Institutional stories and self‐stories: investigating peer interpretations of significant disability

Abstract

This paper describes the data collected from a study that examined the participation of two students with significant disabilities in separate settings — a first‐grade classroom and a high school. Interweaving several theoretical strands — disability studies, narrative theory and socio‐cultural perspectives on learning — it incorporates an understanding of relations between students with significant disabilities and their peers that centralizes the context within which they occur. It appropriates the argument of Ferguson in 2003 that the narratives of others are critical to the development of individuals with significant disabilities and explores its meaning within the classroom. In doing thus, it implicates the institutional arrangements in each educational setting, documenting the nature of student relations that are engendered by them. Simultaneously, it draws attention to the inseparable connection between the shaping of individual student identities and the participation of classmates with severe disabilities. The author suggests that while an institutional narrative that fosters community values can offer students greater opportunities to engage in mutually empowering relations with a peer who has significant disabilities, students also require effective mediation in the classroom to remain in meaningful engagement with him/her.