Inkluderande undervisning och evidensbaserade strategier i fyra danska grundskolor

AbstractTitle: Inclusive education and evidence based strategies in four Danish schoolsAuthor: Margareta AnderssonDanish schools are supposed to include 96% of all students. They are also supposed to use evidence based strategies to make inclusion happen. This case study consist of a survey based on Mitchells (2014) metastudy and four interviews. The purpose of the study was to investigate to what degree Mitchell’s inclusive strategies were used. Another purpose was to investigate what other strategies were used and how the schools documented effective strategies. The results of the interviews were analyzed by theories of special education, the three perspectives, the compensative, the critical and the dilemma perspective (Nilholm, 2007). The results of the survey (n=31) show that teachers use all of the evidence based strategies included in the survey for including pupils with special needs. The interviews show that many of Mitchells strategies were considered effective, especially collaborative learning strategies. Other important factors were the support of pupil care teams and the personnel’s positive relations to the pupils. The teachers in this study worked informed by evidence not evidence based. Documentation about strategies used at the schools are kept in individual educational plans. The results show that teachers meet several dilemmas in working with inclusive strategies. As educational goals sometimes conflict, because of the context, dilemmas occur as to the degree of individualization versus taking part in class activities, what goal to focus on, inclusive or academic goals. Collaboration with parents is another dilemma, concerning the ethics about openness about a child’s or a group of children’s difficulties. Another dilemma is that information about effective strategies at an individual or group level is not generalized at school level. This study can contribute to the discussion on how schools try to resolve the dilemma that inclusion means. The challenge of making schools an inclusive environment remains. The dominating perspective is compensatory in the way that focus lies in adjusting the pupil to the existing organization.Keywords: evidence, inclusion, special education, educational plans, teams for care for schoolchildre