CHAPTER TWO

THE CONCEPT OF INCLUSION

 Definition of Inclusion

• Inclusion in education/service refers to an ongoing

process aimed at offering quality education/services
for all while respecting diversity and the different
needs and abilities, characteristics and learning
expectations of the students and communities and
eliminating all forms of discrimination.
• Inclusive services at any level are quality provisions
without discrimination or partiality and meeting the
diverse needs of people.
• Inclusion is addressing and responding to the diversity
of needs of all persons through increasing participation
in learning, employment, services, cultures and
communities, and reducing exclusion at all social
contexts.
• It involves changes and modifications in content,
approaches, structures and strategies, with a common
vision which covers all people, a conviction that it is the
responsibility of the social system to educate all
children (UNESCO 2005), employ and provide social
services.
• It seeks to enable communities, systems and
structures in all cultures and contexts to combat
discrimination, celebrate diversity, promote
participation and overcome barriers to learning and
participation for all people.
• It is part of a wider strategy promoting inclusive
development, with the goal of creating a world where
there is peace, tolerance and sustainable use of
resources, social justice, and where the basic needs
and rights of all are met.
• This definition has the following components:
1) Concepts about learners
• Education is a fundamental human right for all people
• Learning begins at birth and continues throughout life
• All children have a right to education within their own
community
• Everyone can learn, and any child can experience
difficulties in learning
• All learners need their learning supported child-
focused teaching benefits all children.
2) Concepts about the education system and schools
• It is broader than formal schooling
• it is flexible, responsive educational systems
• It creates enabling and welcoming educational
environments
• It promotes school improvement – makes effective
schools
• It involves whole school approach and collaboration
between partners.
3) Concepts about diversity and discrimination
• It promotes combating discrimination and exclusionary
pressures at any social sectors
• It enables responding to/embracing diversity as a
resource not as a problem
• It prepares learners for an inclusive society that
respects and values difference.
4) Concepts about processes to promote inclusion
• It helps to identifying and overcoming barriers to
participation and exclusionary pressures
• It increases real participation of all collaboration,
partnership between all stakeholders
• It promotes participatory methodology, action
research, collaborative enquiry and other related
activities
5) Concepts about resources
• Promotes unlocking and fully using local resources
redistributing existing resources
• It helps to perceive people (children, parents, teachers,
members of marginalized groups, etc) as key
resources
• It helps to use appropriate resources and support
within schools and at local levels for the needs of
different children, e.g. mother tongue tuition, Braille,
assistive devices.
• McLeskey and Waldron (2000) have identified inclusion
and non-inclusive practices.
• According to them inclusion includes the following
components:
 Students with disabilities and vulnerability attend their
neighborhood schools
Each student is in an age-appropriate general education
classroom
Every student is accepted and regarded as a full and valued
member of the class and the school community.
Special education supports are provided to each student with
a disability within the context of the general education
classroom.
 All students receive an education that addresses their individual
needs
 No student is excluded based on type or degree of disability.
 All members of the school (e.g., administration, staff, students,
and parents) promote cooperative/collaborative teaching
arrangements
 There is school-based planning, problem-solving, and ownership
of all students and programs
 Employed according to their capacities without discriminations
• On the other hand, they argue that inclusion does
not mean:
 Placing students with disabilities into general education
classrooms without careful planning and adequate
support.
 Reducing services or funding for special education services.
 Placing all students who have disabilities or who are at risk
in one or a few designated classrooms.
 Teachers spending a disproportionate amount of time
teaching or adapting the curriculum for students with
disabilities.
 Isolating students with disabilities socially, physically, or
academically within the general education school or
classroom.
 Endangering the achievement of general education
students through slower instruction or a less
challenging curriculum.
 Relegating special education teachers to the role of
assistants in the general education classroom.
 Requiring general and special education teachers to
team together without careful planning and well-
defined responsibilities.
 2. Principles of Inclusion

