Claes Nilholm´s blog 2019

Skrivet 2019-05-20 08:59

It is interesting, and not least, puzzling, to compare how the European Commission looks at the role of education in a democratic society in a recently adopted policy document compared to the picture that appears in the declaration of the new Swedish government.

Both the policy document from the European Commission and the declaration from the new Swedish Government take their point of departure in the threats that exist towards democracy from populism and extremism but end up in quite different conclusions regarding the role of education in counteracting these threats.

The European Commission and inclusion

The European Commission's position is that inclusion is an essential part of the solution to the above-mentioned problems. By including students with different backgrounds and prerequisites in the school, a breeding ground is created to maintain and develop a democratic society. Inclusion is here a plus word, that is, it is not an empirical question whether inclusion is good or not

Inclusion is given a significant importance by the European commission and is seen as encompassing society as a whole and not only schooling. In terms of the school, the concept concerns all students and not only students with disabilities. The European commission also refers to the fact that Member States can (voluntarily) contact the European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education to develop a more inclusive school system. European Agency writes on its website: “Our ultimate vision for inclusive education systems is to ensure that all age groups are provided with meaningful, high-quality educational opportunities in their local community alongside their peers”. Thus what comes close to an understanding of inclusion as building communities is proposed.

In this context, it may be interesting to note that the European Commission has also staged a program for the development of cooperation in the classroom. How then does the Swedish government see the role of education in countering the threat scenario described above? Before embarking on this issue, it may be important to put it in a historical context.

The Swedish education system has gone from being seen as an international forerunner, not least because of its earlier high degree of equity in combination with good performances in international comparisons of learning. Today, considerably more modest performances are interspersed with an alarming degree of decreasing equity. It should be added that confidence in the system, not least in the important link of politician-teacher, is at a very low level.

The declaration from the new Swedish government statement

Against the background that has been outlined, it will of course be of great interest to look at how the Swedish government views the role of education in society when one now gets the opportunity to formulate a governmental declaration.

The focus of the statement is that the school's most important task is to "restore our country as the foremost knowledge nation". This is to be done by improving the fulfillment of the knowledge goals by the students. It is also stated that the equity that has been eroded will increase (unclear how) and that all pupils should get "an honest chance".

Here is not the place to go through everything that is said, but the text can be said to emphasize the importance of all students reaching the knowledge goals and that the school should be a safe environment. It is not at all wrong with these requirements, but the document is not least interesting for what it does not mention. Words such as democracy, citizen and inclusion, which come back many times in the form of plus words in the document of the European Commission document, are absent.

However, we can find a reverberation of the recent political discussions that "inclusion has gone too far". It is stated in declaration from the Swedish government that: "It will be easier to get special support in smaller teaching groups" and further: "Resource schools should be developed and special program for students with intellectual disabilities shall be strengthened".

Such a statement about an increase in the proportion of segregated education in the Swedish school system comes a little bit unexpected, not least in the light of international declarations signed by Sweden (e.g. the Salamanca Declaration) and in view of how the European Commission approaches this issue.

Concluding comment

The Swedish educational researcher Tomas Englund has said that the policy of a part of the Swedish bourgeois has been involved in a striving for "the paradise lost". The paradise lost is in this case the school as it looked before the internationally renowned unit school was introduced. To a large extent, one has succeeded in implementing such an education policy as by now.

The Swedish school has increasingly taken the form of a parallel school system where pupils with similar backgrounds meet each other in the classrooms and where the focus is on strengthening the nation and the labor market's needs and not on citizenship and democracy. In that light, it seems logical to also exclude the students who, late, if ever, have gained access to the regular classrooms.

The outcome when students in different types of difficulties are placed in ordinary classes depends on how this placement is arranged. One can choose to try to develop more inclusive environments or to pass certain pupils to special groups and it is the latter solution that is presented in the declaration from the government.

No one (at least very few) believes that it is possible to place all students in the usual classroom. However, one way to get as many people as possible to be there requires that municipalities and schools have a well-thought-out work to meet the diversity of students. David Mitchell's definition of inclusion can be a benchmark here:

Inclusive education = V + P + 5As + S + R + L V = Vision; P = Placement; 5As = Adapted Curriculum, Adapted Assessment,Adapted Teaching, Acceptance, Access, S = Support; R = Resources; L = Leadership.

