Inclusion Strategies and Interventions, Second Edition. Toby J. Karten
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As I participate in professional development and inclusion coaching across the United States and around the world, I often hear the following comments, questions, and concerns.
• I won’t do inclusion.”
• I don’t know how to do inclusion.”
• Who’s included?”
• How can I better train and support my staff?”
• What is the role of an inclusion coach?”
• My co-teacher and I need more time to plan.”
• I don’t have a co-teacher!”
• It’s not working.”
• Can someone explain what SDI is?”
• We need more direct skill instruction.”
• What is differentiated instruction?
• Are MTSS and RTI the same thing?”
• What does UDL look like in an algebra, a biology, or a Spanish class?”
• What do we do about students who get it quicker than those with IEPs?”
Not all staff, students, or families share the same thoughts about inclusion based on their prior experiences, training, preparation, classroom and school dynamics, and support systems. The conceptual framework of inclusion values the meshing of general education and special education with benefits to all learners and professionals (Villa & Thousand, 2016).
Sometimes an inclusion classroom is viewed differently than an inclusive classroom. It’s more than semantics, because the former indicates that the general education classroom is the preferred classroom environment, but not the sole option for placement. An inclusive classroom often has the connotation that rejects all other placements and can be referenced as full inclusion. At times, the words inclusion and inclusive are used interchangeably, but the Individuals With Disabilities Education Act (IDEA) recognizes a continuum of services, with the regular education classroom viewed as the least restrictive environment on the continuum (Ratcliff, 2009).
I never like to use the legislative term regular education classroom; I prefer to say general education classroom, because if there is a regular classroom, one might place a negative connotation on any other placement as being irregular. Either way, inclusion is at its best when it transforms challenges into solutions (Jung, Frey, Fisher, & Kroener, 2019). However, unlike combining the elements on the periodic table, inclusion has no set formula because each learner is unique, whether he or she shares the same difference or disability label (Karten, 2017a). Inclusion considers each student’s diverse characteristics for planning responsive and appropriate interventions, services, and classroom placements.
Inclusion has been a unifying concept for special and general education, with students benefiting from the supports when teachers adapt and gain new strategies to reach a broader range of learning profiles (Ford, 2013; Jung et al., 2019; Karten, 2017c). For example, when special education practices enter the classroom, general education teachers can see the benefits of differentiated instruction (DI). When general and special education teachers collaborate, they view all learners as worthy of achieving solid educational foundations in the inclusion environment.
General and special educators have collaborative eyes, hands, and minds on how to provide responsive instructional methods, materials, interventions, and supports. General and special educators working together use screening, progress monitoring, and assessments to plan for and support advancements. If schools place students with disabilities in general education classes without the appropriate structure and learner-specific adaptations, then teachers cannot support their individualized learning goals. An inclusion setting with specific, individualized organization; adapted curriculum; and differentiated teaching and learning strategies with embedded supports provides not only access to learners but also a path to their achievement. For example, a student in fifth grade who is reading two grade levels lower than his or her peers cannot independently read and solve mathematics word problems if the teacher doesn’t read the problems aloud or if the student can’t access text-speech digital tools. If a high school student with autism has difficulties transitioning from one class to the next, he or she may require a peer mentor, modeling, increased time, a social script, or a visual schedule. In addition, students who are academically advanced also need differentiated instruction and appropriately leveled, multitiered supports to honor their academic needs and skill sets. Therefore, the teaching and learning in inclusion classrooms is intentional and explicit for students of all skill sets.
Inclusion interventions honor the belief that all students are capable of meeting high expectations when teachers offer them the appropriate and individualized supports to achieve their highest potential. Neuroscience supports multiple types of engagements, representation, and actions and expressions for learners (CAST, 2018). Inclusion interventions, therefore, must connect instruction to each student’s unique needs. This often requires the teacher to use differentiated instruction to provide diverse ways to deliver the content, instruct, and assess. The teacher does not offer identical instruction to the whole class; instead, he or she attends to the learning needs of small groups and individual learners (Tomlinson, 2014). Differentiated instruction uses each learner’s prior knowledge, interests, strengths, and abilities to help the teacher determine how to prepare an inclusion classroom for student success.
This book focuses on helping educators maximize learning for an array of student differences in their inclusion classrooms. Interventions are meaningless unless teachers connect them to the individual profiles of unique students. Education is never exclusively about the subjects that educators teach; it is also about who is in the classroom. Each individual classroom, with its own diverse and unique student population, defines the lesson delivery, depth of concepts, intervention strategies, and types of collaborative structures, pacing, and curricular decisions teachers must make. Savvy inclusion educators always remember that inclusion classrooms consist of individual learners.
In This Second Edition
When the first edition of this book was published in 2011, inclusion was not as prevalent. Thankfully, diverse learner levels are now the norm in general education classrooms. This edition emphasizes how educators can collaboratively increase student engagement and performance in inclusion environments, minus the stigmatization. The strategies and interventions in this second edition include how teachers can implement specially designed instruction (SDI) in their inclusion classrooms without diluting the instruction for learners with and without exceptionalities, nor frustrating or inundating the general or special educators, students, and families.
The ultimate objective is to view inclusion as a collaborative way to better leverage and ultimately achieve higher learner outcomes in school and beyond. This second edition highlights best professional practices, while still honoring the curriculum demands that correspond to learners with and without exceptionalities. This includes partnerships between general and special