Special Teachers’ Educational Responses in Supporting Students with Special Educational Needs (SEN) in the Domain of Social Skills Development

Abstract

The acquisition of appropriate social skills is considered critical for a person’s social development and personal well-being. This consideration is far more crucial in the area of inclusive education, where the development of social skills in children with SEN has been associated with academic progress, social inclusion and successful transition to adult life. Special teachers are considered to be critical agents in designing and implementing school-based interventions targeting at the social development of students with SEN. The aim of this qualitative study was to explore the responses of forty (40) Greek special education teachers about dealing with the difficulties experienced by students with SEN in the social domain. Data were gathered through semi-structured interviews and were coded and analysed according to the principles of the inductive data-driven analysis approach. The analysis revealed that special teachers had to respond to a wide range of difficulties concerning the students’ social skills that were mainly associated with the formation and maintenance of peer relations, the development of assertion, self-management, compliance and academic related skills. The participant teachers used a repertoire of strategies. However, their responses were not a part of a systematic social skills programming. Furthermore, many participants did not consider themselves efficient enough to create and implement such programmes. The paper concludes by highlighting the need to advance the initial training and professional development programmes of special teachers by incorporating courses related to designing and implementing multi-layered and holistic school-based interventions targeting at the social skills development of students with SEN.

Keywords:

• educational practices
• school-based interventions
• social skills
• social development
• social inclusion
• SEN
• special-inclusive education
• special teachers
• special educational needs

Acknowledgement

The findings reported here are based on research conducted as part of a small-scaled project on “Social and emotional difficulties of students attending resource room settings: The perspective(s) of special education teachers” funded by The Research Committee of the University of Thessaly under the Grant No. 4088.08.01 to the authors of this paper, and no restrictions have been imposed on free access to, or publication of, the research data. The content of this publication does not necessarily reflect the views or policies of the Research Committee nor does mention of trade names, commercial products, or organisations imply endorsement by the Research Committee. Opinions reflect those of the author(s) and do not necessarily reflect those of the funding agency (ies).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Research Committee of the University of Thessaly [grant number 4088.08.01].