Teacher Educators’ Self-Reported Preparedness to Teach Students With Special Educational Needs in Higher Education

Abstract

This research explores teacher educators’ self-reported preparedness to teach students with special educational needs. Teacher educators are concerned with preparing the next generation of teachers who will, in turn, be addressing the needs of students with special educational needs within schools. Being able to address this important task also in their own teaching at the teacher education program is important for their own credibility. In total, 104 teacher educators at two university faculties completed an online questionnaire with questions about teaching students with special education needs. The results showed a significant difference between the educators’ self-reported professional development needs. At University B, educators rated their own competence as well as the organizational ability to meet students with special educational needs higher than educators at University A, regardless of disability. One explanation for the differences in self-rated competence might be due to the mandatory courses about how to teach students with special educational needs, shaping a community of practice with a shared knowledge among the teacher educators at University B. However, the experienced challenge lies in difficulties to transform the knowledge of what is required and expected into practical solutions for teaching students with special educational needs. Keywords: disability research, inclusive teaching, professional development, special educational needs, teacher education.

Exploring Current Trends in Education: A Review of Research Topics in the Problems of Education in the 21st Century Journal

“…The authors point to the need of bridging the theory to practice gap in special education. Another study was aimed at exploring teachers' preparedness to teach students with special education needs (Holmqvist et al, 2019). The results of this study are related to the professional development of teachers.…”

Inclusión en educación superior: Un análisis de tendencias desde la perspectiva bibliométrica

“…Acá se destaca la importancia de eliminar la falta de conocimiento, capacitación y conciencia de la discapacidad por parte de los docentes, mediante el establecimiento de iniciativas de desarrollo efectivas centradas en la enseñanza y el aprendizaje accesible. En este grupo, se resaltan las capacitaciones como medio de desarrollo de prácticas inclusivas en los docentes que se enfrentan al desafío de enseñar a estudiantes con necesidades educativas especiales y discapacidades, y a su vez, la promoción de habilidades inclusivas desde la formación académica de los estudiantes que en un futuro se desempeñarán como docentes, con el fin de que estos eviten la enseñanza segregada (Coates et al, 2020;Holmqvist et al, 2019;Marquis et al, 2016;Moriña et al, 2019).…”

En språkverkstad för alla?

“…Resultatet indikerar att kunskap om studiesvårigheter inte sprids vidare till kollegor eller används i mötet med alla studenter och universitetslärare, och att det i sin tur har att göra med synen på språkverkstaden som verksamhet. Språkverkstadspedagogernas motstånd mot att betraktas som en stödfunktion eller en service till universitetslärare kan tolkas som att språkverkstaden används som ett slags reservsystem för de studenter universitetslärare själva inte vill eller kan hantera med sin egen repertoar av kunskaper (se Anderson et al, 2018;Holmqvist, et al, 2019;Melander, 2020).…”