Increasingly, early childhood programs include children with disabilities and typically developing children. The purpose of this paper is to review literature that supports and discourages the practice of inclusion at the early childhood level. This paper will first describe the definitions of inclusion and the rationale behind it. Next, this paper will examine research associated with the benefits and challenges of early childhood inclusion education. This paper will conclude with an examination of research to support the importance of early childhood inclusion education for students with severe disabilities.
Inclusion has always caused extreme controversy in education among administrators, teachers, and parents. Inclusion “represents the
…show more content…
Inclusion is an approach for educating students with special educational needs. In the early 90’s the term inclusion was developed to divert away from the poorly implemented idea of mainstreaming. Inclusion is a “philosophy that brings students, families, educators, and community members together to create schools and other social institutions based on acceptance, belonging and community” (Salend, 2001, p. 5). Theoretically, inclusion will be achieved in the school setting to institute collaboration between students, teachers and administrators. When implemented correctly, inclusion is designed to meet the needs of all students including those in the general education setting. The rationale behind inclusion is that all children including children with disabilities have the right to a high quality education. Students with disabilities should undergo the same preschool experiences as students without disabilities. When inclusion is implemented students with disabilities will become active members of their classroom and have access to develop positive social relationships with classmates and …show more content…
There are many benefits for students with disabilities who attend an inclusive preschool. When students participate in inclusive settings they become released from the negative effects of labels, undesirable attitudes and fear from others cultivated by lack of contact and exposure with other students. Students with disabilities are provided with models that allow them to learn new skills and learn when and how to use their existing skills through imitation. The latest research also reveals that inclusion is significantly increasing language skills of preschoolers with disabilities. They are provided with a heterogeneous classroom population with whom they can interact with and learn new social and communicative skills. These interactions will allow for opportunities to develop friendships with typically developing peers as well as peers that are not. Research shows that stereotypes are developed through both cognitive processes and social experience (Bigler & Liben, 1992). Students that are exposed to different social experiences at an early age are less likely to form prejudices against the unfamiliar later on. The development of attitudes begins during the early childhood years. Early interactions increase the chances of growing up with more positive feelings and less
Retrieved Feb 6, 2010 from http://www.newsforparents.org/experts_. Inclusion_pros_cons.html Villa, Richard A., Thousand, Jacqueline S. (1995). Creating an inclusive school environment. Alexandria, VA: Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development. Card, Toby.
Educators can have strong feelings on the subject because having special needs students in a regular classroom can have a large impact on the classroom community. Those who believe in inclusive classrooms realize that, to be successful, it requires allot of classroom management and differentiated instruction, but feel the benefits are worth the work involved. Those who do not believe in inclusion feel that it leads to “l...
What is inclusion? Inclusion learning is the idea that regardless of a child’s disability they are considered access to a regular education setting that will provide the learning aides needed for that child to learn successfully. The debate of inclusion learning has been on the table for many years. According to the U.S. Department of Education's report to congress in the 2006 school year there were 701,949 children between the ages of three and five years old being served for special needs under the Individuals with Disabilities Act (IDEA)(17). The IDEA was introduced in 1997 as an amendment to the 1975 Education for All Handicapped Children Act. This amendment was to “to ensure free and appropriate education for children of all learning and physical disabilities in the least restricted environment” (Individuals with DisabilitiesEducation Act Amendments of 1997). One of the purposes of the IDEA law was “...
Education World: Inclusion: has it gone too far? (1997) Retrieved November 1, 2002, from http://www.education-world.com/a_curr/curr034.shtml
Odom, S. L., Buysee, V., & Soukakou, E. (2011). Inclusion for young children with disability: A
Schools in today’s society are rapidly changing and growing striving to implement the best practices in their schools. Nonetheless, before a school can implement a program in their school, they need reliable evidence that the new program will work. A new program that schools are aiming to implement is inclusion in the classroom because of the benefits inclusion could bring. The implementation of inclusion is strongly connected by people’s attitudes whether they are positive or negative. However, while inclusion is being widely implemented, there is comparatively little data on its effectiveness. It may be that inclusion benefits some areas such as reading and social skills, more than it does others.
My future classroom will be an environment that is welcoming and engaging with activities that will enhance and encourage each child’s development and learning. Inclusion is difficult, even for adults. Yet without the implementation of inclusion, students are deprived of the opportunity to interact with a variety of people and learn acceptance and respect. It means to make everyone feel loved and accepted just the way they are. Having an inclusion environment will help children grow up to be better adults and citizens of tomorrow.
