Reflections on policy and practice of inclusive education in pre‐primary schools in Cyprus

In July 1999 the House of Parliament in Cyprus passed the Education Act for Children with Special Needs, according to which all children have the right to be educated in their neighbouring regular school together with their age‐mates. An important component of this law is that it introduces, for the first time, inclusive education into pre‐primary education. A child can be considered as having special needs only when he/she has attained the age of 3 years or older. The purpose of this paper is to examine how the policy of inclusive education is implemented in pre‐primary schools in ­Cyprus, to investigate whether some children are still marginalized (after the implementation of the new law) and, if they are, to identify factors influencing marginalization or acting as a barrier to inclusion. We also briefly present the results from a study we conducted that supports the discussion of the issues raised in this paper.     

Exploration of teaching strategies that stimulate the growth of academic skills of children with ASD in special education school

The cognitive growth of children with developmental disorders, like autism, can be seriously impaired due to the disorder. If so, in the Netherlands, these children can attend special schools where they are treated to ameliorate disorder symptoms and to stimulate cognitive growth. The aim of this paper was to identify teaching strategies that stimulate the growth of academic skills in children diagnosed with autism, attending a special needs education school in the Netherlands. Findings showed that the strongest underlying teaching strategy that predicted the academic growth of the children on the autism spectrum in the short and long term was the provision of structure in place, time and activities. It was further found that long-term academic gains were partly predicted by the emotional support from their teachers. The implications of the findings are discussed.     

What trainees in England learn about teaching pupils with special educational needs/disabilities in their school-based work: the contribution of planned activities in one-year initial training courses☆

The project reported in this paper addresses the issue of trainee teacher learning with regard to special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) during the school placement element of one-year postgraduate teacher training programmes in England. Through a focus on the university/school partnership, school organisational and classroom pedagogic processes, the project aimed to improve knowledge and understanding about teacher education relevant to the special educational needs and inclusive education fields. Specifically, the project examined and compared the school-based learning and outcomes of postgraduate teacher trainees in primary and secondary programmes that used different approaches to preparing teachers for the special needs aspects of their future teaching. Three kinds of school-based approaches are examined: one that involved a practical teaching task; a second which involved a pupil-focused task (but not practical teaching); and a third where there was no specific pupil-focused SEND task other than class teaching practice.

The paper reports on what and how trainees learned about teaching pupils with SEND and on differences related to the use of SEND tasks. Findings indicate that what trainees learn about teaching pupils with SEND is strongly interlinked with what they learn about teaching in general. The pedagogic knowledge learned from undertaking planned pupil-focused SEND tasks, however, centres on pupils’ personal learning needs, something that was less likely to be learned from only whole-class teaching experience. Implications for schools, initial teacher education (ITE) providers, national and international policy are presented as evidence-informed questions with possible options.     

Disproportionality in special education: identifying children with emotional behavioural difficulties in Irish primary schools

Within categories of special educational needs, emotional and behavioural difficulties have received much attention in recent years, particularly in relation to their definition and identification by parents and teachers. This paper stems from previous research which highlights how children from disadvantaged backgrounds and those attending schools designated as socio-economically disadvantaged are significantly more likely than their peers to be identified as having a special educational need of a non-normative type such as emotional behavioural difficulty (EBD). Using data from the Growing Up in Ireland study, it examines whether the EBD identified by teachers or within certain schools is matched by the child’s own performance on an internationally validated emotional and mental health measure – the Piers–Harris. Findings show that overall self-reported social emotional well-being bears a strong relationship to the probability of being identified with an EBD. However, boys, children from economically inactive and one-parent households and children attending the most disadvantaged school contexts are more likely to be identified with having an EBD, even after taking into account their social background characteristics and their scoring on the Piers–Harris measure. These findings suggest that the subjective nature of EBD identification is resulting in a disproportionate number of these children being identified with EBD. The implications of this study are explored for existing disability/SEN classification systems, school-wide intervention models and the impact on individual students labelled as EBD. Overall, the findings pose searching questions about the validity of employing SEN classification systems in deciding eligibility and types of appropriate provision.     

