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Abstract
The purpose for conducting this study was to discover those factors that early childhood classroom teachers, grades kindergarten through third grade, perceive as the factors that promote or hinder the successful practice of inclusion. Teachers, from a single school district, who taught grades kindergarten through third grade completed a self-rating form regarding each teacher's perception of success. A group of six teachers were randomly selected--three from returned successful ratings, and three from returned unsuccessful ratings--to participate in a series of four semi-structured interviews about inclusion.
The examination of the transcripts from these twenty-four interviews revealed five themes that were relevant to a teacher's perception of success or lack of success in relation to inclusion: (1) Beliefs, which incorporates the concepts of a sense of community in the classroom, as well as concerns about the practice of inclusion, (2) Training, which incorporates college preservice, graduate classes, and district inservice, (3) Load, which has subsets of class size, ratio of students with special needs in relation to the total class size, severity of the special needs, and complicated extenuating circumstances, (4) Support, which incorporates quantity and quality, has subsets of support provided by the regular education paraprofessionals, the special education teachers, the special education paraprofessionals, and the building administrators, and (5) Time, which incorporates planning time for lessons, as well as time for collaboration with special education and regular education personnel.
Each of these themes was examined in terms of its impact on a teacher's perception of level of success with inclusion. Recommendations and implications for further study are included.