Those students who do not function in the ordinary classroom, even when there is a vision of inclusion, good leadership, support, resources and more are probably difficult to include in a genuine sense. Today, however, special educational groups and resource schools are filled by students because the regular classroom has failde to provide the conditions mentioned by Mitchell.

I believe there is a risk that a dust hatch will be opened with the new declaration from the government and that we will witness a substantial growth of segregated education in the Swedish school system. Creating smaller teaching groups is probably a far less challenging task than making the usual teaching more inclusive.

Mitchell, D. 2008. What Really Works in Special Needs and Inclusive Education: Using Science-Based Teaching Strategies. London: Routledge.

Skrivet 2019-05-05 19:49

Sometimes researchers are surprised by their results. So were the Dutch researcher de Boer and her co-workers when they made a review of the research of how parents look at "inclusion", or to express it more precisely, the placement of "pupils with special needs" in ordinary classes. I use quotation marks for inclusion to clarify that the researchers use a placement definition of inclusion.

Why were the researchers then surprised? Given that the issue of inclusion in many countries from the beginning was driven by parents of students with disabilities partly in opposition to other parents, they expected to find more positive attitudes to "inclusion" in the former group and more negative in the latter group but this pattern did not emerge in their review.

What were the main results then? A mixed but predominantly positive image emerged in the review. The researchers found 10 studies in which parents' attitudes towards the placement of pupils in need of special support in regular classes were examined. In three of these, only parents to pupils in need of special support were studied, in four only parents of other students and in the three additional studies both groups were studied.

In seven of the studies, the influence of different factors on the attitudes towards “inclusion” were studied, for example the influence of parents' level of education or of the student's type of difficulty. The reviewed studies were divided based on whether they showed a positive, a neutral or a negative attitude to the placement of pupils in need of special support in regular classes.

In none of the studies did negative attitudes prevail according to the criteria used by the researchers. Parents of students other than those in need of special support are described as generally positive towards the placement of pupils in need of special support in regular classes. In one study referred to in the review, 47% of these parents were positive about the placement before it was implemented and 64% after it was implemented. Parents frequently described the social benefits of inclusive education for their own children.

Parents of pupils in need of special support were somewhat more neutral in their attitudes according to the article authors. However, it should be noted that in two of the three studies where the groups are directly compared, parents of pupils in need of special support are actually more positive towards “inclusion”.

A very important point de Boer et al emphasize is that there are many parents of pupils in need of special support who think that their children should go in special groups/schools and who also express concern about the access to support and adapted teaching as well as about the child's emotional development when their children go in regular class. In one study e.g., 54% of these parents thought that they did not think their children should attend regular classes.

Higher education levels among the parents as well as more experience of "inclusion" co-varied with more positive attitudes. Pupils with behavioural problems or severe disabilities were considered, as usual one is inclined to say, to be those who were considered most difficult to place in a regular classroom.

Some questions

There are a number of questions, of which I will discuss three here, that are evoked during the reading of this interesting research review: What conclusions can we really draw from the studies? What more research is needed? How should we understand the outcome in relation to the idea of ​​inclusion?

What conclusions can we draw?

David Mitchell (2008) has presented a model for what is required to create inclusive environments. Mitchell means that it is not enough to place a pupil with special educational needs in a normal class in order for us to be able to talk about inclusion. In this way, he represents a different inclusion concept than the placement definition used by de Boer et al. Mitchell uses the following formula to show what it takes to create inclusive environments:

Inclusive education = V + P + 5As + S + R + L

V = Vision; P = Placement; 5As = Adapted Curriculum, Adapted Assessment,

Adapted Teaching, Acceptance, Access, S = Support; R = Resources; L = Leadership.

Without getting into detail with Mitchell`s model, we can see that, according to him, a lot is required by the learning environment in order for it to become inclusive. A setback with the review of de Boer et al is that it does not specify what kind of environment that respondents in the different studies have experience with.

In other words, the parent who has experience of an "inclusive" environment without vision, with weak leadership and little support, etc. probably has a different attitude to "inclusion" than that which has experience in an environment where the opposites prevail. Not surprisingly, the attitudes differ depending on where studies have been carried out.

That does not mean that we should not take parents ' scepticism seriously and it is a very important contribution by Boer et al to show that such scepticism is quite widespread and more widespread than most researchers thought before they did the review. We must never sacrifice students for a principle. It is of course a terrible experience for a parent to see her/his child in a harmful situation in an "inclusive" environment.