New conceptualizations for special education

During their secondary school years, a considerable number of students seriously consider choosing between learning and leaving. Leaving school early means that students do not complete their education. Early school leaving is the last step in a process in which students gradually lose interest and develop the intention to leave school. This study focuses on students with special needs and the impact of their social relations with parents, teachers and peers on their intentions to leave school early. The sample for this study comprises 1873 typical students and 132 students with special needs aged 16 from secondary schools in a large region of Norway. The intention to leave early can be predicted by teacher support and by loneliness as an indicator for peer support. The findings suggest that especially peer support is, for all students, a key variable in staying motivated for school. For students with special needs, teacher support is also important to stay in school in the early years. Over time, however, the support from teachers becomes less important for students with special needs. They too become more dependent on support from peers.     

Disablist bullying in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland: an investigation of student teachers’ knowledge,experience and confidence

This study explored the knowledge, experience and confidence of student teachers from Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland in relation to disablist bullying. Adopting a mixed methodological approach of four focus groups (N = 18) and a pencil-and-paper questionnaire (N = 257), the study explored the students knowledge, experience and confidence in relation to disablist bullying. Results highlight that none of the participants, in either jurisdiction, had received guidance in relation to disablist bullying as part of their Initial Teacher Education (ITE). Results highlight the need for practical, solution-focused and evidence-based input at the level of ITE and Continuing Professional Development in both jurisdictions.     

Personal action potency: early years practitioners participating in interprofessional practice in early years settings

This paper reports on case study research in the UK analysing the participation of early years staff in interprofessional practice to provide effective care and education for children, primarily those with special educational needs. Even though case study staff in different ‘outstanding’ settings had equivalent qualifications and similar years of experience, the ease with which they were able to marshal and deliver effective provision for children requiring input from other services varied depending on a complex set of factors. Social Practice Theory (Holland and Lave 2009) and the concepts of personal action potency in trajectories of participation (Dreier 2002, 2008) shed light on how and why this was the case. The findings indicate that structural arrangements, interpersonal relationships, history and contentions influenced the practitioners' participation in interprofessional practice, but were not entirely deterministic. Contributing to theoretical development, the paper argues that the potential for interprofessional practice is a shared rather than individual capacity in settings. There is scope for enhancing this capacity through attention to the features identified in the analysis.     

Assessing social participation of pupils with special needs in inclusive education: the construction of a teacher questionnaire

This study addresses the development of a teacher questionnaire to assess the social participation of pupils with special needs in regular primary schools and is divided into 2 parts. In the 1st part, the construction of the questionnaire is described. The questionnaire consists of 30 statements related to 4 key themes of social participation: “friendships/relationships”, “contacts/interactions”, “perception of the pupil”, and “acceptance by classmates”, yielding 4 subscales.

The 2nd part of the study addresses an empirical study in which the questionnaire's quality was examined. The outcomes of a confirmatory factor analysis largely supported the division of social participation into 4 key themes. The analysis revealed that 22 out of 30 statements correlated strongest with the subscale they were assigned to. The questionnaire as a whole turned out to be reliable, whereas the reliability of the subscales varied. The construct validity was found to be mainly acceptable.     

How disability and school-related variables influence social security dependence among vulnerable young people in their late twenties

The objective of this article is to investigate how psychosocial difficulties, functional level and school factors affect social security dependence among former students with special needs (N = 373). These individuals have been followed prospectively from their teens and into their late twenties. The study is theoretically inspired by life-course perspectives, with emphases on transitions, linked lives, geographical and historical location and human agency. More than one-third of the study participants are dependent on social security. The logistic regression analyses show how each of the seven independent variables – while simultaneously controlling for the other covariates – impacts adult adaptation to social security. Women have almost a threefold higher risk of social security dependence than men. The covariates affect males and females differently. For men, the risk is especially high if they have psychosocial problems, are supported by teaching assistants in class or experienced delayed educational transitions. For women, the risk is elevated if their functional level is low or school results are poor.     

Using contact with nature,creativity and rituals as a therapeutic medium with children with learning difficulties: a case study

In most cases therapy is addressed as an indoor verbal activity in which the relationship between therapist and client stands at its centre. This article proposes a different approach to therapy: conducting it creatively in nature, with the environment being used not only as a therapeutic setting but also as a medium and a partner in the process. The article is based on a case study carried out with a group of children with special needs within a school setting. It explores the therapeutic and educational impact that this approach had on the participants and on nature's role in it. The article also aims to initiate a dialogue around the option of working with this population in non‐verbal and experiential ways, illustrating the potential that the use of group work, creativity and contact with nature may offer.