Exclusive practices in school integration (Obstacles to Inclusive Education). Ethnographic and survey perspectives

Author(s):

Zuzana Kusá(presenting / submitting)Zuzana Juščáková

Conference:

ECER 2016

Network:

04. Inclusive Education

Format:

Paper

Session Information

04 SES 01 A, School Wide Inclusive Education

Paper Session

Time:

2016-08-23

13:15-14:45

Room:

OB-H2.20

Chair:

William Kinsella

Contribution

Commitment to school integration (and ban of all forms of segregation) has become the general principle of the educational policy. There is rather lot of political and academic criticism of segregation of pupils with specific educational needs (SEN) in special schools in Slovakia. Comparatively less attention is given to situation and prospects of children with SEN who already attend standard schools. General school legislation stipulates adaptation of educational process to heterogeneous needs of pupils (School Act No.245/2008). It has however said nothing about next conditions that are fundamental for setting up the school environment in which all children could feel welcome and accepted.

It is now accepted that inclusive education is more than simply 'integration' of pupils with SEN in standard stream of education. The authors of this proposal belong to those concerned with the issue of comprehensive (systemic, community, interactional) conditions that are necessary for developing an education system in which tolerance, diversity and equity are striven for” (Skidmore 2004).

The aim of the proposed presentation is to contribute to the understanding why daily practice of school integration is far from contributing to inclusive atmosphere in the class and why the teachers fail to follow the inclusive philosophy they declare in the questionnaire. In doing so, we will lean against the findings of the multi-method research done in the Slovak elementary schools that was aimed at identifying forms of daily practice of social inclusion and in-school and out-school conditions and factors, which could support or hinder full acceptance of pupils with SEN by their teachers and class-mates. The research was framed by Booth and Ainscow’s concept of inclusion as „decreasing barriers to learning process and inclusion in education of all individual students“ and as „building relations on the principle of cooperation“ (Booth - Ainscow 2007: 4) Ethnographic part of the research was guided by the symbolic interactionistic perspective and by the concepts of sociology of everyday life and J. H. Turner’ synthetic theory of structuration of social interaction (1989) , face-keeping (E. Goffman), moral organisation of action through attributing responsibility, blaming and praising (Jayyusi 1991) and concepts of moral inclusion or exclusion (S. Opotow). This conceptual framework helps us grasp and examine factors of maintaining interaction order as well as subversive processes such as escaping from or transgressing oppressive everydayness.

Presentation will start with a short outline of the methodology used. Then it will introduce findings of the quantitative surveys and afterwards the findings from ethnographic research in classes. The third part of the presentation will be devoted to the main conclusions based on the comparative analysis and provided with the evidence/illustrations.

The special attention is given to the practices of teachers striving to sustain of attention of all pupils to teaching such as introducing competitive elements, encouraging pupils to play the role of teachers and their intervention (or its holding up) into pupils’ interactions that could have marginalising or excluding effects on pupils with SEN.

Method

The presentation will be based on the comparative analysis of the findings of multi-method research of the subgroup of the representative survey of the six and eight grades of elementary schools that was held under the project Increasing the Quality of Primary and Secondary Education with the Use of Electronic Testing run by National Institute for certified educational measurements (NÚCEM). Project aimed at examining factors and patterns off persisting or equalising the discrepancies in school results of students with differing socio-economic background. Besides other standardised measures it applied the Multidimensional Attitudes toward Inclusive Education Scale (MATIES) for teachers and the Testing of Inclusive attitudes of pupils (CATCH-Rosenbaum). Quantitative survey was added by the ethnography aimed to record all interactions among teachers and pupils and among classmates as well as conversations with the researchers initiated by pupils and teachers. The sample covers 12 standard schools and 15 classes from the various parts of Slovakia attended by pupils with SEN or socially disadvantaged pupils and pupils with Roma ethnic origin. Ethnography of daily life of class lasted 80 days in total and also covers breaks and playtime to observe spontaneous interactions among pupils. Focus was on conversation practices (as well as bodily communication). Quantitative and Ethnographic tiers of research were supplemented by the analysis of legislative and organisational documents that frame educational process and policies of social inclusion and set up opportunities and boundaries for pedagogical action and acting of other participants of educational process. The analysis of ethnographic records and legislative and organisational documents was done by ATLAS.ti and framed by the Grounded Theory Approach (Strauss 1988). The leading principle of GTA - constant comparative method – was guiding the comparative work with all the data illuminating the processes of social inclusion and exclusion in schools under study.

Expected Outcomes

In our presentation we wish to contribute to understanding how teachers proceed and success to keep attention and self-esteem of weaker pupils and pupils with SED and promote or downgrade their feeling that they are part of the class of (equal) value. The findings of class ethnography support the evidence from MATIES that teachers perceive integration of pupils with behavioural disorders in the standard classes as the most difficult problem of integration. Such pupils with their spontaneous comments disturb and interrupt teaching and force teachers to fight for pupils’ attention instead detailed explication. Systemic factors such as the fast pace of teaching enforced by demanding school curricula, competitive atmosphere promoted by regular testing and publishing the ladder of the school successfulness in testing, relatively overcrowded classes and lack of assisting personnel, hinder teachers’ ability to follow their declared inclusive philosophy in their daily work with students. We will, for instance, show that teachers tend to ignore disturbing comments of difficult students and continue teaching also in case other people with SED, socially disadvantaged pupils or pupils with health problems are offended and humiliated. We will argue that the finding of Maties that teachers' attitudes to inclusion of pupils from sociallly disadvantaged environment (Roma pupils) do not differ according their personal familiarity or unfamiliarity with such children, might rather signal widely spread negative stereotypes against Roma pupils that general acceptance of all children.

References

BOOTH, Tony, AINSCOW, Mel 2007. Ukazatel inkluze. Rozvoj učení a zapojení ve školách. Občanské sdružení Rytmus. GOFFMAN, Erving., 1979 (1963). Stigma. Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. Penguin Books. MAHAT, Marian, 2008. The Development of a Psychometrically-Sound Instrument Instrument to Measure Teachers’s Multidimensional Attitudes Toward Inclusive Education. International Journal of Special Education 23 (1) 82 - 92 NUCEM (National Institute for Certified Educational Measurements). Increasing the Quality of Primary and Secondary Education with the Use of Electronic Testing. Research Project 2013-2015 http://www.etest.sk/news/ OPPOTOW, Susane, 1990. Moral Exclusion and Social Injustice. An Introduction. Journal of Social Issues 46 (1), 1 – 20. PARIS, Django, 2012. Culturally Sustaining Pedagogy: A Needed Change in Stance, Terminology, and Practice. Educational Researcher 41 (3) 93-97 SKIDMORE, David, 2004. Inclusion: the dynamic of school development. Maidenhead : Open University Press. TURNER, H. Jonathan, 1989. Theory of Social Interaction. Stanford University Press.

Author Information

Zuzana Kusá (presenting / submitting)

Slovak Academy of Sciences, Slovak Republic

Zuzana Juščáková