What further research is needed?

The question about inclusion has to a large extent been driven ideologically and too little research has been devoted to how to create inclusive learning environments. If we look at the Mitchell model above, we understand that creating inclusive learning environments is a complex task. There is therefore a need for more research on how to create such environments.

How do we understand the outcome in relation to the issue of inclusion?

The Norwegian researcher Peder Haug, as well as other researchers, have argued that the right of students in difficulties to be placed in a regular group and to be part of a learning community is not an empirical issue but an issue about social justice. From such a perspective, the surveys that de Boers and others are reviewing become questionable: What groups other than students with disabilities can be challenged in this way? Is a reasonable question from such a perspective.

From the standpoint of inclusion, it is also rewarding that these students by many respondents seemed to be seen as bringing value to the educational environment.

One should however be hesitant to draw general conclusions on difficult issues. Inclusion is often about very vulnerable students and it is important to show great humility rather than getting stuck in locked ideological positions.

In my opinion, we should try to create as inclusive school environments as possible which we will not succeed in if this task is not given priority and taken very seriously. At the same time there are very few who believe that it would be entirely possible to avoid segregated placement for some pupils and this is also clear in the Salamanca declaration refers to (see link). Let us see inclusion as a goal to pursue where needless to say no one can be sacrificed on the way.

De Boer, Anke., Pilj, SJ. & Minnaert, A. (2010) Attitudes of Parents towards Inclusive Education: A Review of the Literature. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 25(2), 165-181.

Mitchell, D. 2008. What Really Works in Special Needs and Inclusive Education: Using Evi-dence-based Teaching Strategies. London: Routledge.

Blog about the Salamanca statement, December 2018: What is meant by "inclusion" in the Salamanca Statement?

Written 12/04/19 14:47

Most researchers have told or in any case heard stories of the following type: "We got five points on our research application last year, then we developed it on the basis of the reviews we got and then we got a four this year, that's really strange…." The central point of this short story is to illustrate that the assessment of quality that is assigned to applications by research councils, foundations and the like, tend to appear quite less systematic than expected.

This blog will thus deal with the assessment of research applications and whether it is possible to assess the quality of such applications. It may seem particularly strange to ask the question at all. Of course, why would such assessments otherwise be made? And the assessments have far-reaching financial consequences, since in many cases a lot of money is distributed. Is it not true that such an activity rests on a secure foundation? A basic requirement for an assessment is that it reliable, that is, the grade we give to an application should not be arbitrary, but independent experts are expected to assess the same application to a great extent in the same way. What does the research say about researchers' ability to assess applications in a uniform manner?

Reliability in the assessment of research applications

Research about the assessment of research applications provide an unusually coherent picture with regard to the ability to achieve reliability in ratings. After analyzing applications to the Australian Research Council in a large project, Marsh e.g. concludes (2008): "Peer reviews lacked reliability". Interestingly, the outcome was no better for applications in the natural sciences than in social sciences and the humanities. In a more recent study mimicking the assessment procedure of the National Institute of Health in the United States, the authors draw the following almost devastating conclusions:

”We examined 43 individual reviewers' ratings and written critiques of the same group of 25 NIH grant applications. Results showed no agreement among reviewers regarding the quality of the applications in either their qualitative or quantitative evaluations. Although all reviewers received the same instructions on how to rate applications and format their written critiques, we also found no agreement in how reviewers "translated" a given number of strengths and weaknesses into a numeric rating.” (Pier et al, 2018).

It seems to be a consistent result in studies of independent assessments of research applications that interrater reliability is on embarrassingly low levels, not least for those who claim that quality can be assessed in this way. Note that I only talk about the reliability, that is, the ability to make similar judgments, and not the more advanced and complex question of validity, which is about whether it really is quality you measure. However, as we know, reliability is a necessary prerequisite for validity, which is why I will stay on the discussion about reliability.

One argument in responding to the fact that independent judgments have low reliability is to argue that panels of experts arrive at better assessments of scientific applications than individual assessors. The idea is then that when all assessors jointly put their perspectives on an application, the final assessment will be better than if each one assesses from their own perspective. I myself have felt quite skeptical in relation to that kind of argumentation since it seems more like a legitimization of a decision-making process than being built upon evidence. We can expect an occurrence of such arguments because it is in the interest of many to show that assessments are made with a process that is exact.

