Associate Professor
Binghamton University State
University of
New York
Binghamton, NY 13902
USA
JKugelmass@aol.com
Abstract: This paper examines the evolution of one progressively oriented, inclusive public elementary school in the United States over a fifteen year period (1983 -1998). Ethnographic data illustrate how support for the inclusion of children classified for special education in general education classrooms developed alongside teachers' shared commitment for creating classroom communities that valued racial, cultural and linguistic diversity. Its story illustrates what other researchers have found to be essential ingredients for sustaining school reform: a commitment to a central philosophy and belief system; teacher initiatives supported by a strong leader; structures that support on-going change and continuous improvement. Collaboration among teachers, students and parents emerged as central to both the evolution and maintenance of the school's inclusive culture. The paper concludes by asking if it will be possible to sustain inclusive schools in the face of the agenda of educational bureaucracies that require all students to meet a uniform set of standards.
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John Dewey (1938) recognized the paradox of progressively oriented teachers calling for the exclusion of those children who did not seem to respond to the learner-centered approaches he advocated. Noting that 'Exclusion is perhaps the only available measure at a given juncture, but it is no solution' (1938: 57), he suggested that a more 'common sense solution' would be for teachers to modify instruction to accommodate these students. Dewey could not, however, have anticipated the degree to which the bureaucratic structures that today engulf public education in the United States would limit teachers' ability to apply 'common sense'. The school described in this paper is one among only a handful of progressively oriented, inclusive public elementary schools I have known in my thirty years working within special education in the US, where teachers have been able to develop these kinds of solutions in the context of a school culture that puts children at the centre of instructional decisions. Its story illustrates what other researchers have found to be the essential ingredients for successful reform: a commitment to a central philosophy and belief system; teacher initiatives supported by the building principal; structures that support on-going change and continuous improvement. This paper focuses on how the collaborative processes used in the school's development and everyday operations have enabled teachers to sustain reforms supporting their belief in the value of diversity, and manage external demands for curricular uniformity.
School reform, inclusion, and collaboration.
Most attempts to introduce innovation through external directives have failed to create authentic or lasting change in public schools in the United States (Tyack and Cuban 1995). Rather than transforming school cultures, reforms directed at supporting diversity among students have historically become altered to fit existing values, beliefs and structures (Sarason 1996). Critical theorists explain the resistance to reforms that support the development of inclusive schools as evidence of the hegemony of sexism, racism, classism and ableness within school systems (Giroux 1983, McLaren 1989, Luke and Gore 1992). By supporting hierarchical structures and a standard curriculum that excludes the experiences and strengths of large numbers of children from low-income families and non-dominant cultures, schools reproduce the values and beliefs of the dominant culture (Katz 1971, Bowles and Gintis 1976). Special education further supports these beliefs by attaching deviant status to children whose learning does not conform to societal expectations.
The inclusion of children with learning challenges, disabilities, and other impairments in general education classrooms has been hampered by the meaning teachers attribute to differences among children. Their belief that some children cannot succeed in general education classrooms has been supported by deficit-based paradigms and medical models that provide the foundation for special education practise (Bogdan and Kugelmass 1984, Poplin 1988, Rhodes and Dudley-Marling 1988, Skrtic 1991a, b ). General educators who identify themselves as 'progressive' may be just as unaware as more 'traditional' educators of how their implicit and explicit beliefs limit a willingness to include children with special needs in their classrooms. The teacher-directed approaches needed by some students with physical impairments and/or those identified as having developmental, learning and/or emotional disabilities, may conflict with the definition of 'child-centeredness' underlying their teaching practises. The exclusion of some children from their classrooms allows their definition of 'child-centeredness' to remain, unchallenged. (Walkerdine 1984, Delpit, 1988, 1995, Grumet 1988, Burman 1994, Ladson-Billings 1994, Mallory and New 1996).
