Remote learning for students with a disability: Game changer or moment in time? Literature Review

This literature review draws from Australian and international research into the impact of remote learning for students with disability, published between March 2020 and April 2022. The literature relates to pedagogical services provided by early childhood services and schools to support students with disability, rather than therapeutic services. The social implications for students are reviewed along with educational factors, and implications for inclusion and support by schools. Following an overview of the legal and policy frameworks supporting the education of students with disability, this review investigates benefits, challenges and opportunities for both remote learning and transition back to in-person educational settings for students and their families. The themes emerging include flexible approaches to learning, connectedness and wellbeing

School Improvement Tool Elaborations: Student engagement and wellbeing. Background report and literature review

This literature review outlines the evidence that underpins the development of a set of evidence-informed elaborations, or specific practices, that support student engagement and wellbeing across the 9 domains of the National School Improvement Tool (NSIT). These observable, measurable practices to support student engagement and wellbeing have been developed from a review of relevant literature in the areas of socio-emotional learning (SEL), health and wellbeing, student engagement and a sense of belonging, and motivations for engagement. They also take account of commissioned research reports by the Queensland Department of Education and the Department\u27s (2018) approach to student learning and wellbeing across the whole school: creating safe, supportive, and inclusive environments; building the capability of staff, students and the school community; and developing strong systems for early intervention. The Department of Education Queensland engaged the Australian Council for Educational Research (ACER) to elaborate the evidence underpinning the National School Improvement Tool (NSIT) as it relates to student wellbeing and engagement to produce a set of related practices or elaborations to support schools to improve their practice. The overarching research questions were: How do student engagement, wellbeing and learning outcomes relate? What is the evidence relating to whole-of-school approaches to student engagement and wellbeing? What are the evidence-based practices that lift student engagement and wellbeing, alongside academic gain, as aligned with each of the 9 National School Improvement Tool domains

Access to Achievement: Enabling Students With Disability to Engage With Classroom Assessment

Students with disability have the right to an inclusive education on the basis of equal opportunity to their peers without disability. Despite this, students with disability internationally and in Australia continue to experience barriers in accessing inclusive education and demonstrating their learning. Australian students with disability underachieve compared with their peers without disability despite expectations of quality, accessible assessment practice for all students. The aim of this study was to examine classroom assessment practice for students with disability. The focus of this study was on how teachers enable students with disability to engage with classroom assessment within the sociocultural context of official and intended inclusive education policy and enacted classroom practice. The study adopted a case study approach and investigated how two teachers supported three focus students with disability to engage with classroom assessment in a Year 7 classroom. Both quantitative (survey data) and qualitative data (interviews, video-recorded classroom observation data, and assessment artefacts such as marked assessment tasks) were collected and analysed. Using a sociocultural lens, systematic analysis resulted in identified elements related to teachers’ pedagogy and instruction and to enabling students’ access to summative assessment. The study developed the concept “community of inclusive assessment practice” (CoIAP) to investigate how and to what extent features of classroom assessment, inclusive education and inclusive assessment come together to enable students with disability to enhance and to demonstrate their learning. The findings revealed a tension between teachers’ navigation of sociocultural factors (i.e., disability funding, historical non-inclusive approaches and institutional practices) and intended inclusive assessment practice. The study identified a fractured CoIAP, characterised by a lack of collaboration among teachers and support staff and barriers in classroom assessment processes. Students with disability were still being required to demonstrate their learning through assessment processes that were not fully accessible to them. This is in contrast with official policy of inclusion and official expectations regarding teachers’ assessment practice. The study brought together the fields of quality assessment and inclusive education and confirmed that quality assessment practice cannot be implemented without coordinated consideration of the requirements and characteristics of students with disability. Similarly, inclusive education practice needs to consider features of quality assessment to ensure promotion of student autonomy. The study has highlighted that inclusive assessment practice cannot be established in a context that is not reflective of inclusive education values. The study further highlighted that inclusive assessment does not occur in a vacuum but is a social practice, where teachers, students with disability and support staff negotiate sociocultural factors, including historical and institutional factors, within a CoIAP. As these factors can enable or disable students to enhance and to demonstrate their learning, the sociocultural context within which teachers engage in classroom assessment practice needs to facilitate enactment of quality assessment practice and inclusive education policy

Improving remote learning for students with disability

ACER and Catholic Schools NSW have identified strategies that contribute to inclusive learning experiences of students with disability during remote learning as well as upon returning to the physical classroom

Making adjustments to curriculum, pedagogy and assessment

This chapter discusses the Australian Curriculum and describes how its alignment with pedagogical design and assessment affords opportunities for teachers to cater for a diverse student population in inclusive classrooms. It illustrates how teachers can make supplementary, substantial and extensive adjustments to curriculum, pedagogy and assessment for different year levels and across different subjects. The Australian Curriculum, Assessment and Reporting Authority (ACARA) has developed the Australian Curriculum to be equitable and responsive to the differing requirements or preferences of all students spanning all areas of ‘cognitive, affective, physical, social, and aesthetic curriculum experiences’, The summative assessment task requires students to ‘create a structured text to explain their ideas and use language features to demonstrate coherence and add detail’. Australian teachers are mandated by law to identify and use strategies to enable the access and participation of students with disability in their classes

Fundamental concepts of inclusive education

For inclusive education to succeed, system and school leaders and educators need a deep understanding of both curriculum content and learner diversity. This knowledge enables them to anticipate and eliminate barriers in what they teach (curriculum), the ways they teach it (pedagogy), and how learning is demonstrated (assessment). The fundamental concepts of inclusive education provide teachers with foundational knowledge to enact inclusive practices with sensitivity, authenticity, and fidelity. In this chapter, five important concepts are discussed: ableism, the social model of disability, the concept of equity, the dilemma of difference, and inclusive language

Beyond Salamanca:A citation analysis of the CRPD/GC4 relative to the Salamanca Statement in inclusive and special education research

More than two decades ago, UNESCO’s (1994) Salamanca Statement and Framework for Action on Special Needs Education galvanised the inclusion movement by providing a framework for inclusive education. The Statement succeeded in raising awareness of the concept of inclusion internationally, yet genuine inclusion is still the exception and not the norm. This is despite inclusive education being a fundamental human right under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2008; CRPD in July 2008) adopted by the United Nations in 2006 as an international treaty and ratified by 181 countries that are legally bound to uphold its terms. In this paper, we examine education scholars’ uptake of the CRPD and GC4, relative to the Salamanca Statement, by conducting a citation analysis of literature published in journals from the fields of inclusive and special education between 1994 and 2019. We then look at how each document has been used in the literature over time and conclude with strategies to help improve knowledge of the CRPD/GC4 within education and discuss how these documents can be used to progress inclusive education internationally

Students with disability have a right to inclusive education: Reviewing the Melbourne Declaration

Students with disability were not identified as an explicit priority within the Melbourne Declaration, a statement that was agreed back in 2008 by all Education Ministers in Australia. It stated that the main goal for education in Australia should be equity and excellence for all young Australians and outlined a commitment to action..