Making education more inclusive

Our team had previously sought to identify inclusive practices in two secondary schools. This was done by surveying around 130 teachers and educational professionals about what affected their sentiments and attitudes towards including children with special education needs in the classroom. The aim was to address any concerns the teachers had during initial training and their subsequent professional development in inclusivity.

From the teachers’ responses, we found several factors that affected perceptions on inclusion: the training teachers received for including students with special educational needs in the classroom, their experience in teaching students with such needs, and their reported confidence in teaching them. For example, teachers who expressed confidence in supporting students with special education needs had more positive perceptions towards inclusion. Together, these factors accounted for 20% to 37% of the variation in how school professionals responded.

Our research continues in a primary school where we are currently exploring whether these same factors continue to impact the attitudes of school professionals. We will also be exploring how these factors are associated with the teachers’ intention to engage in inclusive practices, and the actual practice of being inclusive, in preschools.

EFFECTS OF TEACHING PRACTICE

The contexts of education can be quite different across preschools and primary schools. Our recent reviews of over 100 research articles indicate there are several aspects that make a classroom inclusive for students with special education needs.

Some aspects include the way teachers interact with their students and the use of resources to further support students with special needs. While these features require time and funding support to put in place, our reviews indicate that teachers also make use of other factors such as a classroom’s layout, help from classmates, and collaboration with other professionals and the families of students with special needs.

We also found that these same aspects were relevant in a survey of close to 500 teachers from primary and special education schools on what practices they engage in to teach children with special educational needs.

Our team is continuing this research to understand the practices of teachers in another ongoing study involving video recordings of over 40 classrooms in primary and special education schools. The goal is to discern any patterns present in how teachers interact with children.

IMPACT ON CHILDREN

We seek to further understand the impact of teachers’ practices on students’ behaviour. In our ongoing research on classroom video recordings mentioned earlier, we aim to examine the impact of teachers’ actions on the engagement level of students with special needs in classrooms.

Research around the world indicates that students who are included in high-quality classrooms make gains that are comparable to what they receive in mainstream classrooms.

These are aspects that we are in the midst of investigating in our longitudinal study of the development of students with special educational needs.

The progress of society, as the late Indian leader Mahatma Ghandi expressed years ago, is measured by how it treats its weakest members. The question of how Singapore, with its rising affluence, is supporting and including people with disabilities, grows increasingly salient. Our team’s research continues to inch us towards our goal of refining our practice of educating children with special educational needs at preschools and primary schools. Our next stop: secondary schools.

By Kenneth Poon

The article appeared first in NTU's research & innovation magazine Pushing Frontiers (issue #21, December 2022).