Fundamental Concepts of Inclusive Education
Education is a fundamental aspect for every given child in society regardless of their physical abilities and inabilities. Ultimately, inclusive environments of education ensure that all children get the opportunity to learn in the same classrooms. Therefore, this aspect means that groups of children who have always been traditionally excluded include not only children with various disabilities but also speakers of minority languages. Moreover, inclusive education ensures equity in learning for the given children (Forlin et al., 2013). According to the social model of disability, the world is significantly made or developed by people with disabilities. Additionally, according to the given model, people are often disabled by various barriers ion society. Therefore, removing the barriers also ensures that equality is created, offering people with disabilities independence, among other aspects such as choice and control.
From the given scenarios with regards to the social model of inability, there is the possibility of barriers such as physical, social, and communication barriers. For instance, with Angela’s scenario, there is the possibility of both physical and social barriers in which she has Autism and prefers on her own while playing and will scream if other children try to come near her. Ultimately, from George’s scenario, there is the possibility of both physical and social barriers as he has both impaired vision and finds it hard to make friends barriers. None the less, from the given scenario, Adelle is not very hopeful that George is ready for the next transition of schooling in the coming years. On the other hand, Andrew’s scenario shows the possibility of a communication barrier in which Andrew can only understand oral instruction but still needs more assistance with tasks that need cognitive skills. Additionally, Andrew also has a limited vocabulary to the extent that he uses short sentences when speaking. These given barriers, in turn, affect the way these children interact and participate in the classroom.
Universal Teaching Strategies
Finding effective ways to consult with the learners and their parents concerning their strengths, interests, and learning preferences are essential in ensuring that the given children learn without any given difficulties (Australian Research Alliance for Children and Youth, 2013). From the three given scenarios that include Andrew, Angela, and George, there are several ways in which consultation can be made with both the children and their parents concerning their strengths and interest in conjunction with learning preferences to ensure their wellbeing. Firstly, in the first scenarios, it will be essential to consult the parents and the children by asking for the background information of the children ranging from the education history, the involvement of any given psychologist involvement, language pathology, and support agencies. According to the disability standard for education, the consultation will be done by focusing on the standards for enrollment, participation, and support services.
The consultation will be essential in ensuring that necessary adjustments can be made in the given school to ensures that the children learn peacefully without any given challenges. The consultation will be done through holding meetings with both the parents and the teachers to find for amicable solutions concerning the given situations in which the children are. Since Andrew has some intellectual disabilities when making consultations, it would be significant to give him and the parenting priority before the other two students. Ultimately, the consultation will be significantly done by offering double consultation time for the given children to make sure that extensive and conclusive information is obtained. Consultations will also be done by being sensitive to the children’s feelings concerning different aspects of learning. Asking of open questions to both the parent and the children will be used to consult to check the consistency of the answers.
Getting relevant information form the supporters will also be a vital part of the consultation that will be carried out to obtained further information on the given disabilities. Additionally, the consultation will be done by using simple and understandable language that each of the parties can familiarize with. During the consultation, important information about the children’s abilities will be obtained by asking the parents on the strengths and weaknesses that each has to find for an effective solution or way to attend to the said barriers. Each of the three students has specific needs, and the establishment of an evidence-based assessment and teaching with be vital in ensuring that they achieve successful learning outcomes within the early years learning framework.
Concerning the quality of differentiated teaching practice, various adjustments can be made within the learning environments to deal with the barriers faced by each child to ensure that they learn effectively. Typical adjustments can be made for Andrew’s case as it does not require the drawing of additional resources with regards to the communication barrier. From the given scenario, Andrew is socially promising but has some challenges in following long verbal instructions on top of his intellectual disabilities. Additionally, Andrew can only understand oral instruction but also still requires additional assistance regarding cognitive skills when it comes to matching and sorting.
Andrews’s learning to meet the early years learning framework could be improved and made stress free by the use of modified instructions that can be vital for Andrew’s coding and decoding of nonverbal information. Since Andrew is an essentially sociable and friendly student helping him make friends will not be a challenging task as it can be done through classroom competitions in groups on playing musical instruments while singing educative songs. While taking the competitions, Andrew should be provided with a personal metallic egg shaker, which will solely belong to him. Ultimately, the competitions will also be significant, providing Andrew with a sense of belonging in the classroom, further strengthening his relationship and interaction with the other students. Additionally, due to his intellectual disabilities, pictorial, or marble representations of different colors can be used to trim his matching and sorting skills.
Angela’s scenario will require, and adjustment in which there is a place provided for managing the Autism condition within quality differentiated teaching practice. From the evidence present in Angela’s scenario, it can be concluded that she has fixated interest and preoccupation and very poor at forming relationships with other children in school. Some of the adjustments that can be provided to help solve the communication barrier that threatens her learning process will be setting aside a water and sand spot in the school playground. None the less, since not all students love playing with water and sand, some additional adjustments can be made in the teaching practices in which during playtimes, the teacher mobilizes students on the castle making games using water and sand. This move will be important in ensuring that Angela gains a sense of belonging as required by the early years learning framework. The available play areas should be divided in such a way that it allows for student interaction when playing castle building competitions using the sand and water, among other toys.
