation Swiss Center for Healing and Special Education supports the cantons in the implementation of their cantonal special education frameworks. The cantons are responsible for the education of children and young people with special educational needs. The design of special education services and measures is determined by each canton in accordance with its respective special education framework. In Basel, the Special Education and Hospital School Ordinance is the ordinance governing the education and support of students with special educational needs and hospital schooling. This ordinance regulates the provision of education and support for students with special educational needs during compulsory and post-compulsory schooling, up to a maximum age of 20, as well as for students with or without special educational needs in hospital schools. Various services are available both within and outside the school setting, depending on the child's needs in Basel-Stadt. Detailed information and links regarding these services can be found at https://www.bs.ch/ed/volksschulen/foerderung/verstaerkte-massnahmen

The relevance of the topic is due to modern trends in the development of the educational sphere not only in our country, but also in the world as a whole, in particular, reform processes that should ensure unhindered access to education for every child, regardless of their characteristics and needs. In domestic conditions, inclusive measures are actively being implemented, which create the need to develop modern approaches to the educational process for children with special educational needs. Regulatory and legal changes in the system of regulation of educational activities require teachers and educational institutions to provide an inclusive space that would take into account the special needs of students, which, in turn, requires continuous improvement of methodological and organizational methods of work. At the same time, taking into account modern problems, in particular, the lack of trained teachers to work in inclusive conditions, it is worth developing measures that would contribute to improving the qualifications of teachers and specialists who work with children with special educational needs. Also, the practice of foreign countries confirms the importance of introducing effective models and strategies for adapting them to domestic educational conditions. Therefore, this study is extremely relevant, as it requires a comprehensive approach to optimizing educational services for children with special educational needs, taking into account modern trends in the field of education in Ukraine. The purpose of the study is to reveal the importance of providing psychological assistance in the process of adapting children with special educational needs in institutions with inclusive education. In the process of writing this article, the following methods were used: analysis and synthesis, generalization, system method, logical, dialectical, generalization method. It was found that psychological assistance should be based not only on the internal capabilities of the child, the purpose of which is to determine specific areas of its development, but also on support in the manifestations of independence, the fight against problems in personal development, solving current tasks of learning and socialization, and should also include the development of psychological literacy of the subject of psychological assistance. It was determined that the effectiveness of psychological assistance to children with special educational needs lies in the fact that in the process of developing a theoretical scheme of assistance it is necessary to: perform a psychological examination and analyze the dynamics of the child's development; clearly establish the factors that influenced the emergence of problems in learning and socialization of the child; overcome the identified problems in the psychosocial development of children, reduce the risks of problems of adaptation to learning; ensure the timeliness of prevention of deviations in development; form active cooperation in educational activities aimed at improving the child's personality; develop the social skills of all participants in psychological assistance.

With today’s increasingly challenging and growing transformation and technology within the world of education, the impact on the education system among students with special educational needs (SEN) with learning problems is no less great. Various initiatives have been set by the ministry for the benefit of students with special educational need's future, such as the expansion of students with special educational need's Career Transition Program. This study aims to discuss the application of entrepreneurial skills in Career Transition Program among students with special educational needs (SEN). This study uses a qualitative approach, which is a method of structured interviews, observations and document analysis. The study sample is a total of four special educational teachers who teach vocational subjects. The findings of this study show that there are four elements of entrepreneurial skills that are applied to students with special educational need, especially with learning disabilities, which are the skills to produce products, the skills to market products, the skills to do business and communicate and the skills to calculate costs. Most individuals with special needs can perform productively if given the knowledge and skills through an appropriate educational program.

