Through the Maze: What is (special-) education in
inclusive settings?
Dóra S. Bjarnason
Inclusive education is not just about
disabled or disadvantaged students. It is
about ALL students, human rights,
democratic values and participation, and
quality education for each and every
learner. There is no one right way to
inclusive education, but that does not
matter; it is the moving, stumbling and
trying again, learning from mistakes and
successes, that makes the journey worth
while.
Introduction
I lead a program within the faculty of Education Studies at the University of
Iceland for post-graduate students, mostly veteran teachers, who return to
the university to specialise in special education. The program is titled
Special education in inclusive settings. It’s main purpose is to create leaders,
specialised teachers who can work skilfully with a broad diversity of
teachers and learners in pre-schools to upper secondary schools, and within
the local and national educational authorities. It is the only program in
Iceland that qualifies special educators. Thus it has to provide the schools
with highly qualified professionals who can enable the schools to meet their
responsibility; both the collective responsibility of schools to educate all
children and to help guard the individual rights of each and every child.
Most of our students are teachers in regular schools or preschools, but a few
come from one of the four remaining special schools in Iceland and may or
may not stay with these schools upon graduation. Others are developmental
therapists and a few have background in psychology, ergo therapy or other
such fields.
Most of our students apply for the program with the intent to improve their
ability to work with diagnosed pupils in a functionalist, medical model
sense, that is meant to help and improve or “repair” pupils seen to have
special learning or behavioural problems. However, when they graduate with
their M.Ed. (or in some cases an M.A.) degree, they have been enmeshed in
the research literature on inclusive education, social justice, democratic
schooling, disability studies, and pedagogy involving the teaching and
learning of heterogeneous groups of pupils in inclusive settings.
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Additionally they will have taken two or more optional courses on how to
work with learners identified with “problems” of various sorts such as
speech- and language, reading or mathematics, multi impairments or
behavioural difference. This “smorgasbord” of different courses, attempts to
meet both the students’ expectations and the demands of the school system,
while simultaneously teaching them to think inclusively. This is a tall order,
probably confusing for the students and some of their teachers. The program
is very demanding, yet the students are diligent, inquisitive, challenging and
appreciative of the opportunities to be able to look at the kaleidoscope of
theory, method and praxis offered to them.
I am known by many as an ardent inclusionist, but hardly a day goes by
without my wondering how I see inclusive education and why, what special
education means, and how, if at all, they mix in practice. My concerns,
doubts and hopes involve the contradictions of this mixed menu offered to
our students. On the one hand some of our emphasis is badly disguised
traditional special education methods and techniques, grafted onto general
education settings, while on the other hand the students are presented with
some of the most radical theoretical research literature grappling with
inclusive education. Out of this mix, the students make their own meanings.
Some become social agents, set on changing their schools or even the school
system, and advocating for social justice and the inclusion of vulnerable
pupils in schools and society. They move ahead to work inclusively with
their students and colleagues in the general education system. Others prefer
to work with “diagnosed pupils” in regular or special classes, or in special
schools. If asked, I expect that all our graduates would argue, referring to the
educational legislation, that they share in the collective responsibility of
schools to meet individual pupils’ learning needs and prepare them for living
in a democratic society. But they may have very different understandings of
what that entails and how they should set about fulfilling that promise.
This chapter attempts to explore some of my concerns about the mix of
special and inclusive emphasis of the program, and its impact on the practice
in our schools. In the chapter I use the metaphor of the maze to describe the
various inclusive special- and general education policies and practices. In
this metaphor, theory becomes the tools that are applied to calculate how to
proceed.
The chapter concludes with a short reflection on how I understand inclusive
and special education, their value and why.
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Special education in inclusive settings?
Does it make any sense to implement a policy which is a hybrid between
inclusive education and special education? To grapple with this question I
will begin by looking at these terms in context.