However, I want to warn against arguments that are based only on trust in processes and which are not substantiated by empirical facts. Interestingly, I have found a study by Fogelholma et al. (2012) that examined whether discussion in group panels improve the reliability of assessments of research applications and their conclusion there was: ”This indicates that panel discussions per se did not improve the reliability of the evaluation. These quantitative and experimental data support the conclusion by Obrecht et al., who based their findings on mainly qualitative data”. In fact, Fogelholma and his collaborators recommend that you should not have panels because they are costly without contributing to better reliability.

It should be noted that there seem to be some candidates for how the reliability could increase of which the perhaps most promising to at least raise the reliability somewhat seems to be to have several independent assessors. Other proposals are that researchers should assess applications in areas they really master, which is not the case in e.g. the educational sciences where assessors meet applications in areas they have little knowledge in. It is also the case that if there are many really bad applications the reliability increases. However, the current funding system has meant that universities and colleges, at least in Sweden, arrange work-shops and similar activities with the aim of writing successful research applications, which leads to a reduction in the number of substandard applications.

Conclusions

Thus, research implies that assessments of applications have a very low level of reliability and thus hardly any validity. Further, it seems that panel discussions did not increase reliability when examined systematically. Perhaps I should point out that the reliability (and validity) of research applications is not my research area and it may happen that there is some study that I have missed. I hope the reader who knows of any such study can get in touch with me. Moreover, there is also the possibility that new studies can come that put things in new light.

But what conclusions can you draw if the pattern I found is correct? One obvious conclusion is that researchers who are surprised by the grading of applications as in the example initially have no reason to be surprised. Different assessment of the same application seem to be the rule rather than the exception. Or more generally, the researchers, and there are quite many, who believe that gradings of research applications have an objective character can abandon this idea. Many researchers, including myself, are convinced that we can assess the quality of an application. Facts, however, point to a need for a greater element of humility on this issue.

A second conclusion is about the importance of discussing how research funds should be distributed. Often professional assessments are used because there is no other way that has proven better. If it now turns out that the emperor is naked, we cannot pretend that we do not see it and therefore we should seriously discuss how much resources should be given to peer reviews of applications.

Thirdly, the outcome may not be so surprising upon closer reflection. Researchers simply have very different opinions about what is the most urgent research.

Fourth, and finally, research applications are not the only area where peer-review is conducted. There are many reasons to also discuss the possibilities and limitations of such processes in other contexts.

Fogelholma, M. et al. (2012) Panel discussion does not improve reliability of peer review for medical research grant proposals. Journal of Clinical Epidemiology 65 (2012) 47-52.

Marsh, H., Jayasinghe, U. och Bond, N. (2008) Improving the Peer-Review Process for Grant Applications Reliability, Validity, Bias, and Generalizability. American Psychologist, 63 (3), 160-168.

Pier, E. et al. (2018) Low agreement among reviewers evaluation the same NIH grant proposals. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 115 (12), 2952-2957.

Written 11/03/19 09:41

We cannot include anyone if he/she does not want to be included. On the other hand, we cannot include those that do not adhere to the basic values that inclusion involves. There is a paradox in the inclusion idea which means that inclusion always has its limits, because some do not want to / cannot be included.

To put it in a more personal perspective: No one can force me into a community I don't want to belong to. There are some communities I cannot be included in because I do not share the norms and values ​​of these communities.

An example can further clarify what I mean with the proposition that not everyone can be included. If we mean that inclusion represents an affirmation of equality and a belief in people's equal value, inclusion almost by definition cannot include people who think that people who express a certain form of values or belong to a specific cultural/ethnic group have less human value.

Thus we cannot expect to build communities that include everyone. In the compulsory school, this fundamental paradox is reinforced because the student is obliged to attend. This means that the school must put a lot of effort into trying to include all students. We can nevertheless expect that there will be students who do not want to or that cannot be included in the community.

Paradox 1: Inclusion segregates

The paradox expressed in the title is clearly visible on the global arena. For example, when the EU strives to become more inclusive, it is obvious that everyone does not feel at home in this community. For a long time, it appears that a democratic, socioliberal political project has emerged victorious. Values ​​that have been central to this project are individuals' equal value, human rights, globalism, democracy and, at best, an idea that everyone should feel part of society.

