Teacher Information Literacy for Inclusive Early Childhood Education (ECE) to Provide Literacy and Numeracy for Special Needs Children in Central Java-Indonesia

Abstract

Digital teaching emphasises information literacy as one of the competencies critically required in the education community. It marks the starting point of information management to acquire comprehension and achieve learning objectives, as an attempt to support individual abilities in facing any challenges. The increasing number of special needs children at inclusive schools challenges teachers to provide the best education services. Teachers are urged to learn in diverse ways to acquire skills in handling special needs children in their classrooms. This study used a mixed methods approach, using quantitative data to present participants’ demographic data and observation on literacy-numeracy skills of special needs children and qualitative data on the teachers’ information literacy for facilitating literacy-numeracy activities for special needs children in inclusive classrooms. This study purposively selected 20 Early Childhood Education teachers from five regions in Central Java who were experienced in handling inclusive classrooms. The data were collected through interviews, observations and documentation studies. Meanwhile, the data analysis interpreted all aspects that correlated to each other. The findings confirmed that teachers with information literacy on special needs children could facilitate play-based activities for literacy-numeracy skill learning. Teachers used the outcome of this information literacy to manage learning, starting from identifying the learning needs, designing learning programmes, implementing programmes, to conducting evaluations. Therefore, teachers urgently require necessary training that supports their information literacy in managing classroom learning, especially for special needs children.