Inclusion In The Classroom

Inclusion in the classroom

Research log - Didactics I

24/10/2012

Instituto Formación Docente Tbó

Sharon Jaimez

INDEX

INTRODUCTION 3

AIMS 3

PROBLEM 4

HYPOTHESIS 5

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK 5

RESEARCH 8

COURSES OF ACTION 10

CONCLUSION 11

BIBLIOGRAPHY 12

INTRODUCTION

Promoting a classroom environment where students can learn from their interaction and experiences is very important. People learn a lot when exchanging experiences and students should learn not only the topic establish in the curricula, but they also must learn to socialize with people from other parts of the city, with other beliefs and other cultures.

In this work we will be dealing with the different points of view about the topic chosen, inclusion. Observations during the lessons and the way students worked were taken into account, and then different strategies were implemented to change the situation and take notes about their progress.

Apart from that, a research was done about inclusion and also about cooperative learning to support our methodology was done. The main information is developed in the theoretical section of this work.

AIMS

As we live in a globalized world, it is important for teenagers to learn how to work in a cooperative way. Deal with problems and solve them in groups is very common in the business field.

The aim of this work is to plan some strategies in order to improve the peer interaction and their cooperative work.

To find a solution to this problem, some research is going to be done in order to determine the main cause for the “division” into subgroups. Being discovered the causes, strategies will be implemented to promote the integration of all the students within the class.

PROBLEM

The topic inclusion was chosen because it was noticed that in the classroom, students tend to divide themselves into subgroups.

We could notice four groups.

• The first one is formed by the students that know English.

• The second one is formed by students who are not excellent but make their best to accomplish the tasks and learn.

• The third is formed by the students that are also not excellent but are so shy that have no oral participation.

• The fourth group is formed by some students that do not pay attention and do not care about the subject.

In the first classes we participated, it was noticed that when students had activities in groups they always formed the same groups as it was mentioned previously.

Another noticeable thing was that their teacher did not realize about this fact, so she did not promote instances to form the groups differently. When a group work was set, there were no criteria to form them, students just joined with the classmates that were next to them. And as it is very common to keep the same place in the classroom during the whole year, they formed the groups always in the same way.

HYPOTHESIS

High-school N°1 is the only high-school that has the “bachillerato” level. In that institution students from the entire city join for at least three years. It has four shifts, and in all of them there are about 500 to 600 students each.

There is variety of people, each of them with their beliefs, their way of dress, their culture and also their way of life. In many cases it is seen that the fact of going to the “Liceo Departamental” where everybody have gone, is a challenge for teenagers. They are in a period of their lives when they really need feel safe, be surrounded by friends and keep a group of people that can support them and give them the necessary stability and strength to go through this important period.

That is way the main hypothesis is that students keep their friends all along the three years. And as all students are from different parts of the city and they have different ways of socialization, they would feel kind of afraid of establish new relationships with their similar.

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

Based on the hypothesis stated, a research about the topic is done in order to support the theories to implement in the practice.

Inclusion:

“In school, inclusion does not occur by placement in the regular class alone, rather it is a desired end-state. It must be created with proper planning, preparation and supports. The goal of inclusion is achieved only when a child is participating in the activities of the class, as a member who belongs, with the supports and services they need. Inclusion is "not" a trade-off of supports and services for placement in the regular class and is not a trade-off of achievement of individual goals.”

“Inclusion is about the quality of children's experience; how they are helped to learn, achieve and participate fully in the life of the school”.

When talking about the inclusion of somebody to a group, it is related with the fact of integrate somebody to something in this case to integrate a person to a group of people.

The inclusion of someone improves solidarity, cooperativism, the development of the self esteem, as the personal and social autonomy. When it is achieved it could be said that the person is able to participate actively and efficiently in the society.

Cooperative learning:

1. “The instructional use of small groups so that students work together to maximize their own and each other’s learning.”

2. “Principles and techniques for helping students work together more effectively.”

The point is that cooperative learning involves more than just asking students to work together in groups. Instead, conscious thought let students make their experiences as successful as possible and take the most advantage of it.

There are some principles in the cooperative learning, here are listed the most important of them.

• Heterogeneous grouping; within the groups students are mixed at random, so they have different sex, ethnicity, social class, religion, personality, age, language proficiency and knowledge.

• Collaborative skills; it refers to the skills needed to work in a group of people. Most of the time the integrants of the groups complement

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