Teachers' In-Flight Thinking in Inclusive Classrooms

Abstract

This article explores the thinking of five junior high school teachers as they teach students with learning difficulties in inclusive classrooms. Insights into the ways these teachers think about students in these inclusive secondary school contexts were obtained through triangulating data from semistructured interviews, stimulated recall of in-flight thinking, and researcher field notes. Exploration of teachers' in-flight thinking (i.e., the thinking of teachers as they engaged in classroom teaching) revealed a knowledge of individual students that was not related to categorical notions of learning difficulties. This research has implications for the practice of teaching in inclusive settings as well as for teacher preparation. Specifically, it suggests that attention to student differences should be replaced by the development of teachers' knowledge about individual students as a rich source of practical knowledge and the basis for developing effective instructional techniques.

Coping strategies of high school students with learning disabilities: a longitudinal qualitative study and grounded theory

“…The methodology of using in-depth semi-structured interviews (Paterson 2007), bolstered by complementary data culled from teacher and parent discussions and academic reports and notes, provided a rich source of data. Researchers heard the voice of the students expressing their perceptions of their problems and needs.…”

Teachers’ pedagogical decision‐making and influences on this when teaching students with severe intellectual disabilities

“…An exception is Stough and Palmer's () study of special education ‘expert’ teachers in the US which noted the dynamic nature of moment‐by‐moment instructional decision‐making based upon teachers’ ‘extensive knowledge of student characteristics and educational practice’ (p. 219). This ‘in‐flight thinking’ (Paterson, , p. 427) and the ‘pedagogical moves’ (Kalantzis and Cope, , p. 209) initiated by such thinking are of particular relevance in this study.…”

“…The study adopted a qualitative research design consisting of classroom observations followed by semi‐structured interviews, incorporating stimulated recall (Calderhead, ). A similar design was used in the pedagogical decision‐making studies of Stough and Palmer (), Paterson () and Perfecto (). The research question underpinning the study was:

What pedagogical decisions do teachers of students with severe intellectual difficulties make and what influences these decisions?

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Doing what works: A grounded theory case study of technology use by teachers of English at a Korean university

“…As per grounded theory, an additional participant was added later during this phase (five total participants) as necessary to reach "theoretical saturation" (Strauss & Corbin, 1998, p. 143), in which no new significant data are found during analysis. The final, fourth strand involved a follow-up "think aloud" semi-structured interview after each of the two lessons based on stimulated recall (Fogarty, Wang, & Creek, 1983;Paterson, 2007) in which each of the five participants from strand three and one of the authors viewed the observation videos together and discussed significant events.…”