Introduction

Education is a fundamental right of every child. Unfortunately, access to education is denied for
many children because of marginalization due to race, caste, gender and religion. In addition to
these special educational needs is also a factor that hinders a child’s rightful access to education.
Educational needs differ based on student’s learning styles, socio economic status, learning
environment, disability or health need, or social and emotional factors. Children with special
educational needs require additional support because of the restrictions in their capacity to
benefit from the general education system due to physical, sensory, mental, specific learning
disability or any other conditions.

The concept of Special Educational Needs or SEN was introduced in the Warnock Report
published in 1978. In the 1970’s Rutter, Tizard and Whitmore conducted an enquiry on the
prevalence of difficulties in learning in the school population. The report revealed that 20 percent
of students were experiencing difficulties in learning. Prevalence of SEN among children is
considered to be one in five (Croll & Moses, 2012). Four broad areas of needs are covered under
special educational needs. The Special Educational Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to
25 Years (Department for Education (DfE), 2014) conceptualized ‘areas of need’ as
communication and interaction, cognition and learning, social, emotional and mental health, and
sensory and/or physical difficulties.

Special education was introduced in order to give a learning opportunity for children deemed to
be incapable of benefiting from ordinary methods of instruction. But it was segregated from the
mainstream education system in an attempt to safeguard efficient education for the majority.
When this idea was challenged due to the limiting nature of segregated education methods,
including children with special educational needs into mainstream classrooms was proposed.
Since then, inclusive education has been the norm many schools around the world are trying to
adapt. Inclusive education implies that difficulties experienced by pupils result from the ways in
which schools are currently organized and from rigid teaching methods (UNESCO, 2005).

Moving forward each area of special educational needs will be discussed with the aid of
examples of disabilities put forth by the Individuals with Disabilities Education Act (IDEA).
IDEA was introduced to provide cost free special designed instruction to meet the unique needs
of students with disabilities. IDEA assesses the eligibility to access special education if a child
has ‘significantly greater difficulty in learning’ than their peers, or a disability that hinders them
from using educational facilities normally available in the local school. Along with each area of
need, inclusive practices to be integrated in schools will be discussed. Finally, inclusive
education will be critically analyzed.

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Special Educational Needs and Inclusive Educational Practices

One of the initial areas of special educational needs put forward by The Special Educational
Needs and Disability Code of Practice: 0 to 25 Years (Department for Education (DfE), 2014) is
communication and interaction. Communication is vital in everyday life. It allows us to learn,
express thoughts and feelings as well as understand those of others, and to create and maintain
relationships. Language is how we organize words, phrases and grammar to communicate.
Language can be receptive or expressive. Receptive language is the ability to comprehend what
is said or written whereas expressive language conveying thoughts and ideas coherently through
verbal or written format. Communication is pivotal for emotional and social development. Aside
from language communication also includes gestures, body language, voice tone, eye contact and
facial expressions. One of the difficulties faced by children diagnosed with autism is their
inability to understand how to use language in social situations and comprehend what is said.
This poses great difficulty in a classroom as majority of the teaching depends on spoken and
written language. Children diagnosed with autism struggle to develop vocabulary (Bishop &
Adams, 1989), they struggle in developing conversational skills such as turn taking and keeping
up with the topic of the conversation (Bishop, 2014) and sometimes they can be insensitive to
their listeners. Adams and Lloyd’s (2007) proposed some interventions to be used in a classroom
so that children with communication and interaction needs can be included in a classroom. They
suggested that hidden and immediate meanings of language, communication, pragmatics and
grammatical structure has to be made clear to some children. Another suggestion was to have a
assistant instructor who can interact with the child at an appropriate level of understanding, also
using visual demonstration to communicate was recommended. In the recent pas many electronic
assistive devices are available to allow students to communicate.