It now seems as if it is an undeniable fact that a relatively large proportion of the populations in many countries do not want or can be included in this socioliberal project. .Instead, they argue for a different set of concerns such as nationalism, ethnocentricity, and traditional values, often involving a desire to live life as it always was lived. In the post-industrial society, structural changes are constantly occurring which break the possibility for people to live the life they want to live. Progress marginalizes groups and individuals. Some who say no to the social-liberal project are xenophobic and others are pure racists but far from everyone. Many simply feel that progress and the good life are not for them.

Personally, I think it is devastating if we do not carefully monitor the fundamental values ​​that are part of the social-liberal project. At the same time, of course, it is fatal if large groups of citizens are emerging who cannot identify with such a project. It can be people who reasonably argue that family and nation are values ​​that have, and should have, significance, and which can at the same time include the idea that nations do not necessarily contradict a commitment to the global, over those who simply feel outside and marginalized to extremes such as racists.

If the fundamental values of society are challenged, it will be even more important to create an inclusive school where pupils with different backgrounds and conditions learn to work and work together and are prepared for the democratic life. This question leads us to paradox 2. The discussion primarily concerns the Swedish school system but is relevant to many other school systems.

Paradox 2: A society that claims to be inclusive has created an increasingly exclusive school system

Ideas about how society should be designed and organized are passed on to new generations, not least through the educational system. Put differently, if we want a society that is inclusive, we must also have a school that is inclusive and that advocates inclusion. The school act states, among other things, that the students should be prepared to participate in society, which presuppose that they are and feel included in the school.

The school today, however, is increasingly resembling the old parallel school system. That is, the high and middle classes tend to gather in the same schools while students from homes where parents have less resources in the form of money and cultural capital end up in others (see link below). Pupils with disabilities, including those from privileged groups, tend to become the short straw. The second paradox means that the need for a more inclusive society is paralleled by a school system that develops in a more segregated direction. This increased segregation involves in Sweden not only the issue about where students are educated but also the educational attainments of students with different backgrounds.

When we more than ever have to create communities in schools for students with different backgrounds, more and more walls are thus created between different groups. As much as freedom of choice, it emerges to be about the FREEDOM TO REMOVE. At a time when schools are to show results, pupils who are not high-performing and who are resource-intensive are seen as a burden in many schools.

At the beginning of the 20th century pupils in need of extra support were described as "an extra weightt" that slowed down the other students' progress. As a lecturer, one could before use this quote to be slightly ironic about the intolerance and constraint of the time and little could be thought that similar ideas would come back with renewed power.

When there is no natural place for pupils with disabilities in the ordinary schools and classrooms, it is natural that parent groups call for special solutions. If diagnoses are then required to gain access to support and resources, the demand for these will also increase.

A final word

There are two different kinds of paradoxes I have discussed. The first one is, so to speak, inevitable, we simply cannot establish inclusion without at the same time excluding someone. However, communities can be made more or less inclusive. The second paradox I discussed is not inevitable. Here it is not a paradox in a logical sense but rather something paradoxical: Politicians and others in Sweden who advocate an inclusive society have made possible the development of an increasingly segregating school system.

Blog about the decrease in inclusion at the system level in Sweden, December 2018: Inclusion at the system level - a challenge

Written 18/02/19 08:33

In the social and educational sciences, it is common to talk about different turns, which means that the research community, or at least parts of it, begins to move in a new direction. One example is the qualitative turn. The qualitative turn meant that many researchers began to get interested in meaning creation and the social agent.

Previously quantitative research had dominated. In this research, one tries to find law-like relations between variables. Phonological training improves learning to read is one example from the educational science field of such relations.

I will briefly describe the most important turns from the second half of the 20th century until today in the educational sciences before returning to the question in the title. It should be noted that the different turns are expressed in different ways in different national contexts and my point of reference is primarily the Swedish research context. However, I believe that the reasoning and distinctions made are relevant to many other national contexts. So let us start with the qualitative turn.

The qualitative turn

I believe that a strong argument for a qualitative turn was that human agency and morality were to a large extent ignored within the framework of quantitative research. Human beings were seen as objects among other objects in a mechanistic worldview. When the view of the human being as an acting and morally responsible subject was increasingly established, the interest in this human being and her/his meaningful interpretation of the world was established. Interpretation to a certain degree replaced measurement.

