Inclusive and Supportive Education Congress International Special Education Conference Inclusion: Celebrating Diversity? 1st - 4th August 2005. Glasgow, Scotland

home about the conference programme registration accommodation contact

Teacher and Parent Beliefs about the Nature of Disabling Barriers:
Implications for Practice

Abstract:

The nature of teacher and parent beliefs about disabling barriers for students appear to greatly impact how teachers and parents participate in the planning and implementation of educational programs for all students. This study validates the use of the Individual-Social-Political (ISP) model of beliefs about the nature of disabling barriers to measure parent and teacher beliefs about disabling barriers in education, and links these beliefs to parent and teacher practice. Interviews were conducted with 42 parents and 34 teachers with reference to 43 students from five different school boards in Ontario Canada. ISP coding produced a three-point belief profile score which was validated with the pathognomonic-interventionist (PI) scores (Stanovich & Jordan, 1998) for teachers, and a Parent Self-Rating Questionnaire about the Nature of Disabling Barriers (PSQD). Qualitative analysis is used to identify the practices associated with each belief category for both teachers and parents. Sixty-six implications for practice were identified.

Introduction

This study explores teachers’ and parents’ beliefs about disabling barriers, using a tripartite profile of beliefs with each score representing one of the categories of belief (Individual, Social, Political). Interpretive analysis offers insight into the practices of teachers and parents and the relationship of the belief profiles to the parent and teacher contributions to program through the IEP and collaborative consultation. Further, a range of special education policy in Ontario, Canada creates a problem for implementation and maintenance of the inclusive agenda. This study seeks to understand the implications of the mixed epistemological approaches to special education and inclusive practices that are evident amongst teachers and parents in Ontario, Canada.

There has been extensive research on the nature of teacher beliefs and the impact of teacher beliefs on students (Kagan, 1992; Muijs & Reynolds, 2002). The ISP interview captures teacher beliefs which inform their practice and in turn the impact on the educational experience of their students. Teaching behaviours such as flexibility and adaptability have been linked to both exemplary special education teachers and general educators (Fuchs, Fuchs, Hamlett, Phillips & Karns, 1995). Individual beliefs about disabling barriers are aligned with the notion that students have fixed abilities and that barriers to their learning are a result of factors internal to the student. Social beliefs about disabling barriers are associated with the view that teachers contribute to student learning through dialogue and scaffolded instruction, and that barriers to learning are solved through adjustments in instruction. Political beliefs about disabling barriers are associated with educational policy constraints and systemic problems in schools, which hinder both teachers and students from full participation in learning goals.

The literature also shows that there have been varied trends in how professionals perceive parent reactions to having a child with a disability and these perceptions have shaped how professionals interact with parents. There are several types of collaborative relationships between teachers and parents (Vincent, 2000). In this study the variations in beliefs amongst teachers and parents are examined. Variations in parent participation may account for differences in resource allocation and also could have a direct impact on how children with disabilities develop their self-concept.

Outside of the educational policy context, attitudes toward people with disabilities have undergone a significant social evolution over the last twenty years. The development of social model theory in the United Kingdom, the disability rights movement in the United States, and human rights legislation in Canada have forged a revolution in how people with disabilities participate in our society. But as with all such movements, there has been resistance and challenges to these concepts. The new paradigms of disability, which have emerged from challenges to social model theory, argue for a theoretical framework with three distinct levels of analysis of the nature of disabling barriers. This framework is derived from the old medical model view of disability and a division of social model theory into a social and a political model view of disability. The divisions of the social model theory should not be viewed as a dilution of social model theory into two weaker categories but the emergence of two categories of equal weight and importance.

Through the critical theory challenges to social model theory, as described above, three new theories emerge. Barnes, Mercer & Shakespeare (1999) describe three levels of sociological analysis: Individual (experience of disability and impairment); Social (socio-cultural categories of disability and identity politics); and Societal (social welfare systems, and politics of disablement) (p.35). These levels of analysis are the basis for the categories which make-up the ISP model of belief about the nature of disabling barriers.

The Individual Social Political (ISP) Model

In this section I will briefly describe some theories of disability which I have adopted in order to create a theoretical framework to understand teacher and parent beliefs. This framework includes three theoretical positions about the locus of responsibility for students’ educational attainment.

