During the academic years 1996–98 the authors undertook a series of one‐day training and professional development seminars for learning support assistants working in secondary schools. Delegates attending the seminars represented sixty‐two local education authorities. They were asked to complete a questionnaire recording details of their qualifications and experience in post. During the course of the seminar, their wider comments were collected and examined. Many found their experiences shared or their views challenged by fellow delegates. This article discusses the findings of the survey, juxtaposing questionnaire data with the contextual field data of steered discussions. Its conclusions represent the views of 274 non‐teaching professionals currently supporting learning in secondary schools.
At a series of one‐day seminars for newly qualified teachers, Denise Dew‐Hughes and Howard Brayton collected information regarding the element of special educational needs the participants had experienced during their initial training. Much of what they unearthed was predictable but there were one or two surprises. The authors conclude that there should be a continuum of training that supports individuals well into their professional career.
This case study of primary age children in two linked Oxfordshire schools investigated the contribution of staff attitudes and practices to inequalities in education, and contrasted the socialisation of children with similar learning difficulties in different educational placements. Participant observation of a group of children and carers in a special school suggested areas of more rigorous inquiry. Structured observations compared this group with a matched sample of children with similar learning difficulties in a mainstream setting. Staff on both sites were invited to comment on findings arising from analysed data in order to identify attitudes and policies which might account for the observed differences in practice. The study was engendered by experience of differences arising from educational placement. The theoretical stance arose through reviewing previous work, predominantly the debate on inclusive education, and the wider issues of human rights and equal opportunities embedded in the social development of people with disabilities. The theoretical framework underpinning this study is established in some depth. The project was designed to investigate issues of the wider social perspective, by conducting a micro-study of one model of educational inclusion whose outcomes have direct relevance to those issues.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.