Background
The Compulsory Education Act from 1974 gave every child the right and the
obligation to attend school. This legislation opened up schooling for disabled
pupils (Jónasson, 2008). A few special schools and special classes gradually
emerged. Since Iceland signed the Salamanca Statement and Framework in
1994 (Salamanca Statement and Framework, 1994), the educational
legislation has prescribed school inclusion, first, but not very clearly, in the
Compulsory Education Act of 1995 (lög um grunnskóla 1995) and from then
on in each subsequent act on preschools and compulsory schools. But the
words “inclusive education” do not appear in the legal text until in the
compulsory education legislation from 2008 (lög um grunnskóla 2008), and
there only in an article about the education of learners with special needs
(article 17). The words “special education” are not to be found in the 1995
legislation, but a statutory regulation based on the 1995 law, The Regulation
on Special Education (Reglugerð um sérkennslu 1996) from 1996 prescribes
in detail the special education practices that should be available within
Icelandic schools, how and where it should be delivered, who should be
entitled to enjoy such services from special teachers and other experts, and
how special education should be funded. This regulation is still in effect.
The legal texts prescribe inclusive education, but also the rights of parents or
guardians of students with disability labels or other defined special
education need to choose between general and special schools, according to
their preference, and after consulting with experts. In 2008 approximately
0,4% of each age-cohort of children attend one of the remaining four special
schools in the country, but many more attend special units or special classes
in general education schools and up to 20% of all Icelandic school children
receive some special services (special education) in the course of their study
( Morthens, 2009).
The movement towards educating all children in the mainstream is by no
means universally agreed upon by parents and teachers. Recently for
example, three parents of students in special schools published an article
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entitled The Mission of Inclusive Education. A Few Words of Warning
(Thorláksson et al., 2008: 12-15) in a journal published by the Association
for People with Disabilities, describing ardent advocates of inclusive
education as narrow minded, dangerous fundamentalists. Similar views
uttered by individual teachers adorn the pages of newspapers and blog pages
as regular as clockwork when the school year starts or teachers engage in
disputes over pay and work conditions.
This shows that the current Icelandic education policy is debated and
disputed, but also that the term inclusive education has taken on a variety of
meanings in legal texts and in the minds of teachers, parents, and the general
public. Next I will grapple with how I understand the meaning of specialand inclusive education.
Special education
The history of special education goes back a couple of centuries (Johnson,
B.H. 2001). Its roots are to be found in the mindset of the Eugenics
movement, training defective children to do some useful work and thus care
for themselves and become less of a burden to their families and their
society (Kirkebæk, 2001). This broad category is seen to include for
example poor children, children caught in criminal activity, children
mistreated by parents, the chronically ill or incapacitated and children seen
to have a variety of disabilities and learning problems (Jónasson, 2008). In
the 20th century, special education gained ground as a specialised
professional practice. It has developed within the functionalist paradigm
(Skrtic, 1995), and in recent years it has been given wings by methods and
research findings from developmental neurosciences and new assessment
procedures (see Shakespeare, 2006).
The focus of special education has been on separating defective pupils from
others (so called normal or regular learners) while working on “repairing” or
diminishing their deficiencies and amending their strengths, with the intent
of returning them to unchanged regular schools or classes. This separation
ranges from grouping defective children into special schools or institutions,
special classes or units in general education schools, or by withdrawing a
pupil or a group of pupils seen to share similar problems from regular
classes from time to time, in order to work on their learning deficits. Some
special educators deliver their specialised skills to one or more pupil inside
the regular classroom.
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Some authors point to its specialised pedagogic and stringent methods and
the type of learners selected for special education (Kauffman, 1995,
Hallahan and Kauffman 2006), and still others align the meaning of the
concept with practice in special schools and units (Kristjánsdóttir, 1994).
Other authors go as far as stating that there is no such thing as special
education per se, and that if special education is defined as effective
education it probably refers to the effective education of most students. For
those the term special education is synonymous with all good effective
educational practices ( Shapon-Shevin, 2007).