Figure 1: Levels of responsibility for educational attainment

Figure one shows a simple illustration of the key stakeholders in education. Each circle represents a different level of responsibility for educational attainment.

In the centre circle, the individual student has a deficit which must be overcome or they will not do well in school. This deficit might be behavioural, or motivation, or self-esteem, or a disability such as a learning disability or intellectual disability. I call this an individual belief about the nature of disability because the locus of responsibility is with the student.

The two circles which surround the individual student are the groups with which an individual student has the most intimate contact. Each group is made up of several members each of whom has some responsibility to break down existing barriers and not to build new ones. I call this a social belief about the nature of disability because the locus of responsibility is within the social interactions of the student.

The encircling all of the members of these groups is the community, which is made up of several bureaucratic structures which hold power and the responsibility to design, fund and generally support a system that meets the needs of all of its members. These bureaucratic structures include Departments of education, school boards, teachers’ federations, as well other more abstract social structures. I call this a political belief about the nature of disability because the locus of responsibility lies with the political choices made in a democratic society.

The three levels of responsibility make up the components of the ISP model of beliefs. The ISP model of beliefs, taken from the disability studies literature is a theoretical model which I authored. The ISP model of beliefs is an expansion of Jordan and Stanovich’s bi-polar continuum (the P-I) which they used to investigate teacher beliefs. The pathognomonic end of the spectrum views disability as a pathology and the interventionist end of the spectrum is a belief that teacher intervention is important for all students. The expansion of the P-I scale to the ISP model 1) looks more broadly at disability rather than restricting beliefs to the professional construct of intervention, and 2) investigates whether teachers hold beliefs that include an understanding of disability situated in political or systemic responsibility. I also investigate whether parent beliefs are similar to teacher beliefs and whether they span the three categories.

The research questions to be addressed in this study are as follows: Is the individual-social-political (ISP) model a valid measure of teacher and parent beliefs about the nature of disabling barriers in education? And, what are the implications of teacher and parent beliefs for inclusive practice?

In addition to understanding the nature of teacher and parent beliefs, I investigate what these beliefs mean with regard to how teachers and parents report educational practice. I analyse how these beliefs are linked to the ways in which these stakeholders describe their judgments about their experience, their rationalizations for their own behaviours and/or their attributions with regard to other people’s behaviours.

Method

Interviews were conducted with a volunteer sample of teacher/parent dyads working with students with IEPs. Forty-two parents and 34 teachers with reference to 43 students volunteered to participate. The schools represent urban, suburban and rural schools in Ontario, Canada. The four school boards represented in the study had varying degrees of inclusive practice and represented both urban and suburban, and Catholic and public boards. Participants were asked to describe their experience with this student in relation to 6 theme areas: assessment and placement, program, monitoring, collaboration, reporting, and non-academic issues.

The ISP interview: The interview, based on Jordan and Stanovich’s PI interview, focuses on a particular student or child and how that teacher or parent works with the child around their individual educational needs. Teachers, using a chronological sequence, begin with when they first learned that the child would be in their class, and continue with how they have developed their program for the needs of this student over the school year. Similarly, parents also are asked to think about when they first learned about their child’s disability and how they have interacted with the school system since. Both interviews produce a narrative story of the participants’ experiences (Engel, 1993). Interview data were coded by selecting statements that reflected judgments about their experiences, rationalizations for their own behaviours or attributions with regard to other people’s behaviours. The statements were scored using a six-point system where each of six points were allotted to three categories of belief to validate the tripartite model (ISP). A mean score was then calculated for all statements in the interview and the resulting three scores provided a profile of beliefs indicating the dominant belief category for each participant.

The quantitative analysis described above was useful for establishing the reliability of the coding mechanism as well as validating the constructs. However, the interview data contained a wealth of descriptive data which provided a different type of evidence. Belief profiles for each participant showed the range of understanding about the nature of disability amongst the participants. In addition, teacher and parent behaviours and decisions they make on behalf of students with IEPs were extracted from the interview data in light of teachers and parents beliefs. The practices of teachers and parents and the implications of the belief profiles for educational outcomes were also explored.

