Lessons From Research
Research offers little guidance on professional learning for inclusive education
By Learning Forward
Categories: Outcomes, Research, Standards for Professional LearningDecember 2014
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At a Glance
Prompted by the urgency to address the learning needs of all students, particularly students who are different (students with disabilities, with various ethnic and racial backgrounds, from different family backgrounds, from low socioeconomic backgrounds, etc.), this study examines the findings of a decade of research on preparing and supporting teachers to create inclusive classrooms. Research is limited and insufficient to guide effective professional learning in inclusive education.
The study
Waitoller, F. & Artiles, A. (2013). A decade of professional development research for inclusive education: A critical review and notes for a research program. Review of Educational Research, 83(3), 319-356.
What This Means For Practitioners
Education practitioners work with students who manifest differences every day. To create equitable opportunities for access, participation, and achievement for all students and inclusive cultures within schools and classrooms that nurture student success, educators require deep understanding, skills, dispositions, practices, and willingness to address the intersection of multiple differences simultaneously through cognitive and behavioral changes.
This form of professional learning, as evident in the extensive use of action research in the studies examined, increases teachers’ “construction of their knowledge that is situated in their daily practice and struggles” (p. 331) and builds their “confidence and efficacy to use an inquiry approach to teaching, create schoolwide programs to foment inclusion, introduce to teachers practices such as differentiated instruction, and challenge teachers’ deficit views of students who struggle to learn” (p. 331).
To acquire the capacity to create schools and systems that implement inclusive education, educators need to engage in continuous learning through collaborative, co-constructed learning that occurs within their daily practice.
Learning Forward is the only professional association devoted exclusively to those who work in educator professional development. We help our members plan, implement, and measure high-quality professional learning so they can achieve success with their systems, schools, and students.
Categories: Outcomes, Research, Standards for Professional Learning
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