INCLUSION: SECONDARY TEACHER ATTITUDES TOWARD INCLUSION OF STUDENTS WITH SPECIAL NEEDS INTO REGULAR CLASSROOMS
Research findings demonstrate that findings related to the topic of teacher attitudes toward inclusion are mixed and studies of secondary school teacher attitudes are few in number. In addition, findings show that these attitudes are related to factors such as teacher experience, training, support, and age, and student disability and behavior. Study findings have also demonstrated that there are differences between general and special education teacher attitudes.
Since research findings regarding the topic of inclusion are inconsistent or lacking, a study is needed to further examine secondary school teacher attitudes toward inclusion with a focus on differences between general education and special education teachers and related factors. If inclusion is the way of the future in educating students with special needs than we as educators need and must understand the attitudes all teachers have toward this trend. Such placement of all students receiving special needs services would carry a tremendous impact on everyone associated with the field of education. Especially teachers would be required to make major adjustments if students of special needs are included in general education classrooms. As Cochran (1998) indicated inclusion would mean that all teachers become teachers of special needs students. This makes it crucial to understand teachers' attitudes towards inclusion because teachers' attitudes are captious to the success or defeat of this trend. This in turns impacts the success of students with special needs. Thus the need to for this study is imperative to assess teachers' attitudes and to gain accurate data that can provide insight to assist the inevitable trend towards inclusionary education. Thus the goal of this researcher for this study is to contribute to the body of knowledge on inclusion an...