Finally there are authors who attempt to find common ground for what they
take to be the meaning of special education and what they understand by
inclusive education. Allan and Slee (2008) quote Karen Harris who seeks
such common ground for special and regular education practices and
learning under the umbrella term of inclusive education. She argues that
general education should become more appreciative of the insights into
general education practice derived from special education.
…hopefully we’re finding common ground. So hopefully what we do goes back to just
helping the kids who need the help, and that is hopefully where we see the work (Allan
and Slee, 2008, p 152)
Harris’s perspective catches well some of the questions and compromises
made by a number of my colleagues and students in the program Special
education in inclusive settings at the University of Iceland. But for me this
poses concerns because this perspective on inclusive education practice,
even though it may be true, opens up opportunities for segregation and
exclusion – by doing what works for and with the Other.
Special education gained ground in Iceland in the 20th century. Children who
in the early 20th century were not seen to be fit for school were gradually
brought into the educational system and legislation and funding adjusted to
that end. It is difficult to tell that story briefly because the categories of
“deviant” children have changed significantly, and because the story of their
education is interwoven with several institutions that were not (or only
partly) educational institutions. In the 1960s the categories were narrowed
down to children diagnosed with physical, sensory or intellectual
impairment. The Association of Teachers to Help Defective Children was
established in Iceland in 1960. That association was concerned for example
with the schooling of poor and neglected children. Ten years later the name
of the association was changed to The Society of Special Teachers
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(Jónasson, 2008, Sigurðsson, 1993). Children with disability labels and
special education were thus firmly connected in the minds of the teaching
profession and society at large. By the end of the 20th century the categories
have been broadened again. Now any form of specialised support given to
pupils in the educational system is called “special education” and is
accompanied by a specially earmarked funding system.
When I ask myself where I stand on this, I on the one hand wish to debunk
labels in respect of all children, agreeing with such people as Brantlinger
who has written extensively on the schooling of children from low income
families, and Gable and the Fergusons who have focused on children with
severe disabilities (Brantlinger, 2004, Gable, 2005, Ferguson, 2003,
Ferguson and Ferguson 2001). But I do not wish for the disappearance of
many of the methods and skills of special education. In that I sympathise
with Brantlinger’s view as it is reported by Julie Allan and Rodger Slee:
In some ways I didn’t feel we should get rid of [special education]and the reason is I do
think that any kids who have problems with schools and teachers who have diverse
classes need support and I didn’t think it was going to come from the inside (Allan, J. and
Slee, R. 2008 p. 149)
Mine may not be a very radical view on the meaning and importance of
special education, but it is pragmatic for the time being – but I wish we
could do without the “special” in special education and train and support
each and every general education teacher to work effectively and inclusively
with every child and guard his or hers individual rights.
Inclusive education
I am an ardent inclusionist at heart in the sense that I believe that we should
locate and remove barriers that exclude students who are seen as different.
As the mother of Benedikt, a young man with significant disability and a
string of non-flattering labels, I learnt about inclusive education in practice
when I was a visiting professor at Syracuse University in the mid 1980’s.
There I experienced my son in a wonderful school, Jowoniow, where he
found his first friends. I took those experiences and my academic baggage
home and got my son enrolled in our local school against expert advice.
There he gained friends and invaluable experiences, some good and some
not so great, and I got a task, which lasted through his schooling, of trying to
convince almost every adult that this was a worthwhile experiment
(Bjarnason, 2003). Now, at age 29, he is a fully fledged adult, included in his
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society. He has an interdependent adulthood (Bjarnason, 2004). He lives in
his own home, with three young people to support him, has a car, work,
friends and interests. This is quite an achievement for a man who needs help
with almost every intimate detail in life.
Since I first learnt the important lessons on inclusive education in Syracuse,
my thoughts have nuanced and changed (Bjarnason, 2004, 2005, Bjarnason
and Pearson, 2007).
We do not all speak in one voice
One thing is clear: Inclusionists do not speak with one voice; the field is
split, with different authors giving it different meanings and applying
different perspectives in their research ( Allan and Slee 2008). There have
been and probably will be bitter disputes within the field (see for example
Oliver, 2007), but I will not go into those here.