Results

Two independent raters coded each interview. Inter rater reliability of r = +.94 (p <.01) for the first six parent interviews and r = +.90 (p<.01) for the first six teacher interviews was calculated. The ISP coding was correlated with the Pathognomonic-Interventionist (P-I) scoring (r= +.540, P<.01). The parent ISP scoring was correlated with the The Parent Self Rating Questionnaire about the Nature of Disabling Barriers (PSQD) for four parent interviews (50% agreement). Descriptive statistics of the ISP codes indicate variance amongst the teacher and parent beliefs, and widely diverse belief profiles.

Qualitative analysis of the interviews showed that both parents and teachers holding individual beliefs were likely to attribute the causes of academic failure to internal factors in the student and thus take less responsibility for instructional interventions. The individual belief about disability is based in a pathological view of the student. Learning difficulties are perceived to be a result of something being physically, emotionally, or intellectually wrong with the student. The difficulties faced by the student are not considered to be a result of their social interactions or the community to which they belong and therefore the locus of control for solving the problem lies within the student. The overriding philosophy of this belief is some students have characteristics that make it hard for them to learn.

Example interview statements which were coded as individual beliefs are these:

Teacher:

“The parents don't understand that there is nothing I can do for their child. The problem is him. He has to change or he will fail.”

Parent:

“I don’t put as much time into helping with his homework anymore. He doesn’t have a clue to what he is reading anyway.”

Participants with social beliefs viewed educational difficulties as their responsibility and sought information and support in order to teach students to the best of their abilities. The social belief about disability is based on the idea that the student’s difficulties are a function of interactions with individuals and physical spaces in their immediate environment. These interactions are affected by the attitudes of the people with whom the student interacts, or physical barriers to full participation for students with physical or sensory disabilities. The student’s difficulties are not attributed to policy issues, nor are they perceived to be due to the impairment itself. The responsibility for breaking down barriers lies with all of the group members such as teachers and classmates, parents and siblings. The overriding philosophy of this belief system is that individuals are responsible for removing barriers.

Example interview statements which were coded as social beliefs are these:

Teacher:

“Even though we lay out expectations in the IEP, we know Ryan as an individual, not just as expectations.”

Parent:

“I made a book about him to show the teacher. Like a get-to-know you, so that they could understand him.”

Finally, participants who held political beliefs viewed students’ educational attainment as linked to policy definitions of success, funding criteria, and curriculum constraints. These participants situated learning difficulties within a political context. Within this belief systemic pressures such as the economy and the status quo are thought to influence decision making and whether or not the needs of all students are supported. Learning difficulties are thus a function not of individual attitudes but the underlying values of society, the educational system and education policy. The overriding philosophy of this belief system is the system is not equitable.

Example interview statements which were coded as social beliefs are these:

Teacher:

“I stopped teaching behavioural because every afternoon in the regular class she would be great, and then it would be terrible with me in the morning.”

Parent:

“It’s hard to communicate his needs to a Board and a school where they have to follow protocol and guidelines.”

Sixty-six implications for students with disabilities, based on the three categories of belief about the nature of disabling barriers, were found in the parent and teachers interviews. These implications are presented in the Tables 1 and 2.

Implications for Teacher Practice by ISP Belief Category.

Implications for Parent Practice by ISP Belief Category.

Conclusion

This study provides evidence of the validity of the ISP model of beliefs via teachers’ and parents’ reported judgments, attributions and explanations which fit the model. This is supported by the correlation and descriptive statistical data and the high inter-rater reliability. Parent self-rating on the belief categories should be examined further with a larger sample.

Beliefs are a key component in understanding how teachers and parents work together to meet the needs of students with special needs. Learning from teachers and parents who have experience working within the education system provides important understanding about the practice of including students with special needs in regular classrooms. The beliefs and implications for inclusive practice which are found in this study provide new information about how teacher and parent beliefs influence practice.

In general, the implications for teaching practice fall into three broad categories which are linked to the belief categories: policy implementation, barriers to inclusion and student self-concept.

Policy implementation: Parents and teachers are critical to inclusive policy implementation. Although parents have been a driving force in the inclusion movement, parents also hold anti-inclusion attitudes that are one of the most common barrier to inclusion practice (Palmer, Fuller, Arora & Nelson, 2001). Teachers have influence over broad policy issues via teachers’ federations (issues such as workload, and training). Many teachers feel that self-contained classes are better equipped to meet the needs of some students. These teachers are less likely to support implementation of inclusive practice.

