The influence of child, family, home factors and pre‐school education on the identification of special educational needs at age 10 (original) (raw)
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Aim: This article aims to explore whether labelling children and young people with Special Educational Needs and disabilities is still helpful or whether this leads to more discrimination, exclusion and stigmatisation, according to Becker's labelling theory. Method: Based on reviewing Special Educational Needs literature, this study begins with an exploration of advantages of assigning labels to children and young people with Special Educational Needs, such as determining appropriate provision and extra support. Also, it investigates the tendency of Special Educational Needs labels to negatively affect individuals in various ways such as their educational and employment futures. By considering labelling theory, this paper considers a crucial question in just who has the power to establish and assign labels to children and young people with Special Educational Needs or disabilities? Findings: In a succinct way, findings indicate that conceptualising disability and impairment according to medical and social models allows professionals to classify people with SEN according to normalising judgements of diagnosis and identification. Conclusion: The paper concludes that the drawbacks of SEN labelling seem to outweigh its advantages. Thus, it suggests to change the current label to be more alleviated and harmless.
Education and the schooling of those with 'special needs'
The paper is an extended review of SEN as it was about 1988 - the criticisms that were made seem to me to be still applicable. In the paper, criticisms are made of the survey and quantitative approaches beloved of policy makers. It argues for a more critical approach to 'education' not as the name of a system of schools etc but as a critical perspective on the processes that take place in schools and more widely.
Irish Educational Studies, 2012
Despite dramatic changes in Irish special education policy during the last decade, there is little understanding of the factors influencing how special educational needs (SEN) are identified and whether identification varies across different school contexts. International research has tended to focus on how individual child characteristics influence SEN identification. Less attention has been given to other factors such as teacher characteristics or school social mix. Using data from the nine-year-old cohort of the Growing Up in Ireland study, this article examines which children are most likely to be identified with different SEN types taking into account student social background characteristics, teacher characteristics and school social mix. Findings show that children attending highly disadvantaged school contexts are far more likely to be identified with behavioural problems and less likely to be identified with learning disabilities than children with similar characteristics attending other schools. It seems that 'behavioural' issues take precedence over learning difficulties in these schools pointing to a culture of care/containment rather than academic progress.
BMC Pediatrics, 2014
Background: If the window of opportunity presented by the early years is missed, it becomes increasingly difficult to create a successful life-course. A biopsychosocial model of special educational need with an emphasis on participation and functioning moves the frame of reference from the clinic to the school and the focus from specific conditions to creating supportive environments cognisant of the needs of all children. However, evidence suggests that an emphasis on diagnosed conditions persists and that the needs of children who do not meet these criteria are not identified. The Early Development Instrument (EDI) is a well-validated, teacher-completed population-level measure of five domains of child development. It is uniquely placed, at the interface between health and education, to explore the developmental status of children with additional challenges within a typically developing population. The aim of this study was to examine the extent to which the special educational needs of children in their first year of formal education have been identified.
Grand Challenge: Priorities for Research in Special Educational Needs
Frontiers in Education, 2016
In this paper, I propose some priority areas for research in the field of special educational needs (SEN) and disabilities and some additional challenges regarding conceptualization of SEN. As the term "special educational needs and disabilities (SEND)" is now used in England, that term will also be used as appropriate, particularly with reference to the system rather than children and young people. cOnceptUaliZatiOn OF Sen Conceptualization of SEN is itself a major challenge, with respect to research and also practices. In the past, children with SEN were viewed primarily with respect to disability. Governments either created separate systems or excluded children with a disability from the education available to typically developing children, either deliberately or by default. For example, it was not until the early 1970s that children with severe or profound learning difficulties, including all those with Down syndrome, were eligible for education in England. Lack of financial resources and expertise was, and continues to be, a major challenge in many countries. Recognition of the rights of all children, however, has led to both a substantial development of positive policies, with substantial funding in some countries, and the necessary development of support through training teachers and others. This has spawned a substantial policy-related research agenda for SEN. Research has been shaped by changing conceptualizations of SEN. Over time, a substantial body of work has focused on specific categories of children and young people with respect to diagnostic categories, for example, deafness, Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and mental handicap. Some terms such as mentally handicapped, idiot, imbecile, and educationally subnormal have become unacceptable, considered offensive and demeaning. Other categories, however, have become the foci of substantial research programs, for example, autism spectrum disorders (ASD), dyslexia, attention deficit with hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and specific language impairment (SLI). Diagnosis of these "conditions" has been a key factor in researchers' selection of samples; furthermore, categories have been fundamental to initiatives to identify and make appropriate provision for children and young people that are identified as being exceptional (Norwich, 2014). The use of diagnostic categories has benefits for research by specification of samples on key characteristics. But there are also limitations. First, in reality, many children do not just have one type of SEN but, rather, they often have two or even several (Rutter et al., 1970). Research must therefore consider comorbidity and also gender, age, home language if different from that of the school, and ethnicity, as these are associated variables. For example, there is increasing evidence of the overlap in characteristics of children with language impairment and those with ASD (Dockrell et al., 2015). Second, there is concern about the validity and usefulness of many categories, for example, see the recent examination of the usefulness of the diagnostic category SLI (Bishop, 2014; Reilly et al., 2014). Third, whereas there are strong associations between some types of SEN and certain genetic, chromosomal, perinatal injury, or illness (e.g., rubella) factors, there is now also substantial evidence
Special education needs across the pre-school period
2002
The Early Years Transitions and Special Educational Needs (EYTSEN) project builds on the work of the Effective Provision of Pre-School Education (EPPE) project, a major longitudinal study of a national sample of young children’s progress and development through pre-school and into primary school until the end of Key Stage 1 (age 3+ to 7 years) (Sylva et al., 1999).1 Both the EPPE and EYTSEN research studies are funded by the Df ES. The EYTSEN study explores evidence of possible special educational needs (SEN) amongst preschool children. It uses a range of information to identify children who may be ‘at risk’ in terms of either cognitive or social behavioural development and investigates links with a variety of child, parent and family characteristics. It also describes variations in the policies and provision offered by different pre-school centres designed to support children with special needs. Information for over 2800 children attending 141 pre-school centres selected from five ...