General education students also benefit from the diversity of an inclusive classroom. Duhaney and Salend, 2000 found that parents of children without disabilities identified benefits for their own children such as greater sensitivity to the needs of other children, more helpfulness in meeti...
Inclusion in classrooms is defined as combining students with disabilities and students without disabilities together in an educational environment. It provides all students with a better sense of belonging. They will enable friendships and evolve feelings of being a member of a diverse community (Bronson, 1999). Inclusion benefits students without disabilities by developing a sense of helping others and respecting other diverse people. By this, the students will build up an appreciation that everyone has unique yet wonderful abilities and personalities (Bronson, 1999). This will enhance their communication skills later in life. Inclusive classrooms provide students with disabilities a better education on the same level as their peers. Since all students would be in the same educational environment, they would follow the same curriculum and not separate ones based on their disability. The main element to a successful inclusive classroom, is the teachers effort to plan the curriculum to fit all students needs. Teachers must make sure that they are making the material challenging enough for students without special needs and understandable to students with special needs. Inclusive classrooms are beneficial to students with and without special needs.
Inclusion is about ensuring that the rights of all children are met, so that they can actively engage in education within their community. Uditsky (1993) extends on this sentiment, noting the importance that students with additional needs are a welcomed and valued member within the setting. In order for children’s rights to be met, the setting must ensure that the child with additional needs has equal access to all things that their peers have access to.... ... middle of paper ... ...
Inclusion of all students in classrooms has been an ongoing issue for the past twenty-five years (Noll, 2013). The controversy is should special education students be placed in an inclusion setting or should they be placed in a special education classroom? If the answer is yes to all special education students being placed in inclusion, then how should the inclusion model look? Every students is to receive a free an appropriate education. According to the Individual Education Act (IDEA), all students should be placed in the Least Restrictive Learning Environment (Noll, 2013).
Inclusion is the main issue within the inclusive learning environment, if a child doesn’t feel included within their environment then their learning will be effected by this. The Oxford English Dictionary defines inclusion as “the action or state of including or of being included within a group or structure” (Oxford English Dictionary 2011: Inclusion) This means that every child should feel involved and included, no matter of there different learning abilities or levels. This can mean children who have special educational needs, such as dyslexia, physical disability or metal disability. Inclusion should provide opportunities for all children, no matter of their age, race, gender, disability, religion, ability or their background, to be involved within their learning environment. Each child should feel like they belong and feel like they are...
There are millions of children that are passing through the United States school system every day, not all children possess the same traits, and not all children can learn at the same rate, and do not perform at the same ability. The fact that all children learn differently and some have difficulties learning in general classrooms, special education was put into place to try and take care of these issues. Special education programs were put into place to help all students with disabilities. These children range from general disabilities to more complex and severe disabilities. There has been a revolution occurring in the past several years with education systems, and special education. There have now been several laws that have been passed that mandate changes in special education and the treatment that children, and parents receive, it also changes how the children are being taught, and how the teachers are to also change and conform to this idea called inclusion. Inclusion in the school system simply is stating that children who have learning disabilities, and more severe disabilities are to be included in the general education environment for as long as possible daily. There has been several different names other than inclusion that have been used, but in present times and since the 1990’s inclusion has been the most common term used. “The change in terminology was pushed in part by the philosophy that inclusion would mean more than only physical placement of children with disabilities in the same classroom, but rather it conveyed that children with disabilities would become a part of larger social, community, and societal systems” (Odom, Buysse, & Soukakou, 2011, para. 3). There has not been just one major law that was passed...
The idea of inclusion within a classroom tends to breed controversy from many people. Currently there is no clear consensus on a definition of inclusion (Heward, 2006). There are many different views on how students with disabilities should be handled. Those views ranged from students being fully included, partially included, or not included at all in mainstream schooling. Different descriptions of inclusion tend to reflect the person's own opinions towards it. People who feel students should not be included in the classroom focus on the negative characteristics of inclusion, such as the challenges of developing plans for students as well as the hard work it requires to incorporate those plans. However, studies show that full inclusion has many benefits to the students, for both students with disabilities as well as students without them. Inclusion has shown to improve the student's social skills, encourage communication, inspire laws and regulations, and improve the overall schooling experience (Gargiulo, 2012). Although it will take longer then some would like or have the patience for, full inclusion can be done in the classroom, with its benefits outweighing the hard work that it requires.
Inclusion has become increasingly important in education in recent years, with the Education for Persons with Special Educational Needs Act being passed in 2004 to ensure equality in our system. In summary, inclusion is the idea of there being no child...