Inclusive School-Based Inquiry and Educational Research

Inclusive School-Based Inquiry

  • A course to help student teachers make professional decisions.
  • Addresses challenges inside and outside the classroom and how to solve them.

Key Components

  • Inclusive: Mechanism to cater for everyone without discrimination.
  • Inclusive education: Strengthening education systems to reach all learners.
  • School-based: Involves everything affecting the school, including stakeholders.
  • Inquiry-based learning: Learners construct understanding through systematic problem identification, data collection, and analysis.
  • Equality: Same treatment for all.
  • Equity: Treatment based on specific needs to ensure expected functioning.

Three Major Areas in Formal Education

  • Curriculum, Instruction, and Assessment are key areas.
  • Teachers need knowledge in these areas to positively impact students.
  • Curriculum: All educative experiences in an educational program.
  • NaCCA: Oversees curriculum development in Ghana for basic and second cycle schools.
  • Instruction: Guidelines and strategies to present content effectively.
  • Assessment: Collecting data to make informed decisions; not limited to paper tests.

National Teachers’ Standards for Ghana (NTS)

  • Minimum competencies for all teachers.
  • Three domains: Professional Values and Attitudes, Professional Knowledge, and Professional Practice.
  • Focus on what teachers should value, know, and do.

National Teacher Education Curriculum Framework (NTECF)

  • Prepares competent, engaging, inspirational, and reflective teachers.
  • Roadmap for training basic level teachers in Ghana.
  • Three programs: B.Ed. Early Grade (KG-BS3), B.Ed. Upper Primary (BS4-BS6), and B.Ed. Junior High (JHS1-SHS1).
  • Four pillars: Subject and Curriculum Knowledge, Pedagogic Knowledge, Language and Literacy Studies, and Cross-Cutting Issues.
  • Pedagogy: Methods and strategies used to teach children.
  • Cross-Cutting Issues: ICT, gender, ethnicity, disability, religion, race, and socio-economic status.

Introduction to Basic Research

  • Methods of knowing: Scientific and non-scientific.

Non-scientific Methods

  • Tenacity knowledge: Believing something because it has always been believed.
  • Intuitive knowledge: Believing something because of a feeling. (Yount, 2006).
  • Authority: Accepting information from a trusted source.
  • Rationalism: Using logic to draw conclusions from known facts.
  • Experiential knowledge: Learning through trial and error and direct observation (empiricism).

The Scientific Method

  • Systematic and organized body of knowledge acquired using scientific method.
  • Involves knowledge acquisition, theory development, and testing.
  • Goals: describe, explain, predict, and/or control phenomena.

Characteristics of Scientific Inquiry

  • Objectivity: Based on facts and realities, devoid of personal feelings.
  • Control of bias: Minimizing attitudes and beliefs that may influence the study.
  • Willingness to alter beliefs: Accepting findings based on evidence.
  • Verification: Findings should be replicable.
  • Deduction: Making generalizations based on specific observations.
  • Precision: Exact information at the end of the process.
  • Provisional truth: Conclusions based on available evidence, subject to change with new evidence.

Processes of Scientific Inquiry

  • Identification of a problem.
  • Clarification of the problem through reading.
  • Review of relevant literature.
  • Collection and organization of data.
  • Interpretation of results and reporting.

Meaning of Research

  • Seeking new facts or modifying older ones (Kumar, 2002).
  • Involves problem identification, data collection, analysis, and interpretation.
  • Systematic study to discover or establish facts and principles (Fraenkel & Wallen, 2000).
  • Process of collecting and analyzing information to increase understanding (Creswell, 2012).
  • Systematic process of collecting, analyzing, and interpreting data (Leedy & Ormrod, 2010).

Meaning of Educational Research

  • Formal and systematic way to study educational problems.
  • Application of the scientific method to solve problems in education.

Characteristics of Educational Research

  • Begins with a question or problem.
  • Requires a research plan (proposal).
  • Demands a clear problem statement.
  • Addresses the main problem through sub-problems.
  • Seeks direction through hypotheses or research questions.
  • Deals with facts and their meanings.
  • It is circular.

Ethics in Educational Research

  • Moral principles guiding conduct (Wellington, 2000).
  • Protecting life and property.
  • Ensuring honesty and respect for participants and their information.
  • Fully informed consent.
  • Opportunity for questions.
  • Protection of welfare and privacy.
  • Confidentiality.
  • Respecting autonomy.
  • Treating people equally.

Research Design

  • Overall plan for answering research questions or testing hypotheses.
  • Blueprint providing procedural outline for investigation.
  • Types: descriptive (survey), correlational, and experimental.

Descriptive Research Design

  • Collecting data to test hypotheses about current status.
  • Specifies the nature of a phenomenon.
  • Common methodology: survey.
  • Purpose: observe, describe, and document.

Correlational Research Design

  • Investigates relationships among variables without influence.
  • Determines the extent of relationships between quantifiable variables.
  • Concerned with numerical relationships (correlation coefficient).
  • Correlation does not equal causation.

Action Research

  • Collaborative activity to solve perceived problems.
  • Aims to improve a problem-related situation through intervention.
  • Develops intervention strategies for identified problems.
  • Diagnoses and solves problems in specific contexts.

Data Collection

  • Two types: qualitative and quantitative.
  • Qualitative: words to describe actions, problems, situations.
  • Quantitative: numbers to describe actions, problems, situations.

Method of Data Collection

  • Observation: Critically looking at events or situations.
  • Interview: Dialogue to obtain information.
  • Questionnaire: Written instrument for collecting data.
  • Test: Exploring evidence for characteristics.
  • Document Review/Analysis: Reviewing documents for relevant data.

Screening Quantitative Data

  • Ensuring reliable and properly coded data.
  • Coding demographic data (e.g., male/female as 1/2).