I believe this shift was not primarily about methodology (quantitative/qualitative) but rather about differences in worldviews, objectivism was to some extent replaced by subjectivism. However, the qualitative turn has been criticized for being too uncritical of society and schooling, not least from those who advocated a critical turn.

The critical turn

Already Marx developed a critical social science. When talking about the critical turn in the educational sciences, one often implies sociologically oriented research which is based on the assumption that society and education are deeply unfair. Thus, it became the researcher's task to criticize the society and the education she/he studied and, at best, also to try to initiate some change.

The critical turn gained momentum through the leftist student movement during the latter part of the 1960s. The class society and colonialism were the main enemies and with time the patriarchal social structures and other power systems have come to be criticized. Sometimes the critical turn has gone hand in hand with the linguistic turn.

The linguistic turn

A basic starting point in the linguistic/communicative turn is that the language is not a transparent tool that reflects the outside world of objects and their relations. On the contrary, language and language use make an active contribution in recreating and renewing the world we live in. Some within the linguistic turn even went so far that it seemed that almost everything was language and / or that the world was created in interaction.

There is a particular risk with the concept of language because it has such a huge metaphorical potential. It is almost too easy to see everything as language, for example, as in the terms "soccer is a language", "the language of clothes" and the "language of the silence", that it is easy to forget all the materiality and practice that is part of the life that provides a framework for language.

It is probably the fact that we see the very construction of meaning as so central to language that we so easily use it as a metaphor for other meaningful phenomena. Maybe this tendency is strengthened when the researchers theorizing the world themselves live their lives in a textual world.

The very idea that language also contributes to the construction of the world means that the linguistic turn easily can be connected to the critical turn, perhaps since both turns take the starting point that the world as it appears is not a natural fact.

The last turn I will present is in some ways even more critical than the critical turn. Before going over to it, it should be noted that there are also connections between the qualitative and the linguistic turn, such as in, for example, ethnomethodology.

The ontological turn

This expression was used by an internationally well-known researcher at a seminar at Uppsala University, but I do not really know how established the expression is. Sometimes this turn, or parts of it, is referred to as post-humanism / postmodernism and can take different forms, ranging from a milder form in which man's rationality is partly deconstructed, over views such as at Bruno Latour´s where objects are seen as actors to approaches where animals are seen as subjects with equal value as human beings. The ontological turn thus involves a radical questioning of human sovereignty.

It is possible to distinguish and name the turns in slightly different ways and also to put them more clearly in a chronological context. It should also be noted that they have co-existed and the quantitative approach has always had a strong position. However, my point here has been to illustrate the occurrence of turns and to briefly describe them. It is now time to return to the question that was asked initially.

One turn too many?

This question can be interpreted in two ways. One the one hand the turns can be seen as an expression of a research community where confusion prevails. If so, we could talk about several turns too many. Many would think that it is important to turn in the right direction and then go on in that direction. However, I do not agree with this because I believe pluralism is an inherent aspect of modern society, therefore we can expect different views and each approach can contribute to our knowledge in different ways.

The other way to interpret the question has to do with the fact that a return to quantitative research seems to be evident in many countries. It is seen by many as a turn too many. The research community should have stayed within other approaches the argument goes. I agree with that objection but certainly not fully. Of course, my position depends on my own theoretical starting points. I consider myself a pragmatist in the sense that I believe that the development of knowledge should be relevant to the development of society and schooling.

In order to avoid misunderstandings, I do mean that research should follow the lead of politicians and school authorities but research should be relevant to the democratically decided goals of schooling. The pluralism in perspectives illustrated above can all be useful in such a pragmatic project.

However, I do not sympathize equally with the different turns, sometimes I have even warned of some elements in them, but everyone contains something important that we should take advantage off. What I see as particularly problematic in my pragmatic perspective, however, is that there are very few encounters between researchers who adhere to different turns.

If we use democracy as a metaphor, the research community in that light can be seen as consisting of different parties that very rarely debate with each other. The metaphor comes out a little bit short because political communication is usually ritualized. It is rarely about genuine discussions. But the educational science research would definitely benefit from different approaches coming into contact with one another.

