Attention to learning difficulties in a sample of primary school textbooks and didactic materials in Portugal

This article presents the most relevant findings from a study carried out at the Dept. of Didactics and School Planning in the University of Santiago de Compostela for the purpose of determining whether primary school textbooks, which are often used in schools in Portugal, provide adequate work proposals and resources for students with learning difficulties. The study methodology consisted of a content analysis. Toward this end, we elaborated a guide-tool for identifying the strategies and resources contained within textbooks and didactic materials. The guide includes a total of 10 dimensions or analysis blocks that correspond to the study’s main points of inquiry. A total of 21 textbooks were assessed, of which 18 included a handbook of working «note cards». Before presenting the process of elaborating the evaluation guide-tool and the research findings, we will briefly describe the main aspects that, in our opinion, should characterize attention to learning difficulties in textbooks and curricular materials. Our findings show that the materials analyzed are limited in terms of strategies and resources for fostering attention to students with learning difficulties. The activities and proposals that they contain do little to help teachers address this group of students and do not provide alternatives for adapting the work proposals for students with learning difficulties. The study also provides some recommendations regarding the measures to be adopted by institutions and professionals involved in the process of designing and using school textbooks