Although a positive relationship between collaborative teaching and decision-making and the successful inclusion of children with disabilities in general education classrooms has been documented during the past decade (Stainback and Stainback 1991, 1996, Bauwens and Hourcade 1995, Pugach and Johnson 1995, Berres, Ferguson, Knoblock, and Wood 1996, Dettmer, Dyck and Thurston 1996, Friend and Cook 1996, Erwin 1996, Lipsky and Gartner 1996, Mallory and New 1996, Poplin and Cousin 1996, Rainforth and York-Barr 1997), this knowledge has not radically altered either the grounding assumptions, instructional practises or organizational arrangements that dominate both general and special education in the United States. Public schools continue to be organized in ways that support and maintain differentiated roles and status among teachers identified as specialists and classroom teachers. This has limited the adoption of the kinds of collaborative teaching arrangements that are needed to support the special educational needs of children in general education classrooms (Bauwens and Hourcade 1995, Pugach and Johnson 1995, Udvari-Solner and Thousand 1995, Dettmer, Dyck and Thurston 1996, Friend and Cook 1996, Rainforth and York-Barr 1997, Snell 1998). The elimination of rigid role boundaries among school staff is essential to achieving equity, reciprocity and mutual respect among participants (Friend and Cook 1996, Rainforth and York-Barr 1997) and establishing the kinds of collegial norms for interactions ( Little 1982, Glickman 1993) that characterize the collaborative cultures found in inclusive schools (Paul, Rosselli and Evans 1995, Berres, Ferguson, Knoblock and Wood 1996).
In his investigation of collaborative schools, Hargreaves (1994) describes the importance of collaborations among teachers in promoting and sustaining authentic change. Effective collaborations evolve spontaneously and, although supported by institutional leaders, such as principals, are generally begun by teachers to address initiatives they perceive as important. Teachers' active participation in such collaborations is voluntary, in response to events as they take place. Collaborative activities are primarily informal, outside administratively fixed schedules, and, therefore, often unpredictable. Although Hargreaves recognizes how these collaborations energize teachers and support needed reforms, he acknowledges the difficulty of sustaining a collaborative school culture within highly centralized and bureaucratic school systems. This dilemma is reflected in the story of the school described in this paper.
An evolving research methodology
My interest in understanding how a school built on values and beliefs I shared, but rarely found in public schools in the United States, had developed and sustained itself led to the research described in this paper. I began by observing the second grade classroom of one of five teachers from one school, each of whom who had participated in a graduate course I offered in the Fall of 1994, and continued throughout the school year. I visited once a week, for three months, and then bi-weekly, for the remainder of that school year (1994-1995). I was specifically interested in understanding how she addressed the diversity among her students. The twenty seven- and eight-year-old children in her class represented an ethnically diverse mix of European, African and Asian American, Latino and Korean children, from professional, middle-class and low-income families. Of these children, three were classified as eligible for special education services because of identified learning disabilities, cognitive delays, speech and language impairments and/or emotional disorders. Six children lived in households where languages other than English were spoken. During that year, I observed and recorded how she adapted a learner-centered constructivist curriculum and organized her classroom (Kugelmass 1995). In order to understand the relationship between her classroom and the rest if the school, I returned the following year.
Phase 1: an interpretive ethnography
The initial analysis of the data gathering during the first two years at the school (1994 -1996) revealed regularities within the school's structure and in everyday interactions among adults and children. Themes emerging from analysis of observational data were triangulated with information gathered through conversations with staff, children and parents with semi-structured interviews and documents describing the school's organization and regulations imposed on the school by outside systems. Every teacher with whom I spoke articulated a commitment to progressive reforms, diversity and the inclusion of children classified for special education. They described the school as having a 'culture of inclusion'. All written materials supported this description. Publicly distributed literature articulated a school-wide statement of a shared purpose: 'The school is for students'; a common value: ' Inclusion'; and beliefs: 'All children can succeed; families are central; diversity is enriching'. In other written material the school was identified as a 'bias-free zone', built on the belief that 'inclusion is central, diversity enriching'. A valuing of diversity was articulated in projects and posters displayed throughout the school, and in school-wide activities and celebrations. These ideals were also integrated within thematic curriculum units, found in many of the children's books and stories read to children, and seen in posters and children's art hung on the walls of the classrooms I visited.