• The fundamental principle of inclusion is that all

persons should learn, work and live together
wherever possible, regardless of any difficulties or
differences they may have.
• Inclusion begins with the premise that all persons have
unique characteristics, interests, abilities and particular
learning needs and, further, that all persons have equal
access education, employment and services.
• Inclusion implies transition from separate, segregated
learning and working environments for persons with
disabilities to community based systems.
• Furthermore, UNESCO (2005) has provided four major
inclusion principles that support inclusive practice.
1. Inclusion is a process
2. Inclusion is concerned with the identification and removal of
barriers that hinders the development of persons with
disabilities.
3. Inclusion is about the presence, participation and achievement
of all persons.
4. Inclusion invokes a particular emphasis on those who may be
at risk of marginalization, exclusion or underachievement.
 Rationale for Inclusion
Educational
 Social
 Legal
 Economic and
 Inclusive society building foundations
Educational Foundations
• Children do better academically, psychologically and
socially in inclusive settings.
• A more efficient use of education resources.
• Decreases dropouts and repetitions
• Teachers competency( knowledge, skills, collaboration,
satisfaction
 Social Foundation
• Segregation teaches individuals to be fearful, ignorant
and breeds prejudice.
• All individuals need an education that will help them
develop relationships and prepare them for life in the
wider community.
• Only inclusion has the potential to reduce fear and to
build friendship, respect and understanding.
 Legal Foundations
• All individuals have the right to learn and live together.
• Human being shouldn‘t be devalued or discriminated
against by being excluded or sent away because of
their disability.
• There are no legitimate reasons to separate children
for their education
 Economic Foundation
• Inclusive education is more cost-effective than the
creation of special schools across the country.
• Children with disabilities go to local schools
• Reduce wastage of repetition and dropout
• Children with disabilities live with their family use
community infrastructure
• Better employment and job creation opportunities for
people with disabilities
 Foundations for Building Inclusive Society
• Formation of mutual understanding and appreciation
of diversity
• Building up empathy, tolerance and cooperation
• Promotion of sustainable development
 BENEFITS OF INCLUSION

• Inclusion benefits communities, families, teachers,

and students by ensuring that children with disabilities
attend school with their peers and providing them
with adequate support to succeed both academically
and socially.
 1) Benefits for Students with Special Needs Education

• Appropriate models of behavior

• Improved friendships with the social environment
• Increased social initiations, interactions, relationships and
networks
• Gain peer role models for academic, social and behavior
skills
• Increased achievement of individualized educational
program (IEP) goals
• Greater access to general curriculum
• Enhanced skill acquisition and generalization in their
learning
• Improved academic achievement which leads to quality
education services
• Increases the probability that students with SEN will
continue to participate in a variety of integrated
settings throughout their lives (increased inclusion in
future environments that contribute building of
inclusive society)
• Improved school staff collaboration to meet these
students‘ needs and ability differences
• Increased parental participation to meet these
students‘ needs and ability differences
• Enhanced families integration into the community
 2) Benefits for persons without Special Needs
Education
• Have a variety of opportunities for interacting with
their age peers who experience SEN in inclusive school
settings
• Serve as peer tutors during instructional activities &
have increased academic outcomes
• Play the role of a special buddy’ during lunch, in the
bus or playground
• Gain knowledge of a good deal about tolerance,
individual difference, and human exceptionality
• Learn that students with SEN have many positive
characteristics and abilities.
• Have chance to learn about many of the human
service profession such as special education, speech
therapy, physical therapy, recreation therapy, and
vocational rehabilitation.
• Have increased appreciation, acceptance and respect
of individual differences among human beings that
leads to increased understanding and acceptance of
diversity
• Get greater opportunities to master activities by
practicing and teaching others
• Have opportunity to learn to communicate, and deal
effectively with a wide range of individuals; this
prepares them to fully participate in society when they
are adults that make them build an inclusive society
 3) Benefits for Teachers and Parents/Family