As mentioned earlier, the quantitative approach in educational research has never disappeared, but seems to have ended up in the background of qualitative and critical research, at least in Sweden, for a relatively long time. The quantitative research share several assumptions with the instrumentalism that characterizes what is usually called New Public Management, which could largely explain the return of the quantitative approach. There are, of course, great risks with such an instrumentalism, which in its worst forms can develop into an anti-humanism.

From my pragmatic perspective, however, the (re)turn of the quantitative appoach can not only be seen as a negative event. It has raised very important questions about the content of research and the relationship of research to practice and has further contributed with a lot of interesting empirical research that have important implications for the work of schools.

In conclusion, it is something of a paradox that the pluralism of perspectives illustrated here rarely leads to deliberative discussions on the content and functions of research. Rather it seems that the many researchers perceive themselves as entrepreneurs whose task it is to drive their own approach forward rather than to engage in a dialogue with the research community.

Skrivet 2019-01-28 08:57

A number of years ago I gave a lecture at one of Sweden's many institutions for teacher education. Afterwards a prospective mathematics teacher came to me and we started discussing different things. I took the opportunity to ask him "Do you get any teaching on special educational issues when learning how to teach Math?" i.e. I was interested to know if, and in what ways, the learning of how to teach math also considered the fact that several pupils experience difficulties in this area. He answer indicated that the prospective Math teachers learned Math, not how to teach it.

I do not mean that this episode is necessarily representative of Swedish teacher eduation in general. However, I believe that the example points to what seems problematic in many contexts. The anecdote illustrates that the teaching of prospective teachers must be developed if they are going to be able to create inclusive classrooms. In order to underpin such teaching more research is needed about how to teach specific contents to pupils of varying ability.

In a school that strives to be inclusive, students with different prerequisites are in the same classroom. As I have described in prior blogs the placement of students in need of special support / with disabilities in ordinary classes is a necessary but not sufficient condition for inclusion. The pupils needs also have to be met in order for schools to be inclusive. This is a great challenge for the teacher, how should you teach students with very different abilities?

It is a fact that a lot of teachers feel uncertain about how to teach pupils in need of special support. Thus, teachers need more knowledge about how they can teach the diversity of students they meet in a school system where special classrooms and special schools are avoided. Further, the special teachers and special educators who support them also need scientifically based knowledge to build their support on. Consequently research is needed which helps to answer the question about how inclusive teaching can be accomplished.

We thus need teaching research that explores how teachers, together with other staff in the school, can be able to meet the diversity of students and the knowledge that such research generates should become a natural element in courses in teacher education. Younger teachers feel a greater uncertainty than those with more experience. It does seem that many of them do not consider that they have received enough knowledge from their teacher training in how to teach a heterogeneous group of students. This problem was illustrated with the anecdote above. If teachers in teacher education neglect didactics a, they probably neglect the needs of the the most vulnerable students' learning too.

A more profound structural problem is the concept of normality that cuts as a knife through the school systems. Historically, the division into normal students and others has given rise to parallel systems, a normal system and a special system. This distinction has been partly re-created in the research, where the teaching of normal pupils was focused in educational research, while questions about the pupils who were considered deviating became an object of special education. A distinction made in the organization of schooling has thus largely been reproduced in research about the school. My point here is that if we want to break this historical trend and create more inclusive schools, research on teaching should be expanded and also include those students who have been the subject of special education. In a similar vein, students in teacher education has to receive knowledge about how they should teach a diversity of pupils.

Skrivet 2019-01-07 09:09

An old dispute issue in the field of special needs education is whether there are teaching methods that are specific to different target groups such as e.g. students with ADHD, students with intellectual disabilities and autism.

You can distinguish two extremes in this discussion. On the one hand, some advocate teaching built upon similarity, which means that pupils' group belongings are considered to have few or no educational implications. On the other hand, we have those who mean that the deficiencies of the target groups need to be mapped out in detail so that we can tailor teaching approaches to suit their needs.

For the sake of simplicity, I will refer to the two approaches as S (Similarity) and D (Difference) in the reminder of this blog.

Similarity as the point of departure

The S-teacher says something like this: "What's good for all students is good for students in need of special support/with medical diagnoses and vice versa." It was this conclusion that I believe John Hattie reached in his overview of educational research. Working methods such as direct teaching and peer learning appeared to be good for all students. In a similar vein, the S-teacher would argue that structure and order in schools, classrooms and lessons, which are usually emphasized as important to students with ADHD and Autism spectrum disorder, is beneficial to all students.