Triangulating explicitly stated values and beliefs with those embedded in conversations and observed in interactional patterns among staff, children and parents revealed the ways in which these beliefs operated at more implicit levels throughout the school. 'Collaboration' emerged as the central theme at the core of everyday operations. Using a spoked wheel as a visual metaphor, Figures 1 and 2 illustrate relationships that emerged between explicitly stated values and beliefs and the structures and practises used throughout the school. The belief that 'inclusion is central, diversity enriching', is propelled by the spokes that represent the essential structures and practises that drive the school. Each structure and practise is supported by and is supportive of the other. These spokes emanate from and are powered by the central hub of collaboration.
In Figure 1, school-wide structures are represented by spokes that include: the site-based council, grade level teams and blended services. Each was identified as central to sustaining the school's commitment to inclusion. Site based council is the teacher, parent and community member organization where issues related to the overall operations of the school and its relationship to the local community and school district are discussed. Recommendations regarding the school's operations are developed at council meetings, using a collaborative decision making process that requires consensus among all members before a decision is agreed upon. Grade-level teams are the site for collaborative decisions among teachers regarding classroom materials to be shared among classes, scheduling of events, staff concerns about individual children and classroom practises. Blended services is the model used throughout the school that supports co-teaching arrangements within each classroom. Each classroom has both a 'lead teacher" and a 'collaborator'.
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Figure 2 illustrates the collaborative classroom practises that emerged as central to supporting diversity within each classroom. They include a mixture of heterogeneous and homogeneous grouping within classrooms, and the use and adaptation of both constructivist pedagogy and the narrative assessment process. \
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Heterogeneous classroom populations were created by teachers working in grade-level teams, with the support and approval of the building principal. Every class had at least one, but no more than five children eligible for special education services. Their numbers depended on the severity and nature of their specific learning needs. Some degree of homogeneity was also built into the way children were assigned to classrooms. To provide children with linguistic and/or socio-cultural peers, when possible, every class also had at least two children of the same race, ethnicity, religion or who spoke the same language. If children at the same grade level came from non-traditional families, such as those who lived with grandparents, or had gay or lesbian parents, attempts were made to place these children in the same classroom. Called 'clustering', this kind of grouping was designed to support children's sense of belonging and was perceived by teachers as particularly beneficial for children from similar racial, cultural and linguistic backgrounds.
The curriculum in every classroom reflected a school-wide commitment to constructivist conceptions of teaching and learning. Grade-level teams developed thematic units that both conformed to state and local mandated content ( e.g. state and local history) and provided opportunities to integrate issues related to diversity ( e.g. African Americans in state and local history). These units were designed to provide 'multiple entry points' for all children, and supported the range and diversity of learning styles and abilities found in every classroom. Books and activities were selected and projects developed from these themes. Literacy instruction followed whole language approaches and incorporated writers' and readers' workshops. Mathematics was taught conceptually and supported by the use of manipulative materials.
Using a process called narrative assessment, children's individual development provided the standard for the specific educational goals each child was expected to reach. This approach began with a collaborative process through which annual goals and short term objectives were established for every child by parents, teachers and children. In a face-to-face meeting at the beginning of each year, goals were determined collaboratively by aligning a child's strengths, interests and experiences with parental concerns, children's interests and curricular objectives. A narrative summary was then written by the teacher, documenting the goals agreed upon at this meeting. Parents, teachers and children met again at mid-year to evaluate progress and, at times, establish new goals. A final assessment conference at the end of the year was followed by another written report, documenting each child's progress.
Phase 2: An historic analysis
The second phase of the research grew out of my interest in discovering how the school had developed its particular approach to inclusion, and whether teachers would sustain their commitment to inclusion and collaboration after the principal associated with these approaches left the school. This interest led to in-depth interviews with the principal and eight teachers consistently identified as central players in the school's evolution. A thematic analysis of their personal narratives and less formal discussions with other current and past members of the staff, was then triangulated with the ethnographic data I had gathered during the first phase of the research. Archival records from the school, school district and local newspaper were also examined for additional information, as well as for validation of individual recollections. The school I first came to know in 1993, had evolved in response to events that began ten years earlier. In 1983, a district-wide school consolidation plan had closed three other elementary school buildings. One hundred African American children from the low-income and working class neighborhood surrounding that school were then bussed to this school. An additional 100 children of international graduate students from the student housing project at the nearby university were also transferred here. Many of these children did not speak English. These 200 students merged with 200 White students from the surrounding middle-class, professional community who were already attending the school. 'Maximizing efficiency' was presented to the larger community as the rationale for what the school district described as 'restructuring'. Few outside the communities directly affected challenged the closing of schools serving low-income students. That decision was further supported by the dominant assumption justifying this kind of redistribution of students throughout the United States: closer proximity of low-income, African American and non-English speaking children to higher achieving European American, middle class children would help eliminate poor educational performance.
