A - THE INCLUSIVE SCHOOLS PROJECT
The general objective of the Institute for Innovation in Education (IIE ) is to "promote, support, stimulate, disseminate and study innovations with a view to creating quality education for all". The UNESCO project Special Needs in the Classroom was therefore perfectly suited to these aims. Permission was given in 1994 for a national project, Inclusive Schools, based on the UNESCO initiative.
I - Overview
The implementation phase of the project was originally scheduled to last one year. In the end it spanned two school years, from 1996 to 1998.
General objectives
The IIE project therefore had two principal aims: on the one hand to disseminate the concepts and practices inherent to the inclusive schooling philosophy, as the UNESCO Resource Pack proposes, and on the other to implement a research project aimed at evaluating the effects of teacher education based on these materials on the classroom practices and on the school's practices.
Procedure
I. The main features of the research project were:
a) strategy/action:
- Translation into Portuguese of UNESCO's Teacher Education Resource Pack - Special Needs in the Classroom and the book Special Needs in the Classroom: A Teacher Education Guide by Prof. Mel Ainscow (UNESCO, 1996) and their publication by the IIE.
- Copying of the videos included in the resource pack and the subtitling in Portuguese of a part of one of these videos (Inclusive Schools - a secondary school in the UK).
- Publication of a leaflet explaining the purpose of the Resource Pack, its principles and teacher education approaches for extended dissemination in the country.
- An intensive workshop (May 1996), during five days, on the use of the resource pack, oriented by the director of the UNESCO project, Prof. Mel Ainscow. This workshop (the first of its kind in Portuguese) included forty people being five from each local team, members of the IIE staff, one staff member from each of the five regional education authorities and some education professionals from the PALOP countries (Portuguese-speaking African countries) and Brazil.
- Protocols between the IIE and five Teacher Education Institutions one in each educational region of the country, establishing the terms of co-operation for the implementation of the project.
- Creation in each teacher education institution, of an action group comprising teachers from the staff and in some cases representatives of the regional education departments (DRE) of the regions involved, plus teachers or senior teaching staff from the schools selected for involvement in the project. Each action group was led by a co-ordinator appointed by the institution from each region.
- Five regional seminars (one in each educational region), in collaboration with the respective DRE and Teacher Education Institution, whose aim was to build awareness of the project and Resource Pack among local educational leaders and administrators.
- School-centred teacher development activities implemented by the action groups and directed at the teachers from the schools selected.
- Regular meetings at IIE involving the local project co-ordinators and the IIE team in order to reflect upon the process of implementation of the project.
- Production and adaptation of instruments for evaluation of the project by the IIE team in collaboration with the co-ordinators of the local action groups, supposed to be used by these teams with the teachers as a part of the process of implementation of the local projects.
- Presentation of a preliminary and a final report of the local project by each of the action groups of the teacher education institutions (with the collaboration of the teachers and heads of the target schools).
- Publication of a final evaluation report by an enlarged IIE team (composed by the project team and three collaborators from the evaluation departments).
b) Project participants:
1) The IIE team, comprising two staff members, acting one as project leader and the other as project co-ordinator.
2) Five teacher education institutions and the action groups they created, namely,
- Higher School of Education from the University of the Algarve, Higher School of Education of Coimbra, Higher School of Education of Portalegre, Higher School of Education of Setubal and Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences from the University of Oporto.
3) Twelve target schools,
- Schools from the various levels of basic education, from 1st to 9th level, selected by the teacher education institutions' action groups of each region. In each of these schools, those involved in the project included regular teachers, support teachers and other teaching staff.
At the end of the first year of activity a meeting was held to exchange feelings and findings on the action implemented, to assess the principal strengths and weaknesses and to put forward proposals relative to the continuation of the project in the following year. Four of the five local projects participate in this meeting, held by the University of Algarve in collaboration with IIE..
In November 1998, a final meeting was held for the evaluation of the project and the discussion of steps to be taken in the future. Professor Mel Ainscow leaded this meeting.
II. Dissemination of inclusive schooling in Portugal
At this stage the strategy adopted comprised:
a) capacitation of teacher educators via skills acquirement workshops based on the UNESCO resource pack;
b) courses for teachers, mainly administered via the in-service teacher education schools association centres operating locally in Portugal or via seminars for groups of teachers from the same school who expressed an interest in the inclusive schooling approach.