Insightful S-teachers are of course not ignorant of the fact that students are different. However, diversity is seen as a characteristic of individuals rather than as a variety of different kinds. In this way, the S-teacher has to attend to individual difference rather than group differences. Consequently, it is important to have knowledge of each student's specificity.

If a pupil encounters difficulties in school work, the S-teacher advocates a proper educational inquiry where the individual's situation is mapped. The occurrence of a diagnosis is of course not insignificant for such an investigation, but it provides limited information from an educational perspective. It is the individual and his/her teaching environment, including factors such as the teaching and the social climate, that becomes important in such an investigation.

An S-perspective can have very radical implications. If we consider that students are basically the same, it is difficult to argue that some students should be taught in specific groups. Thus, a central question then is how teachers can teach students with different conditions in the same classroom given a certain teaching content.

In other words, how should teachers teach e.g. math / English / gymnastics for students with different prerequisites? Framed differently, how can teachers teach different content in order to create inclusive classrooms? In order to be able to answer such questions in the best way, educational research has to be developed which addresses these types of questions. Unfortunately, such research is too rare.

Difference as the point of departure

The deviation is the starting point for the D-teacher. The question is not "What education is good for the heterogeneous student group?" but instead "How do we teach students with developmental disorder / learning disorder / dyslexia / behavioral disorder / Tourette's syndrome / obsessive-compulsive disorder"? The focus is on tailoring the education to these groups based on their specific characteristics.

It thus becomes important to investigate the deviation itself. Here a lot of research is taking place about, for example, executive functions, working memory and "theory of mind", which strives for a greater understanding of the specific deviations. Knowledge about such deviations, it is argued, will in the long run provide better education for these groups. This research is rarely didactic in the sense of being concerned with a specific knowledge content, but it is of course possible to ask, for example, "Which mathematics education is best for students with ADHD?"

The search for specific problems does not necessarily mean that segregated educational practices are strived for. Some suggest that we need to find out more about how these groups of students process information, etc. in order for them to be taught in the ordinary class.

An empirical question?

In part, the question about similarity or difference is an empirical issue. In order for us to methodologically determine the need for teaching strategies based on difference, we should be able to show that a teaching method X works for the Y group (for example, students with ADHD) in a different way than for "ordinary" students. This is actually quite rare. On the other hand, students in difficulties may often need more education to achieve the same goal, "more of the same."

An example from reading research can highlight this. A special teaching method for pupils with dyslexia would build on the assumption that students with dyslexia learn to decode text in other ways than the other students and thus need to be taught in a qualitatively different way. However, this assumption can hardly be said to be supported by research. On the other hand, students with dyslexia need longer time to learn to read. The difference sees thus to a large extent to be quantitative, more of a similar teaching, than qualitative, the need for another kind of teaching.

There are of course instances where teaching built on difference is necessary. For example, students who are blind need such special education. Seeing students orient themselves naturally easier in the room while pupils who are blind need to train orientation in space in qualitatively different ways, e.g. by learning to use a stick, be more vigilant on sounds and other non-visual perceptual information that seeing students do not need to focus to the same extent.

My own view is that teaching based on similarity takes us quite far but we need more didactic research on how heterogeneous groups can best be taught. Unfortunately several teachers feel more or less helpless when it comes to the task of teaching students whose behavior is considered to interfere with the order in the classroom. In such a situation, it is not uncommon for teachers to ask questions about "how shall I teach students with ADHD". Although research built on difference does not seem to have very many other answers than that it is good with order , structure and consistency and to be encouraging, which is probably good for all students, at least the teachers' concerns are taken seriously.

As long as we to a large extent lack the didactic research that I discussed above, ie didactic research that tries to solve the problem with how heterogeneous student groups are best taught in different subjects, then the demand for teaching methods built on difference will probably increase. One risk of this is that teaching built on difference easily translates into demands for special solutions and sometimes also to working methods that are not the most functional ones.

Moreover, if some students are seen as qualitatively different from other students in their learning, the step is not far to advocate teaching in special groups with educators who have a special knowledge of the group. Education built on difference provides an attractive frame for professional specialization, among other things because some of the high status of medicine comes with the special thinking. Another risk with a starting point in difference is that it conceals the enormous variety that exists within the groups. The pupil with a medical diagnosis then risks being treated based on a stereotype rather than on her/his own individuality.