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There has been an increasing focus in policy and practice on adopting inclusive pedagogy as a way of reconceptualising how schools work with children with special educational needs (SEN). The paper considers the split between knowledge and pedagogy inherent in some dominant strains of inclusive pedagogy. Drawing on the 'knowledge turn' in curriculum studies, we argue that although an analytical distinction between knowledge and pedagogy may be useful, too strong a delineation between the two fails to best serve the needs of children with special needs. Specific implications for teacher education in relation to SEN in England are considered.

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In this article Joseph Mintz explores the importance of developing positive attitudes to SEN and Inclusion among primary teacher trainees. The research reported indicates that student attitudes towards SEN/Inclusion were generally positive, but that such views are fluid and subject to change during a course of training. The article reinforces the importance of Initial Teacher Training in developing a workforce that is attuned to the individual pupils in schools.

Purpose -The "Helping Autism Diagnosed Navigate and Develop Socially" (HANDS) project developed a suite of mobile apps for smartphones, which support children with Autism spectrum disorders (ASD) with social and life skills functioning -areas of ability which tend to be impaired in this population. The apps were field tested in four special schools. The purpose of this paper is to report on an exploratory investigation of the potential use of this and similar technology to support the inclusion of children with ASD in mainstream secondary schools. Design/methodology/approach -A series of technology familiarization sessions and follow up focus groups were held with children with ASD, teachers, teaching assistants and parents at three mainstream secondary schools. A thematic analysis of the focus group transcripts was undertaken. Findings -The analysis indicated common themes across schools relating to challenges and opportunities in the use of smartphones to develop social and life skills. Wider debates in the available literature and the general media about national and local school policy on the use of smartphones in the classroom were reflected in the themes identified. Conclusions are drawn about the potential use of smartphones to promote inclusion of children with ASD, and recommendations are made in regards of national and local policy on the use of mobile technology in schools. Originality/value -There is little literature on the use of smartphones with children with ASD to support inclusion in mainstream. As such, this initial exploratory report will be of interest to policy makers, school managers and researchers.

There is a well-founded assumption in the literature that the first year of teaching presents challenges to beginning teachers. However, few studies have looked empirically at how beginning teacher perceptions about teaching ability change from the pre-service to the novice teacher year. This is particularly the case for inclusive education, where no substantive empirical studies have measured such a change in teacher perceptions across these phases of teacher development. This study tracks changes in the perceived self-efficacy of teachers in relation to working effectively with children with special educational needs (n = 67) following an inclusion-enhancement programme in the pre-service phase and enriched induction on inclusion in the novice teacher phase. The study employed a repeated panel survey design with an intervention and comparison group. A critique is made of the domain specificity of current measures used for considering self-efficacy for inclusion, and an alternative approach proposed. Results indicate that there were relative gains in self-efficacy from the start to the end of the pre-service teacher year due to the enhancement programme, and that these gains were maintained in the novice teacher year. However, there was no evidence that the induction enrichment had any impact on self-efficacy in this domain. Implications for the timing and intensity of induction for beginning teachers, as well as for future research directions on teacher education, are considered.