Inclusive education : educators' perceptions of teaching learners with emotional, cognitive and physical barriers to learning.

摘要

This study explored foundation phase educators’ views on including learners withudbarriers to learning in their classrooms. All of the nine educators worked in the sameudprivate school. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with the educators to exploreudtheir perceptions of learners with barriers to learning, their views on teaching suchudlearners in their mainstream classrooms, and their perceptions of current strategies usedudto cope with such learners in schools. Through content analysis of the interview data theudmain theme arose depicting that the educators believed that they needed more skills andudknowledge relating to the difficulties and impairments of learners with barriers toudlearning and the techniques required to successfully include such learners in theirudclassrooms. Secondary themes of class size, collaboration between parents and supportudstaff and classroom management strategies also emerged. From the results it appears thatudthe educators’ perceptions affect the way in which the educator relates to the learner andudhow they define inclusion in the classroom. The findings also suggest that if inclusion isudperceived negatively by the educator, he/she is unlikely to manage diversity in his/herudclassroom effectively. This then also impacts on the relationship between the educatorudand the support staff. The limitations of the study are discussed and suggestions forudfurther research made.