What is the teacher's attitude towards mainstreaming the education of students with special needs in Male', Maldives? / Aminath Seema

Abstract:

Although there has been a widespread adaptation of polices on mainstreaming and more recently inclusive education polices for placing children with disabilities into regular schools, little is actually known about the relationship between what the teachers think about such policies and the type of learning they provide to the students with special needs. The purpose of this research is to study the teacher's attitude in mainstreaming the education of students with special needs in Male', Maldives in order to identify the barriers to the adoption of inclusive teaching methods and to propose ways to break down these barriers so that all the students will get equal opportunity in education, regardless of their strengths, weaknesses or disabilities. Although there has been many researches done to find the teacher's attitude towards mainstreaming the education of students with special needs in other countries, a research of this type is not done in Maldives. It is very important to conduct a study like this, as special education started in Maldives recently and still teachers have not under gone enough training to be comfortable and confident in teaching students with special needs in their classrooms. The research is carried out using qualitative phenomenology design. Data is collected from six teachers from individual interviews and by observing these teachers while they were teaching students with special needs in their classrooms, to answer the research question "What is the teacher's attitude towards mainstreaming the education of students with special needs?"