Although the expressed intent of redistributing students was to promote equity, the immediate impact on all the children at the school was devastating. Descriptions of the years 1983-1987 consistently present a picture of a 'school in chaos'. The man I came to know as its principal came to the school in 1987. He was its fifth principal in six years. Although everyone interviewed agreed he was the needed catalyst for change, I discovered that the recognition he achieved throughout the larger community for transforming this school, concealed and negated the collective nature of the school's evolution and development. His elevation to the role of 'hero' exemplified the tendency to think in terms that supported hierarchical and patriarchal models of leadership and change. A kind of heroic metaphor was continually evoked in the local community and among reformers in other regions of the country familiar with his work, presenting an image of an individual, striking out alone, taking risks in challenging the status quo. This myth did not, however, accurately represent the process described either by the principal himself, teachers, or information in archival data. One teacher expressed a concern for the larger consequences of not recognizing the collaborative nature of the school's evolution:
These instances of collaboration and joint effort are not taught in our schools, are not held up as an important way things happen and are organized and happen. And it has social implications and class implications for opening up and being inclusive. This has implications for narrowing down and excluding. And we're so well trained, and I do mean in the educational trained way, that even when it happens this way, we can't see it.
Every teacher interviewed, recognized that although the principal's commitment to supporting diversity was central to engaging the staff in creating new programs and structures, he was not the person responsible for the development of inclusive programs. One teacher described the role the principal played in the following way:
He really had a vision for kids and especially for the school. But, it was not at that time clear, because it wasn't clear to any of us where exactly this road was going that we were on, or at least he never laid it out to us, . . . We [ emphasis mine] just kind of happened upon it.
His most significant contribution was recruiting and retaining teachers interested in actively shaping the school by working in collaboration with one another. Those unwilling to accept the compromises to their autonomy required by collaborative arrangements left the school and were replaced by others. By 1990, teachers who had substantive disagreements with him, including discomfort with exploring racism and sexism in their own practise and/or a lack of enthusiasm for experimentation, collaboration and inclusion, transferred to other schools or retired.
The evolution of a collaborative community
Common sense solutions
Structural changes evolved alongside curricular reforms to support the diversity among students who began coming to the school in 1983. Many of these new students were eligible to receive remedial instructional services or were classified for special education. In 1983, students identified as having 'significant management needs' were placed in one of two self-contained special education classrooms. Others were integrated into general education classrooms, but left their classmates for periods of time every day, to receive what were called 'pull-outs'. These services included programs in English as a second language ; special education; remedial reading and/or mathematics; speech therapy and/or counseling.
As they passed through the halls on their way to pull-outs, some students disrupted classrooms, playing loudly or fighting with one another. Others never arrived at their destination. The principal and teachers interviewed believed that removing children from the classroom to receive support services fragmented children's learning and interfered with their belonging to a classroom community. Because the majority of these students were children of colour, they also believed this practise reinforced racist stereotypes among other children, teachers and families. In 1988, after one year at the school, the principal eliminated pull-outs and separate classrooms for children classified for special education or those receiving instruction in English as a second language. He stopped fighting among those children bused to school from other neighborhoods by ending their waiting in lines for their buses to arrive. Instead, students remained in their classrooms until called. Chaos in the cafeteria came to an end when all children and their teachers began eating lunch together, in their respective classrooms. For those interviewed, these 'common sense' solutions were perceived as supporting the central role of the classroom and the classroom teacher in providing a 'supportive learning community'.
Blended services
The teachers interviewed were among those who came to the school during the principal's first two years. They initiated co-teaching arrangements among themselves to support diversity among the children in their classrooms. In 1988, three fifth grade teachers began working together, pooling their expertise in language arts and mathematics to develop inclusive approaches to group instruction they would eventually share with other teachers at staff meetings.
That year we truly did a lot of what I would call team teaching. It really came about because of personalities. Probably one of the best teaching years I've ever had in my life. It was the first year we stopped grouping by ability. [the three of us] began to do a lot of shared grouping around children's interests.
