An analysis of alterity in teachers’ inclusive pedagogical practices

ABSTRACT

This investigation contributes to understanding how teachers reflect on the other with a disability and on their own practices. Literature suggests that inclusion takes place when barriers are removed, allowing participation. However, scholars agree that teachers still struggle with pedagogical practices in inclusive classrooms. Hansen (Hansen, J. H. 2012. “Limits to Inclusion.” International Journal of Inclusive Education 16 (1): 89–98) contends that teachers establish limits to inclusion in order to manage the level of diversity, arguing that the limits depend on the teacher’s understanding of disability. This article examines German secondary school teachers, who reflect on inclusive pedagogical practices and their relationship to learners with disabilities. The analysis shows that most teachers add levels of complexity when constructing the disability’s identity. Teachers struggled with the notion of limitation associated with disability and with the discovery of the other, with new learning skills and abilities. Interactions with learners with a disability open new venues to practice inclusion and encourage participation, but this requires a change in practices; yet, not all teachers feel prepared to do that. Teachers offered various rationales on why they applied limits to inclusion; those rationales are rooted in how they interpret disability and their own roles as teachers.

KEYWORDS:

• Alterity
• pedagogical practices
• disability identity
• inclusion
• secondary school

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes on contributor

Johanna Sagner-Tapia is currently a researcher at the Universidad de la Frontera in Temuco, Chile. She received a degree in Special Education from the Universidad Austral in Chile and also holds a Master’s Degree in Social Anthropology from the Universidad de Chile. She completed her doctoral degree in 2014 at the Eberhard Karls University of Tuebingen, Germany. Her research focuses on disability, alterity theory, inclusion, and diversity.

ORCID

Johanna Sagner-Tapia http://orcid.org/0000-0003-1550-8512

Notes

1. The participant teachers belonged to a Realschule, Werkrealschule, and a Special School for visual disability. The Realschule and the Werkrealschule emphasise technical learning.

2. The most common cooperation programme between mainstream and special schools. AK are regular special school classes placed in a mainstream establishment. Integration in this programme is based on the participation of AK pupils in certain lessons with the general class.

3. This was a special school for the visually disabled, which included young people with SEN who went to the neighbouring Realschule.

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by Universidad de La Frontera [Grant Number Diufro DI16-0093].