Ultimately, while in the classroom, there will need to come up with a calming sport equipped with sentimental toys to Angela. This move will be essentially significant in ensuring that Angela has a calming sport whenever she feels overwhelmed in the classroom. Ultimately, to solve the challenge involved with fixated interest and preoccupation that makes it difficult for her to move from one task to the other. There is a need for the teacher to make minor adjustments to the curriculum to allows for flexible teaching practices in which Angela and the other students can relax or engage in mind relaxing activities before transitioning to another task. Additionally, teaching can be made fun by the use of toys since Angel loves toys to ensure that she catches up with the other students.
George is affected by both communication and social barriers as he finds it difficult to make new fiend without assistance from adults and needs extra time to process information during learning. Additionally, George has challenges when it comes to practicing motor skills. Therefore, to help solve the given barrier, there will need to make extensive adjustments that are entirely individualized in the classroom because George is very behind when compared to his fellow students. There will be the need for the provision of Higley intensive intervention, such as the availability of specialized staff who can take part in constant and vigilant supervision of George to help him catch up with the other students. Ultimately, To help solve the communication barrier, a simplified method of teaching should be implemented, such as the use of picture books and other significant models that might be useful in learning and decoding information. Reading sessions can also be implemented in the classroom in which students take turns to read as the reading sessions can also help George grow his soft motor skills by flipping through pages while reading. A point to note is that story boos chosen should be significantly interactive. The given adjustments will ensure that George has a sense of belonging with the teachers as well as other students.
Other than the approaches mentioned above of dealing with the barriers and providing an effective learning environment for the students in the given scenario, a teacher would also implement the use of universal programming. Universal programming entails the use of universal design for learning within a classroom that accommodates both normal and differentiated instructions. Ultimately, in such a learning environment, the classroom is often arranged and structured in a way that all students in the classroom are reached regardless of the impending exceptionalities. Moreover, there will be no need to modify the existing curriculum as the progress of each student will be monitored individually with the given scenarios.
Differentiated instruction can be significantly introduced into the classroom by being flexible when grouping the students. Additionally, a teacher should also form heterogeneous groups made up of both students with disabilities and those without to foster a good learning relationship. Additionally, with regards to the given scenarios, a teacher would use multi-level texts to cater to both students with and without visual impairments. For the student with more complex disabilities as George, it would be vital to include extra help after school hours by offering varied reading or even using co-teaching support or him to catch up with the other students. Intensive individual interventions can also be implemented by bringing materials to form outside the classroom to facilitate learning.
Engagement and Collaboration
Building strong peer relationships within a classroom is very vital for the wellbeing of the students in conjunction with learning. None the less, strong, and positive peer relationships within a classroom are important for creating an establishing a safe, caring, supportive, and inclusive learning environment for all the learners. From all the three scenarios, I would encourage the sharing of personal objects within peers to foster a robust relationship and creating a sense of belonging. Additionally, I would also encourage teachers to be a positive role model to the student as young children mainly look at their teachers as role models.
The promotion of connections with common interest among children in the classroom will also be important is fostering strong and positive peer to peer relationships. In the three scenarios, it would be important to help the student join ongoing group activities and, in turn, encourage them to support the roles that they feel comfortable to contribute fully. A point to note is that peer to peer relationships dose not have to be only within the classroom and the school but also the outside environment. Therefore, to further softer positive peer to peer relationships, I would encourage the sharing of information regarding new friendships with the children’s parents so that they can also participate by arranging for a get together for students out of the classroom.
Teaching a social skill to the student will also be important in supporting and strengthening peer to peer relationships within the school and thus providing an effective inclusive environment for learning. When peer relationships are supported and strengthened, then students can effectively work together and support each other through the learning process, establishing a sense of belonging for all students. Additionally, peer to peer relationships can be established by encouraging and fostering a collaborative learning scheme which often helps in building successful peer to peer relationships. Supporting and strengthening peer relationships within an inclusive environment will require the understanding of both social and emotional learning, supporting friendships among students, and supporting students in the playground.
Family to school partnerships are often taken as Building meaningful collaborative partnerships with both the parent and the careers among other colleagues can also be essential in supporting the inclusion of all learners in the given scenarios. Meaningful collaborative partnerships can be built by allowing both the teachers and career to bring and share important information concerning the children based on the knowledge and experience of the given educational partnerships. One of the most important aspects would be allowing them to share their children’s interests with the teachers and the school regarding the preferred learning styles so that effective adjustments can be put in place to foster equity in education.
Putting in place joint problem-solving practices can also be important in establishing and building meaningful collaborative partnerships. Moreover, the practice will require teachers, parents, and caregivers to work together in solving various challenges and problems that affect all the students in school. A point to note is that parents and carers of children with disabilities often have some of the best approaches to solving problems, and this can help upgrade the school’s mitigations practices.
Students also play vital roles in building meaningful collaborative partnerships. Thus, schools and teachers need to focus on the strengths of students with disabilities by working with their families. This aspect, in turn, will need the formulation of a strength-based approach to develop significant areas of need in conjunction with valuing students’ interest. Moreover, this can only be done by incorporating the given interest in the available academic program. An important point to note is that effective collaborative partnerships are fundamentally built on trust, respect, and mutual commitment. Additionally, there should be a sense of shared responsibility for effective collaborative partnerships to co-exist. According to the disability standards for the education of 2005, all institutions are fundamentally required to consult with both the students and the relevant career to find the best way to care for the students.
References
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