A teacher of English as a second language described another collaboration that began that same year:
I don't know how it got started, but [the two kindergarten teachers and I], were already working together . . . we literally stumbled upon it. It was right in front of us, and we can find a number of things in the literature that support this. But it was the kids sitting there in front of us that got us to think, that if I'm working with kids from both classes, if we know a week ahead of time what's going to happen in the class the following week, I can work with kids on that and then they will know what's going on, participate better and be successful. And we tried it again and again, and eventually, over time, we got this thing going that now is the model we use.
The principal supported these and other experiments. Workshops and discussion sessions were arranged to explore and expand upon teacher initiatives. During whole school sessions, which sometimes took place at night, occasionally on weekends, and in the summer months, and which generally included food, the staff came together to share new ideas from research, courses and workshops, as well as their own experiences. In 1992, a school-wide pilot project was initiated. In small study groups, teachers examined how their own values and assumptions shaped their understanding of children. These discussion groups continued throughout the year and remain an integral component of staff development at the school.
The blended services model that supports the placement of children with special educational needs in general education classrooms evolved from these and other teacher initiatives and, as I was continually told, was still 'in process'. Every classroom now has both a 'lead teacher' and a 'collaborator', who is either a teaching specialist (certified special education, ESL, reading or mathematics teachers, or speech and language pathologists) or paraprofessional. In addition to sharing responsibility for classroom instruction, they select books, materials and plan activities together. The personal relationships between teachers and collaborators and their commitment to inclusion was continually cited as central to their ability to resolve philosophical and personal differences. Among these was the need for some teachers to reconsider their opposition to direct instruction in specific skills with individual children. Although this is still a contentious issue, many have come to appreciate how their use of direct instruction supports the primary value of the school's culture: whatever is 'best for children' should be at the centre of their collective decisions.
Depending on children's needs, some classrooms may have as many as three adults working together. Lead teachers and collaborators remain with the same group of children for two years, through a process known as 'looping' (LAB 1997). Decisions regarding children's placement in specific classrooms are made collaboratively by teachers representing each of three, grade-level teams (kindergarten and first grade; second and third grade; fourth and fifth grade). These decisions are made in consultation with parents and require administrative approval. However, because eligibility for special education is determined by the district-level Committee on Special Education (CSE), the central school district also exerts considerable influence on classroom configurations. The numbers of children and the nature of their needs determines the numbers and qualifications of collaborative teachers and paraprofessionals assigned to the school. These district-level decisions require compromises by each grade level team regarding which child is placed in which classroom and which adults work together.
Collaboration, compromise and empowerment
All other practices and structures at the school are designed to support and are supported by the blended services model. The dramatic response of the school community was, therefore, not surprising when the new superintendent who came to the school district in 1996 began challenging the school's assessment system. Her agenda reflected shifting priorities in state- and national-level educational reforms that had begun a few years earlier when a newly elected conservative governor appointed a new state commissioner of education. Although federal and state regulations continued to mandate racial integration and the inclusion of children classified for special education in general education settings, newer reforms focused on accountability through developing and assessing a uniform set of educational standards for all children. The contradictions between these new demands and earlier state and local-level support for learner-centered approaches to curriculum and assessment threatened the continuation of the school's inclusive culture.
Unaware of the school's history, and in response to new state-level demands, the new district superintendent required this and every other elementary school in the district to use a uniform, skills-based, developmental checklist as a report card for all first and second graders. The superintendent believed that imposing more rigorous standards would help the school improve poor performance on state-wide standardized reading tests. She did not, however, consider that although this school had the largest number of non-English speaking children and the second largest population of minority children from low-income families, a smaller percentage of children were classified for special education in this school than in others in the district. The relationship between scores on standardized tests and the number of students classified for special education was significant. Test scores of children classified for special education were not averaged with others in determining a school's composite scores. However, to avoid stigmatizing children and because every child's individual goals were established through the narrative assessment process and addressed in regular classrooms, students in this school who may have met the state criteria for classification as having a mild handicapping condition, were generally not referred by teachers. Not identifying children as in need of special education, and including every child's test scores penalized the school by lowering its composite scores on state tests.