Allan and Slee remind us that “the key to inclusive education is the
acknowledgement that inclusive education is about all children as it shifted
its focus to consider the pervasive nature of exclusion in and through
education”(Allan and Slee 2008 p.143). The theoretical tools for researching
the field fall into several categories and approaches.
At a political level, inclusive education gained clout under the Third Way
imperative (Giddens, 1999) in Britain and globally, as it was taken on board
by such international agencies as UNESCO, OECD, The World Bank, the
EU and others. The governments of the world have, after signing the
Salamanca Statement and Framework from 1994, indicated their intent to
honour that declaration by changing some of the wording in their education
legislation and/or by establishing inclusive education within their
educational portfolios.
Inclusive education as a term has too often simply replaced the word special
education in these documents and is defined as a goal by many. Through this
process, the term has been given a moralistic aura that most reasonable
people accept, but at the same time the term is in danger of being rendered
impotent and meaningless as a tool to apply to changes in the school systems
of the world.
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Allan and Slee, open up the inclusive education research discourse “in an
attempt to broaden the definition of inclusive education to the consideration
of exclusion according to factors other than disability such as race, gender
and class” (p. 145), by researching the positioning of a few important
founding fathers and mothers of inclusive educational research. Their data
reveals that the researchers’ work falls into four lines of thought: special
education research, school improvement/reform, disability activism and
critical research, with the two last lines applying a sociological framework
laced with philosophical perspectives. The categories are indicative and
obviously not clear-cut, but they lay bare the roots inclusive research can
claim. They bring post structural approaches to their data and put the
philosophers of difference such as Derida, Foucault, Deleuze and Guattari to
work on it in order to open up new spaces for reflection and analysis (Allan,
2008).
They start out with important questions: What is the problem to which
inclusive education is the answer? And What is seen as the nature of the
“damage” arising from the problem? (Allan and Slee 2008:23) These are
key questions for both researchers and practitioners working in the broad
and unclear field of inclusive education. These questions have no one right
answer, but that should not stop us from asking them. They lead us into the
maze of inclusive education theories and practices. Once we are in we have
to stumble our way through it the best we can. I find myself in that maze
with a glimmer of light: As I understand it, inclusive education implies
working against social injustice and reducing exclusion in any shape or
form, both in the learning process and in the broader school society and
moving towards more inclusive futures for all students.
Changing the practice: Top down and bottom up
The educational policy and legal framework carved by the state must set the
stage clearly for teachers and schools to explore special education, the
processes involved in inclusive education (Barton, L. and Armstrong, F.
2001) and the systematic removal of exclusionary practices. In many
countries including Iceland this is problematic, as the legislation and other
official portfolio contain contradictory clauses both within the educational
legislation and between it and statutory rules and practices such as national
tests. Funding programs also tend to cut across policy goals of equity and
support to disadvantaged students, encouraging the farming out of “difficult
students” to special classes and other segregated settings (see Marinósson,
2002, Marinósson, 2007, Bjarnason, 2004) It is not unique to Iceland that
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public policy aims both for contrary goals and unclear and often
contradictory means to achieve these goals. With a muddy policy, individual
teachers and schools are not given clear guidelines as to how to work with
their heterogeneous group of learners – and maybe just as well. But there is
flexibility and opportunities for experiment and change within the fussiness.
As I write this there is a global recession setting in with unforeseen
consequences for families, children and schools. The Icelandic economy
crashed, as the main banks in the country went down in October 2008. The
nation is facing an overwhelming foreign debt and the crumbling neo-liberal
value system. Public services including schools are being pruned down. This
means that schools will and must change, but in what way is the question.