• Developing their knowledge and skills that meet

diverse students’ needs and ability differences to
enhancing their skills to work with their stakeholders
• Gaining satisfaction in their profession and other
aspects.
• Have more opportunities to learn new ways to teach
different kinds of students.
• Gain new knowledge, such as the different ways
children learn and can be taught.
• Develop more positive attitudes and approaches
towards different people with diverse needs.
• Have greater opportunities to explore new ideas by
communicating more often with others from within
and outside their school, such as in school clusters or
teacher networks, or with parents and community
members.
• Can encourage their students to be more interested,
more creative and more attentive.
• Can experience greater job satisfaction and a higher
sense of accomplishment when ALL children are
succeeding in school to the best of their abilities.
• Get opportunities to exchange information about
instructional activities and teaching strategies, thus
expanding the skills of both general and special
educators
• Benefit from develop developing teamwork and
collaborative problem-solving skills to creatively
address challenges regarding student learning
• Develop positive attitude that help them promoting
the recognition and appreciation that all students have
strengths and are contributing members of the school
community as well as the society
 Benefits for Parents/Family

• Learn more about how their children are being educated in schools
with their peers in an inclusive environment
• Become personally involved and feel a greater sense of
accomplishment in helping their children to learn.
• Feel valued and consider themselves as equal partners in providing
quality learning opportunities for children.
• Learn how to deal better with their children at home by using
techniques that the teachers use in school.
• Find out ways to interact with others in the community, as well as to
understand and help solve each other‘s problems.
• Know that their children—and ALL children—are receiving a quality
education.
• Experience positive attitude about themselves and their children by
seeing their children accepted by others, successful in the inclusive
setting, and belonging to the community where they live
 4) Benefits for Society
• Bring in the students into local communities and
neighborhoods and helps break down barriers and
prejudice that prevail in the society towards persons
with disability.
• Communities become more accepting of difference, and
everyone benefits from a friendlier, open environment
that values and appreciates differences in human beings.
• Meaningful participation in the economic, social, political
and cultural life of communities own cost effective non-
segregated schooling system that services both students
with and without special needs education
 Ultimate Goal of Inclusion

