Inclusive collaboration in and outside the classroom

Abstract

That educators within schools should collaborate with each other is nothing new.  Collaboration is also strongly emphasised in the Curriculum for nine-year compulsory school, preschool class and after-school recreational centres, 2011 (Lgr 2011).  But the issue of collaboration really persists in the same way that it seems reasonable to give thought to who is collaborating and in what way, writes Li Holmström Wirf.

This issue had become a source of inspiration for my study which dealt with class teachers' and remedial teachers'/special educators' perceptions and experiences of collaboration in and outside the classroom.  My experience of collaboration within this area is that the remedial teacher can easily be viewed as a teaching assistant.  As a teaching assistant, he/she must help “their” pupils as well as the class teacher, rather than collaborate closely on equal terms together with the class teacher.  This collaboration would benefit all pupils (including those in need of special support), and where I as a remedial teacher possess cutting edge expertise, specific expert knowledge, in terms of the pupil's individual needs.

This cutting-edge expertise provides a kind of depth, unlike a situation wherein teachers have equivalent knowledge.  Based on my own experience, I find a distance between regular education and special education in the form of deficiencies in collaboration and integration between these forms of teaching.  Ann Ahlberg (2011) points out, working on the basis of the inclusion concept, that pupils who are in need of special support benefit from collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators. In my study, I interviewed ten informants, all women aged 30-60 years old (five class teachers, three remedial teachers and two special educators).

This article will provide examples of different collaborative forms/roles that emerged in the study.  These roles were created in the interaction between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators.

Collaborative roles

The study revealed that class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators felt that they collaborated and that collaboration was important, but that it did not occur to such a high degree in the classroom.  There was however, a desire among teachers to develop this collaboration.  They argued that one of the prerequisites for collaboration was that time needed to be allocated for common planning, as communication is the key to a good working relationship.

Previous research on the collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators has largely focused on Co-Teaching.

• Co-Teaching describes various models of collaboration such as:
• One teach, one observe; one teacher leads the instruction and the other teacher observes the pupils,
• Station Teaching; where the pupils work on three stations, two teachers are responsible for one station each and the third station has the pupils working on their own in a group,
• Parallel Teaching; where the class is divided into two halves and two teachers teach at the same time,
• Alternative Teaching, where one teacher works with a larger group of pupils and the other teacher works with a smaller group who either require special assistance or greater challenges,
• Teaming; where two teachers teach together on equal terms, and
• One teach, one assist; teaching with one teacher and one assistant teacher where the teacher leads the instruction and the assistant teacher circulates in the classroom and helps the pupils who need it (Friend, Cook, Hurley-Chamberlain & Shamberger 2010).

Prior research reveals that the most common model of Co-Teaching is One teach, one assist (Scruggs, Mastropieri, & McDuffie, 2007).  This model also appears frequently in my study  as remedial teachers/special educators often function as an extra resource when in the classroom.Themes

The study revealed themes that, in different ways, were associated with the collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators, both in and outside the classroom.  The themes describe the ways in which the teachers collaborated, such as

• the sounding board,
• the classroom colleague,
• the classroom supporter,
• the collaborator,
• the schedule planner,
• the separator,
• the supervisor.

The roles were a result of interaction. In the sounding board, the classroom supporter, the separator and the supervisor, the remedial teacher/special educator was included, and in the themes classroom colleague, the collaborator and the schedule planner, the class teacher was also included in addition to the remedial teacher/special educator, which meant that the focus was on both of their roles.

The sounding board

In this theme, it became clear that the remedial teacher/special educator was expected to be that person who, in the collaboration between the class teacher and remedial teacher/special educator, would encourage, support and provide feedback on the teaching – someone who the class teacher could talk to and bounce their ideas off, and where the class teacher as a bonus benefitted from the remedial teacher's/special educator's extensive knowledge with the field of special needs education.  One class teacher pointed out in the following way that she appreciated the special educator's feedback on her teaching:

“/. . ./ but I think it is the first time I feel I am getting some feedback on what I do. But now X (special educator, my note) is very good at giving me the “you do this well”. . . and I think it is really good to have “have you thought about this?”, “you can do it this way instead””. (class teacher)

The classroom colleague

The characteristic of this theme was the desire for development possibilities in the collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators. One wish was to be given the opportunity to be two in the classroom; class teacher and remedial teacher/special educator. It was also about improving the teaching, partly to prevent pupils from feeling singled out, but also to implement flexible groupings based on the current needs and to be able to share the responsibility with regard to lesson planning, teaching and assessment.  This wish highlighted the importance of common planning time.