Schools have been changing in the 20th century and the diversity of the
school population is increasing in most Western countries including Iceland
(OECD, 1999). Dianne Ferguson and her colleagues identify three strands of
reforms currently affecting schools and teachers in Northern America. I
suggest that these strands of reforms also affect Icelandic schools. Ferguson
suggests that two of these strands come from developments in general
education and the third from special education (Ferguson, Ralph &
Sampson, 2002). Similar trends have emerged in Iceland (see
Menntamálaráðuneytið, 1999; Fræðsluráð Reykjavíkurborgar, 2001). These
trends set the stage for current school reforms, and inclusive or special
education practices.
The first, “the top down strand”, comes from a broad national and
municipal policy level. Legislatures and councils have introduced new laws,
rules and ideas aimed at efficiency - in terms of how many students
complete compulsory and upper-secondary education and how well they do
on national tests, while remaining as cost effective as possible (Jóhannesson,
2006). One aspect of this top down strand is a call for better, more cost
effective, school management (Hansen, 2008).
The second strand can be identified more as a “bottom up” strand. It comes
from regular educators at all school levels, who are increasingly
experimenting with new curricular and teaching approaches that emphasize
students’ mastery of academic, creative and thinking skills, of collaboration,
problem solving, and general life skills (Fræðslumiðstöð Reykjavíkur,
2002). These teachers are encouraged in their search for new approaches by
official policy makers at state and municipal levels.
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The third reform strand comes from special education, but is prescribed by
the civil rights logic of “one school for all”. This reform strand comes from a
discussion of where special education should take place and which students
should be served by it, how and why (Menntamálaráðuneytið, 1999;
Fræðslumiðstöð Reykjavíkur, 2002; Jóhannesson, 2001 and 2006).
These three reform strands intertwine and affect the changing of schools at
the macro, mezzo (or organisational) and micro (or school class) levels. The
search for inclusive education has to appear in concert at each level and
between the levels to create a coherent space for systemic change. It calls for
the merging of general and special educational practices and school
management that enables teachers and other staff to work together, pool
their strength, and open up spaces for experimentation. With the imminent
pruning of what fat may be found within our school system, there are
dangers that funding for some or much of the special education practice will
be defined as fat. After all, special individualised education delivered to
vulnerable students, especially those without labels (often described as
“students in the gray area”), and the operation of special schools with a very
high staff/ student ratio, are expensive for the taxpayer, and may become
defined as excessive fat.
The future of our schools is unclear and alarming in the circumstances. But
the best scenario occurs if we stay with the maze of inclusive education
practices, which implies an attempt to merge general and special education
practices in regular schools. Dianne Ferguson expresses her hope for such a
merger of the different pedagogies
…into one unified system, that incorporates all children and youth as active fully
participating members of a school community; that views diversity as the norm; and
that ensures a high-quality education for each student by providing meaningful
curriculum, effective teaching, and necessary supports for each student. (Ferguson,
1995, p. 286)
This vision challenges teachers and principals to shift their focus away from
students’ deficits, incapacities and faults, to that of children and youth with
abilities, talent and needs. The new focus then invites new teacher roles and
practices and new or adapted organizational structures and evaluation
methods. There is no single way of approaching this vision, but flexibility in
school organization (including in the organization of teaching and learning),
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and a collaborating community of teachers set on making their schools better
and more efficient places, is a way to start (Tetler, 2000, Bjarnason 2005).
This focus meshes research findings from three of the four research
approaches identified by Allan and Slee (2008): special education research,
school improvement/reform and disability activism. The fourth, the critical
research approach helps the field to scrutinise what is going on, how and
why. The critical research approach opens up spaces in which to grapple
with the imposing questions: What is the problem to which inclusive
education is the answer? And What is seen as the nature of the “damage”
arising from the problem?(op. cit.)
