Special education in comprehensive school: extent, forms and effects

Author(s):

Lisa Asp-OnsjoJoanna Giota

Conference:

ECER 2008

Network:

4. Inclusive Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

04 SES 05A, Creativity in Inclusion - and Special Education in Comprehensive School

Paper Session

Time:

2008-09-11

08:30-10:00

Room:

AK2 136

Chair:

Hermina Gunnthorsdottir

Contribution

Special education in comprehensive school: extent, forms and effects Giota, J., Asp Onsjö, L., & Emanuelsson, I. Today more than one third of the Swedish compulsory school pupils acquire some form of special education support. Lack of a common understanding of who is considered to be in need of special education and/or how the support should be organised makes it difficult to determine the ways in which special education differ from ordinary teaching and also to ascertain effects of special education in a reliable way. The project to be presented started in January 2008 and aims in general to focus on how schools handle the variation among pupils’ prerequisites. More specifically, the aims are a) to describe the extent and forms of special education support offered to pupils in comprehensive school. The main question is: which pupils are considered to be in need of such support?; b) to study effects of special education on educational goal attainment in grade 9 and the educational careers of pupils in difficulties through upper secondary school – especially their motivation to learn, self-concepts and attitudes to school will be focused.

Method

The project studies are based on data collected within the framework of the Swedish longitudinal ETF-project (Evaluation Through Follow up) including five cohorts, each comprising about 10.000 pupils (born in 1972, 1977, 1982, 1987 and 1992). ETF gives unique opportunities to study changes in special education support patterns over a period of 30 years. The results are expected to increase our knowledge about how schools can be more effective in supporting pupils in difficulties. The consequences of how such support is offered, for instance in more or less integrated forms, can also be studied, using advanced statistical modelling tools. The ETF-project comprises no information about costs, however. Given the notion that special education support is influenced by economic cuts, which in turn influence pupil outcomes, additional information will be collected during the spring term of 2008 in school principal questionnaires (for pupils born in 1992 and 1998) in a representative sample of 35 municipalities and 1052 schools, participating in the ETF-study.

Expected Outcomes

The results to be presented show, so far, that the forms of special education support offered to different groups of pupils seem to be rather similar and the proportion of pupils receiving support to be rather constant over the last 30 years, even though changes in the educational system have taken place. Pupils from homes with lower educational background, boys and pupils with other ethnic backgrounds than Swedish are overrepresented among pupils receiving special education support. The results also show that pupils who have received special education support in grade 3 or 4 in compulsory school tend to have more or less permanent such needs over time. In addition, pupils from homes with higher educational background who have received special education support tend to do well in school even though they score low on adaptive tests.

References

Asp-Onsjö, L. (2006). Åtgärdsprogram – dokument eller verktyg? En fallstudie i en kommun. Göteborg. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis. Emanuelsson, I. & Persson, B. (1997). Who is considered to be in need of special education? Why, How, and by Whom? Europ. J. Spec. Needs Educ., 12, 2, 127–136. Emanuelsson, I. (1998). Closing reflections. In P. Haug & J. Tøssebro (eds.), Theoretical perspectives on special education. Oslo, Høyskole Forlaget AS, pp. 165–172. Emanuelsson, I. (1998). Integration and Segregation – Inclusion and Exclusion. Interantional Journal of Educational Research , 29, 95–105. Emanuelsson, I. (2003). Differentiation, Special Education and Equality: a longitudinal study of self-concepts and school careers of students in difficulties and with or without special education support experiences. European Educational Research Journal, 2, 2, 246–261. Giota, J. (2001). Adolescents' perceptions of school and reasons for learning. Göteborg: Göteborg studies in educational sciences 156. Acta Universitatis Gothoburgensis. Giota, J. (2006). Why am I in school? Relationships between adolescents' goal-orientations, academic achievement, and self-evaluations. Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research. 50(4), 441-461. Giota, J. & Lundborg, O. (2007). Kartläggning av stödåtgärdernas omfattning och form för två årskullar (elever födda 1982 resp. 1987) inom ramen för den longitudinella UGU-projektet. (Rapport 2007). Göteborg: Göteborgs universitet, Institutionen för pedagogik och didaktik.

Author Information

Lisa Asp-Onsjo

University of Gothenburg

Departement of Education

Gothenburg

186

Joanna Giota