When the UNESCO Teacher Education Resource Pack was translated into Portuguese, immediately it aroused considerable interest among teachers, head teachers, teacher trainers and various departments of the Ministry of Education.
The IIE assumed responsibility for dissemination of the resource pack, albeit in accordance with certain criteria for maximising its impact on school life. For instance, training had to be given by a qualified facilitator, and had always to involve more than one teacher in every school. The teacher education local centres were also to be involved in the process.
In the beginning, the teacher educators were those who had participated in the seminar of May 96, co-ordinated by Prof. Mel Ainscow. Later, other teacher education staff were included, qualified at seminars held under the auspices of teacher education schools associations centres and teacher education institutions in various points around the country.
At one point the central Basic Education Department (DEB) requested the IIE to take charge of teacher education for starting their own project. Four one week workshops were held in the country, organised by DEB. The DEB itself subsequently assumed responsibility for the dissemination of the UNESCO Pack, implanting a nation-wide "cascade" in-service teacher education structure targeted at regular and support teachers.
According to IIE statistics, since 1996 some 1500 teachers have been involved in this process (IIE and DEB in-service teacher education workshops around the country)
The concepts involved in inclusive schooling were also disseminated at numerous conferences and seminars held in recent years by teacher education institutions, local councils and schools. The prominence given to inclusive schooling in these events is proof that the education community is developing a real interest in this approach.
The impact of the dissemination of the inclusive schooling approach on classroom work and school organisation has yet to be studied. However, informal contact with the schools does allow us to conclude that mere participation in a seminar does not give sufficient impetus to real change: continued support is also required. This said, in some cases the teaching strategies and concepts presented were put into practice, while some teaching teams have created their own frameworks for support and continuous in-service development activities and are making considerable efforts to make their schools more inclusive.
B - EVALUATION AND CONCLUSIONS
1. Global evaluation of the project involving five teacher training institutes and ten primary schools.
The key question which evaluation of the project seeks to address is:
"What is the contribution of the project to the development of inclusive schooling?"
The answer to this question cannot yet be given conclusively, since the study of the analysis instruments used in different ways by the 5 regional teams is not yet complete. The global study, which has been completed and which is presented in summary form below, was compiled on the basis of the instruments common to the five regions, viz.:
. collective interviews with the teachers of each school;
.
interviews with the representatives of the five action groups working under the
local teacher education institutes;
. analysis of the protocols established
with each institute;
. observation of classroom activities;
. action
plans and local evaluation reports.
The information collated was processed in accordance with the following evaluation benchmarks:
- school organisation
- classroom practices
- training and
supervision
- reflection on practice
- organisation, structure and
development of the project
1.1. School organisation
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. How did the school organize itself for the project? . What effects did the project have on organization? |
1. The most significant measures concern the initiatives taken by teachers towards encountering ways of working together and organising continuous training actions;
2. Significant differences were observed from school to school: in some schools, most teachers joined the project, in others only a minority took part.
3. There was a reduction in the number of teachers involved from the first year to the second year;
4. The involvement of the head teachers was minimal, limited to facilitating the initiatives of the teachers;
5. No concrete measures were taken concerning school-family relations.
1.2. Classroom practices .
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In what ways did teachers work together? . What teaching strategies? . What effects? |
Collaboration between teachers
. Collaboration between teachers essentially consisted of informal exchanges of information;
. The sharing of experiences in more formal terms took place mainly at the teacher education initiatives organised by the action groups;
. A new form of collaboration between regular teachers and support teachers was observed: the latter now worked within the classroom, taking part in all class work;
. In some schools, teacher partnerships were formed, which entailed the sharing of pupils in certain activities.
Teaching/learning strategies
. Strategies implemented included: brainstorming, child-to-child approaches, group work;
. These strategies were not implemented on a school general basis but on the initiative of individual teachers;
. They were shared more in 1st-cycle schools (one teacher for all subjects) than in 2nd- and 3rd-cycle schools (different teachers for different subjects).
Effects on pupils
We were unable to trace a cause-and-effect relationship between the project and pupil achievement. However, some teachers noted that certain pupils, especially those with learning difficulties, recorded improvements in terms of involvement in classroom activities, performance and behaviour.