Changes in society, democratization of education enable to shift towards persons with disabilities, in order to integrate them into society without causing discomfort neither the person, nor those around him. Categorization of disabilities and disorders according to medical criteria does not meet the educational objectives of pupils with special educational needs, as both developmental disorders and learning difficulties create the variety of abilities, needs and interests of pupils in the class. Such variety refers to school for all pupils, to involving (inclusive) education. According to the results of surveys, although the pupils with special educational needs are involved in general education, the teacher still remains alone with his philosophy and methods, without being offered an opportunity for cooperation, consultancy support, which is one of conditions for success in the involving (inclusive) education. Lack of systematic research is still observed, which brings out the didactics issues of art education of pupils with special educational needs, therefore, the analyzed scientific problem is relevant. The objectives of special art education are focused not only on the pupils having special educational needs, but also to the surrounding people – teachers, classmates, family, society, and even more, to their mutual interactions. Such change of didactic goals reveals the new art education principles. The subjects of the article are the didactic goals and principles, educating the pupils with special needs by art. Applying the method of analysis of the scientific literature, the article reveals the research of the world and Lithuanian scientists in the field of special art pedagogy and theoretically justifies six principles of art education: art education focused on the emotionally positive interaction between the learner and teacher, directed to the learner’s family and society; art education is of moral aspect; content of art education is integral and perceived; educational methods are applied in complex; in the process of art education the verbal and nonverbal reflections predominate; art education is personally and socially meaningful for the pupils with special educational needs.

The charity/tragedy discourse of disability and traditional versions of femininity bear some striking resemblances. Both are associated with dependence and helplessness, and with resultant practices that are implicated in the enduring reproduction of social and material inequalities. This article looks at the 'identity work' of a group of girls, all of whom had been identified as having 'special educational needs', in a mainstream school in the UK. Using findings from an ethnographic study, the article explores how the girls position themselves in relation to the subject 'special needs student'. The findings suggest that historical meanings associated with femininity and disability combine with contemporary schooling practices to produce a constrained range of subject positions around which the girls have limited room for manoeuvre.

The article considers the perceived prevalence of special educational needs in English primary schools and changes in this prevalence over two decades and relates these to issues in education policy, teacher practice and the concept of special educational needs. The studies considered are two major surveys of schools and teachers, the first conducted in 1981 and the second conducted in the same schools in 1998. Important features of both studies were their scale and the exceptionally high response rates achieved. Two central findings were the perception of teachers that special educational needs were widespread and of an increase in special educational needs over time: perceived levels of special educational needs were one in five children in 1981, which had risen to one in four children in 1998. Learning difficulties were by far the most common aspects of special educational needs but many children had multiple difficulties, and behavioural difficulties were seen by teachers as the main barriers to inclusion. The very high figures for prevalence raise questions about the continued usefulness of the concept of special educational need distinct from broader issues of achievement.

BackgroundIf the window of opportunity presented by the early years is missed, it becomes increasingly difficult to create a successful life-course. A biopsychosocial model of special educational need with an emphasis on participation and functioning moves the frame of reference from the clinic to the school and the focus from specific conditions to creating supportive environments cognisant of the needs of all children. However, evidence suggests that an emphasis on diagnosed conditions persists and that the needs of children who do not meet these criteria are not identified.The Early Development Instrument (EDI) is a well-validated, teacher-completed population-level measure of five domains of child development. It is uniquely placed, at the interface between health and education, to explore the developmental status of children with additional challenges within a typically developing population. The aim of this study was to examine the extent to which the special educational needs of children in their first year of formal education have been identified.MethodsThis cross-sectional study was conducted in Ireland in 2011. EDI (teacher completed) scores were calculated for 1344 children. Data were also collected on special needs and on children identified by the teacher as needing assessment. Mean developmental scores were compared using one-way ANOVA.ResultsEighty-three children in the sample population (6.2%) had identified special educational needs. A further 132 children were judged by the teacher as needing assessment. Children with special needs had lower mean scores than typically developing children, in all five developmental domains. Children considered by the teacher as needing assessment also had lower scores, which were not significantly different from those of children with special needs. Speech, emotional or behavioural difficulties were the most commonly reported problems among children needing further assessment. There was also a social gradient among this group.ConclusionsA small but significant number of children have not had their needs adequately assessed. Teacher observation is an effective means of identifying children with a level of impairment which prevents them from fully participating in their educational environment and could be integrated into a multi-disciplinary approach to meeting the needs of all children.