Voices
Parents, teachers and student do not speak with one voice about their
experiences of school inclusion and special education. Our research
(Marinósson , 2007, Bjarnason and Marinósson, 2007, Bjarnason, 2004) has
shown that parents of young children with disabilities who attend preschool
and the lower grades of the general education compulsory schools are more
enthusiastic about their disabled children’s experiences in inclusive settings
than parents of older children and youth. All Icelandic preschools are
inclusive. A mother of a 5 year old child in a preschool said:
It is a great school …. Our boys went there. They [the staff] know us, listen to our
wishes for Gudrún [their daughter labelled with down’s syndrome] and work
closely with us …. She has her own special teacher but all the staff help .. ….She
loves it there…but …she only plays with her friends at school. She has not yet
been invited to a birthday party. … We worry about the future when she moves
into the compulsory school. They have never had a child with downs…
This quote coincides with the opinions of many of the parents contacted in a
recent study into the schooling of learners with intellectual impairment in
Iceland (Marinósson, 2007). That study focused on the educational
provisions of all intellectually impaired children and youth in the Icelandic
educational system, both in general education and special education schools.
The study showed that as these children moved up the regular education
system, their parents’ and the staff’s satisfaction diminished. That view was
captured in the sentence “the gap widens”. This applied both to the students’
learning and their social participation, and was seen by many parents and
staff as “natural”. But the regular schools paid little attention to the broad
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heterogeneity within the student group as competition and academic subjects
were introduced. These students were expected to fit into traditional moulds
or move into special classes or schools (see also Marinósson, 2002,
Bjarnason 2004). Furthermore, as students got older, the schools did less to
support those with special needs to participate in extra curricular activities.
Both factors resulted in a certain amount of loneliness and isolation for
learners with intellectual impairments (Marinósson, 2007).
Students in special classes and special schools were more positive to the
support they were given in their learning, even though some felt that their
teachers expected too little from them.
A study I undertook with youth and young adults with a variety of disability
labels, confirmed this (Bjarnason, 2004). Jón, a 16 year old student with a
number of diagnostic labels, including the label ADHD, attended a special
class in a regular school. He explained his situation as follows:
Jón: Well, I used to be in [regular education] the ordinary class. I like it better
here in the special class. I can concentrate, when there are only a few students,
and the teachers are kind and have a lot of time to help us. That way I learn
better…[but] I don’t like my classmates… all my best friends are grown- ups. It is
OK, I feel more at ease with old people, you see I am not very social. …But I
would like to have just one friend my age or maybe a girlfriend…
And Thordís aged 16, who had always attended a special school said:
I sometimes think it could be fun to have other friends, maybe friends who are not
disabled, but I don’t know where to find them. Normal kids don't want to play
with me and my old school friends are fine.
Most of the students I talked to who had attended regular school with some
special education support, complained about loneliness as they moved up
through the school and reached adolescence. Many had no friends and some
felt that the teachers did not challenge them or discipline them like they did
non-disabled students. This saddened some and infuriated others. However,
most did not want to move to a special class despite their isolation. Jón was
one of the few who was relieved when he got transferred into the special
class. Yet he pointed out that his education in the special class did not give
him any rights. He said:
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I do not know what to do. The kids graduate into nothing from the special class in
upper-secondary school. Their degree is utterly meaningless…
Many of the students I talked to who had always attended the special school
were less lonely in their teens, but they lived within a special world for
special youth, accompanied by other disabled teenagers, and depended on
their parents and teachers to see their friends. They also thought of
themselves as much younger than they actually were and engaged in
childlike activities (Bjarnason, 2004).
I also spoke to teachers about their perspective on inclusive and special
education in that study, who expressed a variety of perspectives. On the one
hand, the paternalists saw it as their role to act as protectors and gatekeepers
in a specialised environment. On the other hand, the empowerers worked
hard in a team to monitor the inclusion and full, active participation of the
disabled students.
Ragnheiður, a special educator, worked closely with the regular class
teachers in a compulsory school. She explained that most of her special
students were "in a gray area" regarding competence. Most of these students,
she explained, were socially part of their class, but had different textbooks or
study materials to that of typical peers, and a few could not read. She said:
This is the first time that I see a class accepts it as “normal”, that these students
are at the school. They tell me; "This guy cannot read. Why on earth are you
asking him?" For them this is simply OK, he cannot read and that is OK. He
cannot do arithmetic, and that is OK. But I really worry about them when they
enter upper secondary school. There they are not likely to have this support from
a class teacher...