The second need mentioned in the Code of Practice is cognition and learning, this largely relates
to information processing, problem solving, perception and memory. Dyslexia is one of the
disabilities in which children struggle to process the information presented to them. Students
with dyslexia struggle with language acquisition because of their inability to process the
information presented to them in visual format and make connections to the sounds they
represent. These children might start struggling at the preschool level, where they strive to
memorize a nursery rhyme, delay in speech, poor gross motor and fine motor skills and poor
short-term memory, especially when they have to remember a sequence of instructions. As
classroom interventions Topping (2001) proposed ‘paired reading’ that is listening to a recording
while following a text with their eyes, this would help students develop letter sound
combinations, increase word identification knowledge and improve understanding of language
structure. To increase phonemic awareness Hatcher and Snowling (2002) suggested rhyming
activities such as, making up rhymes and playing rhyming games. In order to help with the
students’ short-term memory span teachers can present students with a sequence of tasks and
gradually increase the time length between presenting sequences and recall, and the number of
tasks. This activity will help students with their memory span.

In terms of social and emotional difficulties experienced by young children, this might lead them
to become withdrawn or isolated, or exhibit challenging or disruptive behaviors. These behaviors
might be reasons of diagnoses such as anxiety, depression, substance abuse, eating disorders
often other children who pose challenging behaviors are diagnosed with attention deficit
hyperactivity disorder (ADHD). In a classroom to support children with mood disorders teachers
might have to be on the lookout for certain withdrawn, isolated or sudden ecstatic symptoms.
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Referring children with any symptoms of mood or anxiety disorders to the school counselor or in
house therapist is the right course of action. Coordinating with the students’ families and their
therapist to keep up their progress in the classroom will help these children in a learning
environment.

The last area of need put forth by the Code of Practice was sensory or physical disabilities. Some
examples are hearing impairment, visual impairment and muscular dystrophy. These sensory and
physical conditions might also be the reason of underlying communication difficulties, hardships
in leading a good social life, this also leads the children to isolation. In a classroom teachers
might have to look out for the co-occurring conditions and help the students accordingly.
Meanwhile for to include students with hearing impairments into usual classrooms use of hearing
aids and teachers learning and teaching sign language as a second language is advised (Moores,
2008). For visually impaired students integrating Braille code will help them develop literacy
skills. It would be appropriate if schools could have support staff and shadow teachers for
children with such needs. In inclusive education it is important to recognize that teaching
methods may need to vary based on the needs of each child.

Research worldwide suggests that children who are included in mainstream classroom perform
well in academics. A study done in Norway compared two groups of students for over a three-
year period, one group was trained in a general classroom setting whereas the other was trained
in small groups. Students trained in classrooms showed better progress than the latter
(Myklebust, 2002). Another study done by Orfield and Gordon (2001) proved that students who
got the opportunity to learn and engage with students with diverse abilities and characteristics
were able to become effective leaders in the society. A study done in the US examining over
68000 primary and secondary students with disabilities spending majority of their school day
with their non disabled peers performed well in language and mathematics measures (Hehir et
al., 2012). Myklebust (2007) found in a study conducted in Norway that students who were
educated in general classroom settings were more likely to earn a vocational or academic
credential than students who were educated in special classes. Other evidence also suggests that
children with SEN can develop social and emotional benefits in inclusive settings. Schwab
(2015) found that students with disabilities have fewer friendships and social interactions, lower
levels of perceived peer acceptance and weak sel-perception. He also suggested that including
special needs children in normal school settings with non-disabled peers will help them with
their low level of self-confidence and self-acceptance.

There have been mixed findings as well, in a Dutch study conducted with students with
behavioral problems showed that that they were more likely to be socially excluded than peers
without special educational needs (Monchy et al., 2004). In another research when students with
special needs in regular and special classrooms were compared no difference in social or
academic development were identified (Karsten et al., 2001). In addition to these findings in his
review Hornby (2011) mentioned a number of issues that could be raised when implementing
inclusive education for students with special educational needs. He mentioned that students are
more comfortable with peers who have similar disabilities and interests rather than the same
chronological age, therefore he suggested being included in a learning community is more
important for students with special needs which is not available in a mainstream classroom.
Hornby (2011) also mentioned the issue of what curriculum the teachers were supposed to
follow, he stated that a national curriculum is not appropriate for children with moderate to
severe learning or behavioral disabilities.
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Conclusion

In conclusion, children with special educational needs should not be marginalized they have
every right to have access to education like non disabled students. Addressing students’ needs is
the main focus of inclusive education. Although the success of inclusive education has been
proven by studies, there are some contradicting studies out there.

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