Pupil participation in planning provision for special educational needs: teacher perspectives

Abstract

There are legal, moral and practical reasons to involve pupils in planning provision for their special educational needs. We do not yet know how principles are implemented in practice. This study explored the views and experiences of 64 teachers with an interest in special educational needs through an online survey. Participants reported greater pupil involvement in everyday matters, less in conceptual aspects of planning. Effective strategies were based on good teacher‐pupil relationships and school‐wide systems for sharing pupil views. Participants gave examples of the impact of pupil participation on teacher insight, pupil motivation and material provision. 84 per cent indicated that they would like pupils to be more involved in decisions about their provision than they currently are. Barriers included the nature of children’s difficulties and practitioner attitudes. Listening to children is intrinsic to good teaching, yet pupils also benefit from a more formal role in provision planning.

Ambivalent bonds, positive and negative emotions, and expectations in teachers’ perceptions of relationship with their students with ADHD

“…These findings are in accordance with Curtis et al ( 2006 ) who pointed out several categories of special educational needs of students with ADHD, namely a need to receive frequent feedback on undesirable behaviour, to set goals for desirable behaviour, to record the rate of achievement, to reward for strengths and positive behaviours and to be provided with a clear system of evaluation and conduct in the classroom. Merrick ( 2020 ) emphasized that open communication in the form of listening to students with ADHD is a suitable way how to get feedback and valuable information about the students’ specific educational needs.…”

‘It depends on who I'm with’: How young people with developmental language disorder describe their experiences of language and communication in school

“…It has been suggested that the reasons for not including children and young people with communication problems in research studies are that they cannot be trusted as sources of information (McLeod, 2011; Gallagher et al., 2021; Merrick, 2020), or that children and young people with communication disorders are vulnerable and should be protected from challenging and difficult conversations (Gillett‐Swan & Sargeant, 2018; Merrick, 2020). There is now growing evidence that children and young people with communication disorders can indeed, and are also willing to, participate in conversations about their needs and wishes, and in meaningful ways contribute to both research and development of SLT practice (Lyons et al., 2022).…”