Sólveig, a special educator who worked in a special class said:
Sólveig: It seems to me that the students who are almost OK [almost “normal”?]
seem much more lonely than more [disabled] students. It is as if they do not feel
at home with the disabled students, who are may be childish, don't move on and
are destined to remain children. Neither do these students connect with the others
[typical students]. These students seem to me lonely, and so too do the students
who are aware of their disabilities...
Q: And?
Sólveig: I have also seen this happen to disabled children in the compulsory
school. At first everything is fine, then suddenly a gap emerges. When humans
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reach the age of 10-11 we become so self absorbed that there is no space except
for the self. It is truly incredible to watch how they become self absorbed and
concerned with their own status in the group
Her dream was to teach her students more. She said:
I want them to become independent and more able to live in society. This is what
I think is everyone's goal....I want to see how we can make them more able in
society, more self reliant, and even if we can help them find things to do in their
spare time and some work. That is the goal of their stay here (in the special class)
to get them into work, but they also need to be able to do things outside work...
These quotes show clearly that even though the Icelandic school system on
its route to inclusive education for all, has in recent years opened its doors to
a diversity of students, perspectives and experiences of that process vary.
Those who experience or emphasise a focus on special education, in the
sense of effective and tailor made individualised education seem to be
trading that against segregation and the isolation of individuals or groups
with diagnostic labels. Even though there are some success stories, our
research suggests that there is a danger that inclusive education, may too
often involve the dumping of older students with special needs into
inflexible schools.
Conclusion
I have used the metaphor of a maze to describe the processes of inclusive
special- and general education practices and the theoretical tools put to work
to figure out where we are going, how and why.
I have, I think, laid bare my own confusion and doubts. I hope that our
schools can and will improve and become both more effective and more
democratic serving the interests of all learners. I am decreasingly sure what
the “special” is in special education, and I am afraid that what many
professionals in special education take to be as “special” results in
unnecessary hindrances and the exclusion of some of the schools’ most
vulnerable students, learners who are seen as different from an artificial
“norm”. Yet I do respect and believe in some of the methods developed and
perfected by people who research and practice what they see as “special”
education, and I firmly believe that some of these could benefit most
students some of the time. I also, I hasten to add, respect, admire and even
love some of the dedicated special educators I have encountered both in my
professional and private life over the years. I am deeply indebted to many of
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those, especially my students, for the invaluable lessons they have taught
me. The doubt and the questions I take from them are gifts in my struggle
through the maze of inclusive education.
We will never achieve perfection, either in schools or anywhere else in our
world, but if we do not embark on the trip through that maze, then nothing is
gained. I am still an ardent inclusionist, but in the sense that inclusive
education is a process. That process holds the promise of helping teachers,
schools and researchers to identify and gradually remove barriers and
exclusion in our schools and society and identify and make use of
inclusionary opportunities, both pedagogical and social (see Barton 2002).
For me, the process of inclusive education implies quality education
appropriate for each learner, respect for human rights and democratic
education for ALL children, and thus full, active participation of each and
every learner in a vibrant learning society. This is my greatest hope for my
country’s future, down at the heel as it is now.
We do not all have to be friends, and neither do all of the children and youth
of our schools. But each and every one of us needs to learn and apply the
social rules of negotiation and mutual respect.
Just as I think that Beethoven’s 9th symphony would lose much of its magic
without the chorus Ode to Joy, so I think that human society loses out if
deprived of a particular group, excluded due to its race, colour, gender,
sexual orientation or impairment. We have different talents, and different
perspectives, but each and every one has the possibility of contributing to the
whole. My learning as the mother of Benedikt, who despite his impairment,
is supported to be a full active member of his society, certainly plays its part
in my argument and analysis. The metaphor of the maze should remind us
that there is no one simple way towards inclusion. But if we move on
together, hopefully equipped with a sense of humour so that we can laugh at
our follies, in the maze we are likely to figure it out.
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