Barriers to inclusion: Teachers and parents are concerned that they do not have the ability to adapt instructional practices or to make appropriate decisions. Beliefs thus are a key component to self efficacy for teachers and parents. This in turn impacts whether or not teachers and parents attempt breaking down barriers to inclusive practice.

Student self-concept: Parents transmit their beliefs, values and understandings to their children (Goodnow, 1994, and Lightfoot & Valisner, 1992); parents’ and teachers’ understandings of disability influence the beliefs of children about themselves. Self-concept was frequently cited by both teachers and parents as a barrier to academic success for these students.

Teachers and parents hold variable beliefs about the nature of disabling barriers in education. This variance impacts how they work with each other and how they support students who have IEPs. This study presents evidence that beliefs impact how parents and teachers view their responsibilities for students’ education. These beliefs may therefore be related to how effective teachers are in instructing diverse learners in their classrooms. In addition, beliefs may contribute to how effective parents are at intervening on behalf of their children in schools.

References:

Barnes, C., Mercer, G. & Shakespeare, T. (1999). Exploring disability: A sociological introduction. Cambridge: Polity Press.

Engel, D.M. (1993). Origin myths: Narratives of authority, resistance, disability, and law. Law & Society, 27(4), 785-826.

Goodnow, J.J. (1997) Parenting and the transmission and internalization of values: From socio-cultural perspectives to within-family analyses. In J.E. Grusec & L. Kuczynski (Eds.), Parenting and children’s internalization of values: A handbook of contemporary theory. New York: John Wiley & Sons, Inc.

Fuchs, L.S., Fuchs, D., Hamlett, C.L., Phillips, N.B., & Karns, K. (1995) General educators’ specialized adaptation for students with learning disabilities. Exceptional Children, 61(5), 440-459.

Jordan, A. & Stanovich, P. (2003) Teachers’ personal epistemological beliefs about students with disabilities as indicators of effective teaching practices. Journal of Research in Special Education Needs. [Online] Available: http://www.nasen.uk.com/ejournal/ejprinter.php?id=000059_000184.php.

Jordan, A., Kirkaali-Iftar, G. & Diamond, C.T.P. (1993) Who has the problem, the student or the teacher? Differences in teachers’ beliefs about their work with at-risk and integrated exceptional students. International Journal of Disability, Development and Education, 40 (1), 45-62.

Jordan-Wilson, A. & Silverman, H. (1991) Teachers’ assumptions and beliefs about the delivery of services to exceptional children. Teacher Education and Special Education, 14(3), 198-206.

Kagan, D. M. (1992) Professional growth among preservice and beginning teachers. Review of Educational Research, 62(2), 129-169.

Lightfoot, C. & Valsiner, J. (1992) Parental belief systems under the influence: Social guidance of the construction of personal cultures. In I.E. Sigel, A.V. McGillicuddy-DeLisi, & J.J. Goodnow (Eds) Parental belief systems: The psychological consequences for children. (2nd ed.), (pp. 393-413). Hillsdale: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.

Muijs, D. & Reynolds, D. (2002) Teachers’ beliefs and behaviours: What really matters? Journal of Classroom interaction, 37(2), 3-15.

Palmer, D., Fuller, K., Arora, T. & Nelson, M. (2001) Taking sides: parent views on inclusion for their children with severe disabilities. Exceptional Children, 67(4), 467-484.

Schraw, G. & Olafson, L. (2002) Teachers’ epistemological world views and educational practices. Issues in Education, 8(2), database: professional development collection.

Stanovich, P. & Jordan, A. (1998) Canadian teachers’ and principals’ beliefs about inclusive education as predictors of effective teaching in heterogeneous classrooms. The Elementary School Journal, 98(3), 221-238.

Stanovich, P. & Jordan, A. (2000) Effective teaching as effective intervention. Learning Disabilities, 10(4), 235-238.

Underwood, K. (2002) Parents’ understandings of disability: An exploration of the culture of special education in Ontario. Unpublished Master’s thesis: University of Toronto.

Vincent, C. (2000) Including Parents? Education, citizenship and parental agency. Buckingham: Open University Press.

home . about the conference . programme . registration . accommodation . contact