1.3. Teacher development and supervision
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. What modes and initiatives? . What implementation? |
According to the terms governing the project, in-service teacher
development is the mechanism whereby action is initiated and supervision the
mechanism whereby teacher development activities are seen to be efficient. Once
it had participated in a capacitation course based on the resource pack, each
action group was to bring its skills to the schools and teachers involved in
the project in its area of intervention.
Action consisted of the
organisation of in-service teacher education actions (courses or study
circles). Teacher education sessions were also an opportunity for exchange of
experiences and mutual collaboration; supervision was essentially provided over
the course of teacher education activity.
In the second year, in some
regions, no in-service teacher education initiatives took place and supervision
was minimal.
The resource pack was used in a very flexible manner to
respond to the needs of each group of teachers. All teachers considered it to
be an extremely potent teacher development tool.
1.4. Reflection on practice
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. What modes? . What effects? |
In this section we discuss the following:
. Reflection sessions on practice (which essentially occurred during the courses sessions);
. Self-evaluation (various instruments were used);
. The teachers felt that reflection allowed them to develop awareness of the scope of the project and of the conditions, which had to be created in the school if it was to be properly implemented.
. The most evident effect was that teachers had the chance to air their experiences and feelings to their colleagues. They questioned their own practices and let others question them too, something which until then had never occurred.
1.5. Organisation, structure and development of the project
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. What model? . What implications? |
The project was structured around three levels of intervention:
. National co-ordination - for which the IIE was responsible - comprising the definition of objectives and central strategy (use of the UNESCO resource pack), general organisation of the project, its co-ordination and evaluation, conducted in collaboration with all those involved;
. Regional level: action groups responsible for training, intervention in the schools, giving support and momentum to the project and collaborating in its evaluation;
. The schools (or rather the teachers), whose task was to take part in teacher education in-service activities and take action towards introducing new strategies and trying new approaches to inclusion in their classroom practice and the school environment.
This structure can be defined as both hierarchic and flexible. The action groups played a vital role as they were the real driving forces behind the project. Their activity was approved in the protocols signed by the heads of teacher training institutes and the director of the IIE.
The most relevant aspects here are:
- The structure allowed full impact of the concepts and practice of the resource pack in the initial initiatives of school-centred teacher development via the action of the facilitators involved in the project;
- It gave local institutes the chance to act as regional resource centres for the dissemination of the inclusive schools concepts (though not all institutes assumed this function in the same way);
- It allowed for the existence of local action groups, operating in close proximity to the schools.
There were however some barriers:
. The lack of material resources obstructed the work of the action groups (especially lack of time for work dedicated solely to the project);
. Lack of co-ordination in the evaluation procedures employed by the different action groups;
. Low involvement by head teachers.
2. Conclusions of the Research Project
As of the present phase of evaluation we can draw the following conclusions:
. Teacher education activity was the dominant strand in the project;
. School supervision fell short of the objectives set, due to the lack of working conditions for the action groups, especially in the second year;
. The impact of the project was different from school to school, but in all cases it produced greater co-operation between teachers involved and introduced new teaching/learning strategies in the classroom, especially child-to-child co-operation and the development of work in groups;
. In many schools there was expressed an interest in the future development of the strategies proposed by the project; in some cases these strategies have now caught on in other schools.
C - LESSONS LEARNED
1. What we learned about the implementation of the project
The findings presented above allow us to conclude that the progress made so far is merely the beginning of an extremely complex, and necessarily lengthy, process.
At different moments in the implementation of the Inclusive Schools project, we were able (either with the members of the teacher education institute teams or, more occasionally, the groups of schoolteachers) to reflect on both the barriers currently facing the implementation of an inclusive schooling project in Portuguese schools and the avenues of potential open to us.
Some of these barriers, and much of the potential, are directly related to the structural conditions of the Portuguese education system; other factors stem from the actual process of supervision of each school and its suitability for quality education for all, in terms of the conditions tried and tested in a wide variety of contexts in various countries.
The final evaluation meeting for the Inclusive Schools project, co-ordinated by Prof. Mel Ainscow, constitutes a landmark in the building of awareness of these conditions.
We can now affirm that we learned more from the experience than we could ever have imagined; we know what we should not do and, more importantly, what we can propose to schools wishing to make advances in inclusive schooling.
