Quoting from Permendiknas No. 70 of 2009, inclusive education is an education delivery system that provides opportunities for all students who have abnormalities and have the potential for intelligence and/or special talents to attend education or learning in an educational environment together with students in general. In short, inclusive education aims to provide equal educational programs or access to all learners without exception. In its implementation, the curriculum applied uses the principle of flexibility. With these conditions, adaptations to the conditions, characters, or needs of students can be adjusted. In diversity, there is a strength that can develop the potential of learners. In addition, with the presence of learners with special needs, they can take part and be accepted in the classroom or school environment.
Not only in Indonesia but inclusive education is also a concern in the eyes of the world. According to Sheehy in his study entitled Inclusive Practice through Keyword Signing – Addressing barriers to accessible classrooms, inclusive education is a global phenomenon inspired by and based on human rights. Inclusive education holds the principle that education is for all, so that all children, including those with special needs or disabilities, can have equal access to education with their peers. All parties must work together because education is basically a shared responsibility between schools, communities, and the government.
Manubey et al. (2021) tried to analyze tutors/peers in inclusive classes with an educational character approach for primary school students. The study showed positive character changes in students who followed the learning process.
“All students who participated in this study showed positive character changes. Teaching characters that are included systematically in the design of learning gives good results for character improvement. Teaching character is important to be done systematically because teaching character to students is as important as teaching knowledge and skills. This study also indicates that there is a change in teacher characters. Teacher character transformation provides a virtuous example. Appropriate examples are needed in a variety of character teaching in the classroom, especially related to relationships with students with special needs who study in public schools in inclusive classroom settings. This research also shows that peer tutoring used in learning cannot stand alone but must be implemented with various learning techniques such as games, demonstrations, recitation, simulation, socio-drama, role-playing, and project. This research contributes to helping the school community be confident in developing student character through peer tutoring and learning to process character building through systematic learning as teachers, regular students, and students with special needs”
In addition, several things also affect the learning process in an inclusive classroom, one of which is dyslexia. In this study, Wai et al. (2023) conducted a systematic review of interventions for children with dyslexia.
“The review highlights the various interventions which include phonological-based and assistive technology-based to improve the literacy skills of children with dyslexia. Interventions conducted in Malaysia propensity to employ assistive technology tools than phonological-based intervention. The review of the literature indicated that Malaysia still lacks of a mobile learning application that focuses on English Language phonics and comprises all three language skills (reading, spelling and writing)”
Management of life skills programs for students with disabilities
Governance to ensure the future sustainability of learners with special needs is essential. Wijaya and Syarifah (2022) examined life skills programs organized by upper-secondary special schools. The findings show that a well-managed life skills program can produce graduates to work in companies and be financially independent.
“The data collection was further strengthened by conducting structured interviews. The structured interviews included face-to-face interviews with all participants and focused group discussions involving the principal, teachers, graduates, parents, local government officials, and the company. The local government officials were those from the labor department and the social services department. This interview was conducted to determine the extent of program implementation. The interview data included the participant’s identity and then continued by asking several questions related to the implementation of the life skills program. Face-to-face interviews were designed to bring up the views of each participant regarding the concepts of the life skills program and how the school successfully managed the program so that the school graduates could be accepted to work in the company. The activities of this interview stage also included an informal inquiry to clarify the actions and events that occurred”
The articles above are just a small part of the research on inclusive education. To get more information, readers can visit the page and read the articles for FREE through the following links: http://edulearn.intelektual.org/ and https://ijere.iaescore.com/.
By: Milzam A. Rusdianto
Editor: Septian D. Cahyo