Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study

Teacher beliefs are action guiding in the classrooms. Teacher beliefs about inclusive education are thus a crucial pre-requisite for its success. Therefore, those beliefs have to be addressed during the first phase of teacher training. Generally accepted concepts or operationalized definitions would...

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Main Authors: Roswitha Ritter, Antje Wehner, Gertrud Lohaus, Philipp Krämer
Format: Article
Language:English
Published: Frontiers Media S.A. 2019-09-01
Series:Frontiers in Education
Subjects:
Online Access:https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/feduc.2019.00101/full
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author Roswitha Ritter
Antje Wehner
Antje Wehner
Gertrud Lohaus
Philipp Krämer
author_facet Roswitha Ritter
Antje Wehner
Antje Wehner
Gertrud Lohaus
Philipp Krämer
author_sort Roswitha Ritter
collection DOAJ
description Teacher beliefs are action guiding in the classrooms. Teacher beliefs about inclusive education are thus a crucial pre-requisite for its success. Therefore, those beliefs have to be addressed during the first phase of teacher training. Generally accepted concepts or operationalized definitions would be valuable guidelines for pre-service teachers and their educators. However, neither the ones nor the others are available at present. Therefore, pre-service teachers have to fall back on their own beliefs, a rather unexplored notion so far. Within the present study, pre-service teachers' beliefs about inclusive education were assessed before and after an academic seminar. During this academic seminar, participants co-taught in either multi-professional (i.e., one pre-service teacher for special educational needs and one for general education) or mono-professional (i.e., both pre-service teachers for special educational needs or both for general education) teams in inclusive classes of secondary schools. Pre-service teachers' beliefs were assessed with the help of concept-maps, which were created by the participants at two testing times. The concept-maps were analyzed employing graph-theoretical approaches as well as qualitative, summarizing content analysis methods. Results show that pre-service teachers who worked in multi-professional teams expanded their conceptualization of inclusive education to include facets like individualization and differentiation, while pre-service teachers who worked in mono-professional teams displayed no such expansion. Also, the conceptualization of pre-service teachers who worked in mono-professional teams contained a larger percentage of propositions addressing disadvantages and negative consequences of inclusive education. Therefore, it is concluded that multi-professional co-teaching during teacher training helps prepare teachers for successful inclusive education.
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spelling doaj.art-97028dcf07ba4fe7ae27db4ce5bcc3a42022-12-21T19:56:04ZengFrontiers Media S.A.Frontiers in Education2504-284X2019-09-01410.3389/feduc.2019.00101460755Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory StudyRoswitha Ritter0Antje Wehner1Antje Wehner2Gertrud Lohaus3Philipp Krämer4Molecular Plant Research, Biology, School of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Wuppertal, Wuppertal, GermanyMolecular Plant Research, Biology, School of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Wuppertal, Wuppertal, GermanySchool of Education, Institute of Educational Research, University of Wuppertal, Wuppertal, GermanyMolecular Plant Research, Biology, School of Mathematics and Natural Sciences, University of Wuppertal, Wuppertal, GermanySchool of Education, Institute of Educational Research, University of Wuppertal, Wuppertal, GermanyTeacher beliefs are action guiding in the classrooms. Teacher beliefs about inclusive education are thus a crucial pre-requisite for its success. Therefore, those beliefs have to be addressed during the first phase of teacher training. Generally accepted concepts or operationalized definitions would be valuable guidelines for pre-service teachers and their educators. However, neither the ones nor the others are available at present. Therefore, pre-service teachers have to fall back on their own beliefs, a rather unexplored notion so far. Within the present study, pre-service teachers' beliefs about inclusive education were assessed before and after an academic seminar. During this academic seminar, participants co-taught in either multi-professional (i.e., one pre-service teacher for special educational needs and one for general education) or mono-professional (i.e., both pre-service teachers for special educational needs or both for general education) teams in inclusive classes of secondary schools. Pre-service teachers' beliefs were assessed with the help of concept-maps, which were created by the participants at two testing times. The concept-maps were analyzed employing graph-theoretical approaches as well as qualitative, summarizing content analysis methods. Results show that pre-service teachers who worked in multi-professional teams expanded their conceptualization of inclusive education to include facets like individualization and differentiation, while pre-service teachers who worked in mono-professional teams displayed no such expansion. Also, the conceptualization of pre-service teachers who worked in mono-professional teams contained a larger percentage of propositions addressing disadvantages and negative consequences of inclusive education. Therefore, it is concluded that multi-professional co-teaching during teacher training helps prepare teachers for successful inclusive education.https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/feduc.2019.00101/fullbeliefs about inclusionco-teachingpre-service teachersteacher trainingconcept maps
spellingShingle Roswitha Ritter
Antje Wehner
Antje Wehner
Gertrud Lohaus
Philipp Krämer
Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
Frontiers in Education
beliefs about inclusion
co-teaching
pre-service teachers
teacher training
concept maps
title Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
title_full Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
title_fullStr Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
title_full_unstemmed Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
title_short Pre-service Teachers' Beliefs About Inclusive Education Before and After Multi-Compared to Mono-professional Co-teaching: An Exploratory Study
title_sort pre service teachers beliefs about inclusive education before and after multi compared to mono professional co teaching an exploratory study
topic beliefs about inclusion
co-teaching
pre-service teachers
teacher training
concept maps
url https://www.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/feduc.2019.00101/full
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