“I think if, instead, a remedial teacher was in the classroom and worked with me .  . . with that teacher /. . ./ I think that the pupils who have difficulty would not feel odd.”  (class teacher)

The classroom supporter

On the occasions when the remedial teacher/special educator was in the classroom, she mostly functioned as an extra resource.  However, it was at the beginning of the term that the remedial teacher/special educator was regularly found in the classroom, partly to relieve the class teacher, and partly so that the teachers together could get a picture of the class as a whole.  This function as an extra resource was aimed at individual pupils who the remedial teacher/special educator usually used to work with, as well as to support and help other pupils in the class, for example during reviews, which was positive for the teaching.

“But in the classroom, as I said, it is more like "now we will go through this and this" and then I am around those that I feel need a little extra support during reviews and even during ordinary work”. (special educator)

The schedule planner

The informants expressed that the common planning time they had at their disposal was an important part of the collaboration.  They did not mean that it necessarily had to be scheduled, but that they could solve this anyway, for example, by being sat in the same office and being able to discuss pupils on a daily basis. The schedule plan could be perceived by them to be a demanding step in the planning as it took a lot of time.

They usually had scheduled common planning time together, often once a week. Having common planning time was described as something positive, as it was otherwise easy for it not to happen.  The regularity of the meetings led to it not being necessary to seek each other out during the breaks.  Usually, the class teacher and the remedial teacher/special educator would meet about once a week, but there was also chatting in the corridor, of which the following quote is an example:

“X (special educator, my note) and I have common planning time once a week. And then the school is so small that we see each other every day anyway. In reality it means that we meet each other and chat a little each day. How's it going today? What are you doing? That sort of thing. But once a week it is official.” (class teacher)

The separator

This theme is characterised by the remedial teacher/special educator selecting pupils to work with, either individually or in small groups.  The dilemma with this involved the problem of pupils not always reacting positively to leaving the classroom, but instead wanting to remain in the group.  This was set against the fact that both class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators expressed the benefits of one-to-one tuition, ideally in combination with intensive periods.  Another aspect was the class teacher's frustration at rarely having a full class.  Here it was found that smaller groups were considered to work best in mathematics, while one-to-one teaching worked best in the subject of Swedish.  Both class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators described the dilemma that they have to contend with, namely, the pupils' feeling of being singled out and the possibility of them missing something when they were away from the classroom, in contrast to them being offered extra help.

“/. . ./ the pupils do not think that it is much fun to be removed from class. It is perceived as something negative . . . one is very careful not to do something that is different so that  . . . and at the same time they miss things when they leave the room. They get something else but in their mind I'm sure they wonder . . . what have they done in the classroom, what have they said . . . they are not altogether positive about leaving. Like one of the boys we have, he is very unhappy about doing this . . . he doesn't want to. And the question is how much he learns then?.” (class teacher)

The supervisor

The remedial teacher/special educator was deemed to have an overview of the class as a whole as well as an overview of the special education and related issues at the school at large. The informants expressed that it was the remedial teacher/special educator who had an outside perspective on the group and who was able to observe conditions beyond that of the class teacher's capability.

“Firstly, they (the remedial teachers/special educators, my note) see the group from an outside perspective, and can see things that I myself do not see /. . ./” (class teacher)

Special education implications

I see inclusion as an approach.  In every learning situation, I strive for the inclusion of each pupil, provided that it benefits the pupil, and at the same I time take into account the pupil's experience of the inclusion.  My purpose with this study was to describe the class teachers' and remedial teachers'/special educators' perceptions and experiences of collaboration in and outside the classroom based on the inclusion perspective, and the study reveals that there is significant development potential within this area.

Co-Teaching is, for example, not a recognised concept in the schools in question, nor is it used as a form of collaboration.  Based on the results obtained, I would like my future professional role as a remedial teacher to incorporate the Co-Teaching model in order to develop the collaboration with the class teacher.  In that way, I want to try to demonstrate the positive impact of a genuine Co-Teaching collaboration.

Collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators has been shown to affect the pupils positively, both in terms of knowledge and socially.  In order to achieve a so-called genuine and effective Co-Teaching, three basic components are required:

• co-planning,
• co-instructing and
• co-assessing (Murawski & Lochner, 2011).

The previously described themes present various collaborative roles that emerged in the study.  These variants, I believe, can constitute an excellent basis for discussion in educational discourse in schools.  These discussions can lead to increased knowledge regarding collaboration between class teachers and remedial teachers/special educators,  as well as reflection on how collaboration looks at their own school and how this can be further developed.

I consequently believe that Co-Teaching can be a way to achieve inclusion, that all pupils, to the extent possible, are taught together within the context of the regular classroom activities.