Background: School lockdown in Germany in spring 2020. There is evidence that the pandemic might have negative impact on childrens'/adolescents' mental health and well-being. Currently there is no evidence about specific problems of children/adolescents with special educational needs in emotional and behavioral disorders (E/BD) during or after the school lockdown. Research question: How was the students' emotional and social development (ESD) affected during the school lockdown? Are there differences between students with and without E/BD? Which predictors moderate these effects? Methods: A sample of N = 224 students across Germany were rated by their teachers in an online survey. Standardised teacher-report forms for rating of behavioral problems and competences as well as for perceptions of inclusion were administered both for the current situation and for a retrospective evaluation. Students' socio-demographic data, information on students' psycho-social situation, and aspects of teachers' educational relationship and contact during lockdown were included as predictors. Hierarchical linear regression was applied for each dependent variable. Results: Marginal impact of the school lockdown on E/BD with small differences between groups. Strongest predicting variable was students' psycho-social situation. Small protective effects of educational relationship were found for some dependent variables. Conclusions: In average we found rather marginal effects on students' ESD than severe issues. However, psycho-social situation of students should be monitored by teachers and school psychologists to provide sufficient support during lockdown situation.

Given the pandemic-induced school lockdown in Germany in the spring of 2020, COVID-19 evidently had a negative impact on child and adolescent mental health and wellbeing. However, there is no evidence regarding the specific problems of students with special educational needs in emotional and behavioral disorders (E/BD) during or after the school lockdown. Thus, this study bridges the gap. A sample of 173 students across Germany was included in the analysis. The students were rated by their teachers in an online survey via a standardized teacher-report form for emotional and behavioral problems and competencies, as well as perceptions of inclusion. Several student- and teacher-level predictors were applied in a stepwise regression analysis. The results showed that the school lockdown marginally impacted E/BD, with small differences between student groups. The strongest predicting variable was students’ psychosocial situation. Hence, the psychosocial situation of students should be monitored by teachers and school psychologists to provide sufficient support during lockdown.

This survey aims to investigate the beliefs and self-efficacy of preservice teachers in Rhineland-Palatinate, Germany, concerning inclusive education. There were 491 people who participated in the study. The future teachers responded to a slightly modified questionnaire by Kopp (2009) using case descriptions of pupils with different educational needs to assess attitudes toward inclusion and self-efficacy in inclusive classroom settings. Results show a general effect of the intended type of school on inclusive beliefs and self-efficacy with significant differences between future teachers. Preservice teachers for special needs school rated highest in inclusive beliefs, and self-efficacy secondary school teachers and academic high school teachers lowest. The intended profession also plays a role in rating the readiness for inclusion of the presented case examples. In the eyes of future teachers, children with intellectual disabilities and complex special needs should be educated in special needs schools.

The individual-medical concept of disability, whereby disability is believed to be caused by some intractable impairment, is perhaps the most widely held view in society. However, other concepts exist with which teachers in inclusive schools should be familiar (e.g., social, systemic), to better inform teacher behavior, attitudes and understanding. We therefore developed an instrument to capture education students’ concepts of disability. We constructed the questionnaire according to four theoretical models of disability (individual-medical, social, systemic, and cultural concepts), which are commonly used in inclusive teacher education, and validated this on a sample of 775 education students. Additionally, we administered the Attitudes towards Inclusion Scale (AIS) and measured key demographic variables. The instruments, data and analysis code used are available online at https://osf.io/dm4cs/. After dropping redundant items, a shortened form of the questionnaire contained 16 items, with satisfactory psychometric values for scales pertaining to four concepts of disability (CFI = 0.963, TLI = 0.955, RMSEA = 0.037, SRMR = 0.039). These four concepts of disability showed small correlations with the AIS, indicating that our questionnaire measured an independent construct. The more experience education students had with disability and the more courses they had attended on inclusive education, the more likely they were to agree with the social concept of disability. The questionnaire shows promise in measuring concepts of disability and might be used to stimulate students’ critical reflection during teacher education.

School improvement research describes school leaders as important agents for school development (Leithwood et al., 2008;Thapa et al., 2013). To implement inclusive education, reviews stress the crucial role of strong, supportive, and distributed leadership practices that focus on developing shared visions and values (Ainscow, 2016;