Because the new report card was not directed at reporting children's strengths, interests and goals, as was the assessment system they had been using, teachers saw it as a 'violation of our culture'. The initial response of some was open resistance to and defiance of the superintendent's directive. There were public demonstrations and a sit-in at the superintendent's office by a small group of parents, some of whom were also teachers at the school. Although teachers appreciated parental support, many realized that direct opposition to a directive from the superintendent could be defined as an act of insubordination and might lead to dismissal or reassignment of teachers. Knowing this, they convinced parents to join with them in formal negotiations with the school district through the site-based council. During that time, I interviewed the superintendent, assistant superintendent and other administrators; I also spoke with teachers, parents and children about the new report card.
In spite of collaborative processes and a collective commitment to inclusion, the school's position of relative powerlessness within a bureaucratic system required strategically developed compromises. Rather than evidence of weakness or complicity, these compromises eventually allowed teachers to sustain the culture of their school. This process illustrated what Weiler (1988) described as the 'dialectical relationship between structural forces and consciousness or agency ' (1988: 102) needed by individuals to maintain some degree of autonomy when operating within a bureaucratic system from a position of relative powerlessness. Recognizing their position within the system, teachers called on the collaborative processes they had created over the years. Working with parents and the central administration throughout the year (1996- 1997), they eventually secured a three-year waiver allowing the narrative reporting system to continue.
The waiver required modifications to the narrative reporting system. Students' achievements had to be aligned with newly adopted state-wide standards. To meet this requirement, parents, teachers and administrators came together to develop rubrics and performance standards consistent with both state standards and the constructivist curriculum used at the school. Some teachers and parents believed that performance standards and rubrics contradicted the basic beliefs of the school . However, others saw the addition of performance standards as an improvement . These parents and teachers focused on the political and social realities facing the school and its children. They believed that not acknowledging state-wide standards would jeopardize the school, as well as fail to prepare students to meet the expectations of the dominant culture (Delpit 1995). That, they argued, would violate the core value of the school, the 'bottom line . . . a general view of children; that children come first'.
Technical aspects of the narrative assessment process were changed, but these alterations had minimal impact on curriculum or instruction. The two major changes that resulted were:
1. The goals established at goal setting conferences became tied to state standards.
2. The written narrative reports sent to parents during the year were modified to become more manageable for teachers.
During the revision process, teachers also examined their instructional approaches. They agreed to take a more eclectic approach to literacy instruction and begin integrating direct instruction in phonemic awareness and guided reading into their reading programs. They began an evaluation of the revised narrative assessment process to investigate how well the process fulfilled the needs of teachers, parents, and the school district, in reporting student progress. Teachers were also asked to develop methods to assure a reliable continuum in the assessment process as children move from the developmental approach of the primary grades to the more academic focus of an intermediate curriculum. These components of the evaluation and revision process are being carried out now.
Conclusion
The teachers at the school described in this paper share a belief in the constructivist pedagogies central to progressive teaching practises. However, their commitment to inclusive education superseded their commitment to pedagogical purity. This commitment led to their redefinition of 'child-centeredness'. One teacher offered his understanding of child-centered teaching in the following statement:
. . . we started to look at what the kids needed, and how there could be entry points for the kids who were special ed. or ESL. And we started to modify our teaching in order to meet their needs, versus how we could fit them into some kind of thing.
The decision to add rubrics and performance standards to the narrative assessment process, illustrates teachers' recognition of the need for both skills and process approaches in an inclusive school.
The story of this school's evolution also demonstrates that no one individual can be responsible for creating or sustaining an inclusive school. A commitment to supporting diversity among students requires the development of collaborative processes that, in turn, require internal and external compromises by teachers. As one teacher explained, some of her colleagues were initially, ' . . very territorial, my kids and your kids'. However, through an ongoing and collaborative process of critical self-examination, they realized both that any teacher could teach any child and that collaborative teaching could enhance what went on in every classroom. Student and teacher autonomy was not diminished in the process, but rather, enhanced. The teachers at this school believe that collaboration enriches individual teaching. Their collective strength was most evident in their ability to negotiate with the central school district administration. With the support of their principal, they were able to create and then, on their own, sustain a collaborative culture that empowered both children and adults.
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