Statistical Analysis of the Data

  • Science of collecting, classifying, summarizing, analyzing, and interpreting numerical information.
  • Used for data organization and depicting conclusions.

Statistical Analysis Techniques

  • Descriptive statistics: summarizing data.
  • Inferential statistics.

Descriptive Statistics

  • Organizing scores into tables or graphs.
  • Computing summary values.

Frequency Distribution

  • Displays organized or simplified scores in graph or table form.

Types of Graphs

  • Bar charts, histograms, and frequency polygons.

Scales of Measurement

  • Nominal Scale: Classifies into categories.
  • Ordinal Scale: Classifies and ranks objects.
  • Interval Scale: Equal intervals, arbitrary zero.
  • Ratio Scale: Meaningful true zero point.

Computing Summary Values

  • Measures of central tendency and dispersion.

Measures of Central Tendency

  • Mode: Most frequent value.
  • Median: Divides distribution in half.
  • Mean: Arithmetic average.

Measures of Dispersion/Variability

  • Describes the spread of scores around the mean.
  • Standard deviation: Spread of data about the mean.
  • Variance: Standard deviation squared.
  • Inter-quartile range: Central 50% of observations.

Introduction to Special Education

  • Designed to accommodate students different from the average.

Definition of Special Education

  • Education designed for exceptional students (Kirk & Gallagher, 1992).
  • Individually planned, systematically implemented, and carefully evaluated (Heward & Orlansky, 1992).
  • Meets the unique needs of an exceptional child (Hallahan et al., 2009).
  • Specially designed instruction at no cost to parents (IDEA, 2013).

Distinction Between Special and Regular Education

  • General education is an entitlement; special education for eligible students.
  • Different authorities and regulations.
  • Curriculum dictated by NaCCA (general) vs. IEP team (special).
  • Group-oriented (general) vs. individual-directed (special).
  • Generalists (general) vs. specialists (special).
  • General education is a place; special education is a service.

Basic Concepts in Special Education

  • Impairment: Loss or damage to a body part.
  • Disability: Reduced ability to perform a function.
  • Handicap: Problems encountered due to disability interacting with the environment.
  • Labeling: Assigning names to behaviors or conditions.
  • Segregation: Placement in separate schools or classes.
  • Mainstreaming: Some education in the general classroom.
  • Integration: Educating all students together.
  • Normalization: Providing a living environment close to normal.

Delivery Models in Special Education

  • Placement options arranged in pyramidal form.
  • Regular/normal school.
  • Regular school with consultation.
  • Regular school with itinerant teacher.
  • Regular class with resource room.
  • Special schools.
  • Homebound/hospital services.

Professionals in Special Education Delivery

  • Regular education teacher.
  • Special education teacher.
  • Itinerant & peripatetic teacher.
  • School psychologist & counselor.
  • Social worker.
  • School nurse.
  • Audiologist.
  • Ophthalmologist.

Equipment and Materials

  • Audiometer, Speech Training Unit (STU), Snellen Chart, Braille, Stylus/Slate, Otoscope, Tape Recorder.

Rationale for Special Education

  • Family and societal relief, economic independence, self-help, motor skills, intellectual abilities, and conflict reduction.

Foundation of Special Education

  • Radical transformation over the past 40 years.
  • Ongoing tension between accepting and rejecting individuals with disabilities.

Foremost Pioneers

  • Lloyd Dunn (1968): Criticized disability labeling, advocated for nondiscriminatory assessment.
  • Evelyn Deno (1970): Stressed responsiveness to diversity, proposed cascade of services.
  • James Gallagher (1972): Advocated for contracts with measurable objectives.

Schools of Thought

  • Medical Model of Disability: Attributes disability problems to biological deficits; advocates curing, rehabilitating, or accommodating.
  • Social Model of Disability: Stresses social forces as major factors; emphasizes environmental and attitudinal barriers.

Assumptions of the Medical Model

  • Difficulties explained by certain characteristics.
  • Special education is all or nothing.
  • Categorization/segregation is best.
  • Emphasis on categories, labels, segregation, and care.

Assumptions of the Social Model

  • Learning difficulty is normal.
  • Difficulties point to teaching improvements.
  • Encourages teachers' skill.
  • Adequate support for teachers.
  • Emphasis on inquiry, collaboration, and improvement.

Differences between Medical and Social Models

  • Medical: reliability of treatment; personal tragedy; physiological determinants; denies impact; first-person language.
  • Social: moral argument; product of society; social and cultural determinants; promotes inclusion; disability-first language.

Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA)

  • Enacted in 1975, renamed in 1990.
  • Guarantees education for students with disabilities.
  • Highlights six principles.

IDEA Principles

  • Zero-reject: All eligible students entitled to Free Appropriate Public Education (FAPE).
  • Nondiscriminatory Evaluation: Full, individual evaluation.
  • Free Appropriate Public Education: Special education and related services at public expense, in conformity with an IEP.
  • Least Restrictive Environment (LRE): Education with non-disabled peers to the maximum extent appropriate.
  • Procedural Safeguards: Parental involvement in IEP development.
  • Parent-Student Participation: Parents involved in evaluation, IEP meetings, and placement decisions.

Inclusive Education

  • Focuses on adjusting home, school, and society to develop individuals according to potentials.
  • Process of increasing participation and reducing exclusion.
  • Radical reform of school (Mittler, 2000).
  • Educating learners with disabilities with non-disabled peers (Vaughn et al., 2000).

Challenges to Inclusive Education

  • Socialization over academics, need for special classrooms, safety concerns, teacher fears, physical and educational access, lack of facilities.

Rationale for Inclusive Education

  • Enhances EFA objectives, promotes cooperation, favorable competition, utilizes special education teachers, builds community relationships.