The most important lessons we learned over the last four years are:
a. The results of a project of this nature are only effective within the perspective of the school as a whole, with change implemented systematically, i.e. with all elements interacting: curriculum and curricular management practices, pupils, parents and community, organisational practices, teachers and evaluation.
b. We need to think, and work, in the long term if the initial professional advances made by the teachers are to be consolidated, and if the project is to be effectively adopted by the school. Therefore, the supervision of teachers should be reinforced throughout the launch phase - one or two school years are insufficient. The seminars on experimentation with the five principles of learning of the UNESCO resource pack are a starting point, fundamental but not of themselves sufficient; accompanying the process of change within the school requires the adoption by the teachers who set inclusion as a priority as well as by the school as a whole.
c. At the construction phase of the project, it is necessary that a substantial amount of time be set aside for the negotiation of the degree of commitment of each of the organisations involved, including government bodies. At the same time the clarification of project objectives by all those who are directly involved, i.e. teachers and senior staff of the schools, is needed. Failure to define objectives and commitment may lead to serious obstacles arising due to the complexity of the undertaking: the co-ordination of different partnerships working on the same type of project but with different ideas and purposes.
d. Another aspect directly related with the above, and which we will also examine when we come to talk of prospects for the future, is the need to give more power to the school - at all levels of the project's development, from conception to direct involvement in management and co-ordination, and to evaluation.
e. It is necessary to eliminate certain problems affecting the Portuguese education system, such as:
These problems affect school culture and are serious barriers to the development of a project, which extends to the school as a whole.
f. The importance of exploiting the potential for innovation of the education system:
- linking different programs and projects, some internal to the school and others proposed by the Ministry of Education, as is the case of the application of the new legislation on autonomy and management and the government ruling on curricular flexibility, from the teacher development school based programs;
- giving momentum, in accordance with the needs of each school, to local structures for in-service teacher education, i.e. school association teacher education centres, to facilitate the construction and implementation of context-based teacher development programs for teachers, head teachers and other education school professionals.
- involving regional education departments in the process, thus guaranteeing effective support and securing the presence of the teachers involved in the respective schools.
2. A new project
The challenge Prof. Mel Ainscow presented to us in the evaluation meeting was taken up by the IIE. This challenge is draw on our acquired experience and on expending more time on examining the conditions likely to facilitate the effective support to schools, which express a clear commitment to the development of inclusive schooling. This means giving more power to the schools.
Acting under the consultancy of Prof. Mel Ainscow`s team, we have decided to launch a new project in this area - Promoting Inclusive Education. This is a follow-up project that combines research and action, or in other words experimentation and systematic reflection on existing practice. The aim is to improve practice, by a firmly based formative assessment process, whereby all participants are both actors and authors of research.
At present three schools are involved in the project. These schools formally asked for IIE support for their school project development and expressed interest in participating in an action-research project and in negotiating a contract of collaboration with IIE. This contract covers senior staff as well as teachers. Its objective is to create the organisational conditions best suited to improve the learning of all pupils, via collaboration and reflection on practice.
The three schools were selected from a number of education communities that have hosted UNESCO school-centred demonstration workshops and afterwards requested the IIE for supporting their changing efforts towards inclusion.
The role of the IIE will be to promote suitable teacher development activities and supervision, and to guarantee the creation of a research team made up of its own staff and external consultants, Prof. Mel Ainscow and Dr. Windyz Ferreira, from the Centre for Educational Needs, University of Manchester.
This team oversees the whole research-action process, leading to the development of innovation within the school, and at the same time seeking to understand how more inclusive practices emerges and can be fostered in the Portuguese school system context.
A design of the project was outlined for the period of three years, from 1999 to 2002, based on the survey of the possibilities existing today in Portuguese educational system and the participant schools.
The first step for the school was to create a co-ordination team including the head of the school. The preparation year was a challenging time, marked by two visits of the consultants from Manchester University, including an intensive seminar for the co-ordinators.
The process is lead by each school and based on the work with the inclusion indicators from the Index for Inclusive Education (2000), adapted to the Portuguese context, witch considers three dimensions of the school life - culture, policies and practices.
The project aims for the improved learning and participation of all pupils
The basic strategy is to use the relevant experience and skills previously acquired in the schools as the background on which to conduct reflection on educational practice. This know-how will be complemented with research findings from other experiments, in Portugal and abroad, on the development of quality schooling for all, particularly those projects based on the UNESCO Resource Pack.
Manchester, 25 July 2000
Ana Maria Bénard da Costa
Isabel Paes
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