• The goal of inclusive education is to create schools

where everyone belongs.
• By creating inclusive schools, we ensure that there‘s a
welcoming place in the community for everyone after
their school year‘s end.
• Students educated together have a greater
understanding of difference and diversity.
• Students educated together have fewer fears about
difference and disability.
• An inclusive school culture creates better long-term
outcomes for all students .
• Inclusive society is a necessary precondition for
inclusive growth is a society which does not exclude
or discriminate against its citizens on the basis of
disability, caste, race, gender, family or community, a
society which levels the playing field for investment‘
and leaves no one behind.
• Inclusive growth which is equitable that offers
equality of opportunity to all as well as protection in
market and employment transitions results from
inclusive society.
 INCLUSIVE ENVIRONMENTS
• An inclusive environment is
 one in which members feel respected by and
connected to one another.
an environment that welcomes all people,
regardless of their disability and other
vulnerabilities.
It recognizes and uses their skills and
strengthens their abilities.
respectful, supportive, and equalizing.
 reaches out to and includes individuals with
disabilities and vulnerabilities at all levels
• It has the following major characteristics:
 It ensures the respect and dignity of individuals with
disabilities
 It meets current accessibility standards to the
greatest extent possible to all people with special
needs
 Provides accommodations willingly and proactively
• Successful environment has the following
characteristics:
It develops whole-school/environment processes that promote
inclusiveness and quality provisions and practice that are
responsive to the individual needs and diversities.
It recognizes and responds to the diverse needs of their
individuals and ensuring quality provisions for all
It is committed to serve all individuals together regardless of
differences.
It involves restructuring environment, culture, policy, and
practice.
It promoting pro-social activities.
It makes provides services and facilities equally accessible to all
people.
It involves mobilizing resources within the community.
It is alert to and uses a range of multi-skilled personnel to assist
people in their learning and working environment.
It strives to create strong links with, clinicians, caregivers, and
staff in local schools, work place, disability services providers
and relevant support agencies within the wider community.
It develops social relationships as an equal member of the class.
It is also the classroom responsive to the diversity of individuals’
academic, social and personal learning needs
 Factors that Influenced Development of
Inclusion
• Inclusiveness originated from three major ideas.
1. Inclusive education is a basic human right
2. Quality education results from inclusion of students with
diverse needs and ability differences
3. There is no clear demarcation between the characteristics of
students with and without disabilities and vulnerabilities.
• Moreover, inclusion has got the world‘s attention
because it is supposed to solve the world‘s major
problems occurring in social, economic, religious,
educational and other areas of the world.
• For instance, it is supposed to :
o Counteract-social, political, economical and
educational challenges that happen due to
globalization impact;
o Enhance psychosocial, academic and other
benefits to students with and without special
needs education
o Help all citizens exercise educational and human
rights
o Enhance quality education for all in regular class
rooms through inclusion
o Create sustainable environmental development
that is suitable for all human beings
o Create democratic and productive society that
promote sustainable development
o Build an attitude of respecting and valuing of
differences in human beings; and
o Ultimately build an inclusive society.
• Inclusive education is facilitated by many influencing
actors.
1. Communities: pre-colonial and indigenous approaches
to education and community-based programs
movement that favor inclusion of their community
members.
2. Activists and advocates: the combined voices of
primary stakeholders – representatives of groups of
learners often excluded and marginalized from
education (e.g. disabled activists; parents advocating
for their children; child rights advocates; and those
advocating for women/girls and minority ethnic
groups).
3) The quality education and school improvement
movement: in both North and South, the issues of
quality, access and inclusion are strongly linked, and
contribute to the understanding and practice of
inclusive education as being the responsibility of
education systems and schools.
4) Special educational needs movement: the new
thinking of the special needs education movement – as
demonstrated in the Salamanca Statement – has been
a positive influence on inclusive education, enabling
schools and systems to really respond to a wide range
of diversity.
5) Involvement of International agencies: the UN is a
major influence on the development of inclusive
education policy and practice.
• Major donors have formed a partnership – the Fast
Track Initiative – to speed progress towards the EFA
goals. E.g. UNESCO, etc.
6) Involvement of NGOs movements, networks and
campaigns: a wide range of civil society initiatives,
such as the Global Campaign for Education, seek to
bring policy and practice together and involve all
stakeholders based on different situations.
7) Other factors:
• The current world situation presents challenges such
as the spread of HIV/AIDS, political instability, trends
in resource distribution, diversity of population, and
social inclusion.
• This necessitates implementation of inclusion to solve
the problems.
• Practical experiences in education offers lessons
learned from failure and success in mainstream,
special and inclusive education.
• Moreover, practical demonstrations of successful
inclusive education in different cultures and contexts
are a strong influence on its development.
 BARRIERS TO INCLUSION

• Problems related with societal values and beliefs-

particularly the community and policy makers negative
attitude towards students with disability and
vulnerabilities.
• Economic factors- this is mainly related with poverty of
family, community and society at large.
• Lack of taking measures to ensure conformity of
implementation of inclusion practice with policies.
• Lack of stakeholders taking responsibility in their
cooperation as well as collaboration for inclusion.
• Conservative traditions among the community
members about inclusion.
• Lack of knowledge and skills among teachers
regarding inclusive education.
• Rigid curricula, teaching method and examination
systems that do not consider students with dives needs
and ability differences.
• Fragile democratic institutions that could not promote
inclusion.
• Inadequate resources and inaccessibility of social and
physical environments
• Large class sizes that make teachers and stakeholders
meet students’ diverse needs.
• Globalization and free market policy that make
students engage in fierce completion, individualism
and individuals’ excellence rather than teaching
through cooperation, collaboration and group
excellence.
• Using inclusive models that may be imported from
other countries.
THE END