The document discusses the importance of an inclusive learning environment for children with special educational needs (SEN) and the legal framework that supports their inclusion in mainstream education. It contrasts the medical and social models of disability, emphasizing the role of societal barriers in creating challenges for disabled individuals. The text also highlights various levels of intervention needed for SEN students and the ongoing efforts to adapt educational practices to foster true inclusion.

1. Supporting learner needs: an
inclusive learning environment?
Understanding Learning: MOD001256

2. Objectives
• Compare models and perspectives of disabilities
and learning difficulties.
• Review a range of legislation and a code of
practice relating to disabilities and learning
difficulties.
• Explore views of inclusion and integration and
consider how these impact on children’s
education experiences.

3. 2001 Legislation
Special Educational Needs and Disabilities Act
(SENDA)
• Made discrimination against learners with disabilities in
England and Wales illegal.
• It strengthened the rights of children with special
educational needs (SEN) to be included in mainstream
education.
• Education providers have to:
– Treat children with disabilities as favourably as non-disabled
learners.
– Make reasonable adjustments to their organisation’s facilities
and learning arrangements, so that learners who have a
disability or difficulty are not unreasonably disadvantaged.

4. Special Educational Needs (SEN)
A legal definition which refers to children up to the
age of 19, who have learning difficulties or
disabilities that makes it more difficult to learn or
access education than most children of the
same age.
(Hodkinson & Vickerman, 2009)

5. “I felt like I’d been labelled. I was Arif – the kid with dyslexia and
dyspraxia!”
• Criticism of the term SEN is that it is inscribed with the medical
model of disability and categorises or labels children.
• Add up the number of times the phrase children with SEN is written
in this PowerPoint presentation. Is this labelling or not?
• “This form of labelling …is not only disrespectful and hurtful to the
individual child but can also have repercussions for the manner in
which their learning is supported.” (CSIE, 2005)
• “Difficulties a child may have with learning may be seen …as
resulting from personal deficit and difference and not from the
barriers created by such things such as inaccessible buildings,
inflexible curricula, inappropriate teaching and learning approaches
and school organisation and policies.”
(Hodkinson & Vickerman, 2009, p.13)

6. The Medical Model of Disability
This takes the perspective that:
• The disabled person is viewed as a victim or a problem. The person must
adapt to the way in which society is constructed and organised.
• People who experience a disability are defined by their illness or medical
condition and there is a focus on the lack of physical, sensory or cognitive
functioning.
• Practices and terminology is ‘borrowed’ from the medical profession to
judge a person’s limitations against certain 'norms' in development and
functioning.
• This can leads to a dehumanising view, where only the nature and severity
of the impairment is important, along with the extent to which the difference
can be corrected or minimised.

7. Diagnosed:
“I’m not ill, I just can’t read!”
Historical links between placing children with SEN in the schooling
system and the judgements of medical professional.
“Carrier (1986) argues that special education has employed the
medical model to cloak itself in an aura of respectability in order to
justify the therapeutic intervention made by doctors, paediatricians
and psychologists in the teaching and learning of children with
special needs.” (Hodkinson & Vickerman, 2009, p.19)
Historically (19th century & up to the latter part of the 20th century),
many children with SEN were placed and educated in a separate,
segregated system: special schools.

8. 1970’s – a new model proposed
“In our view, it is society which disables physically
impaired people. Disability is something that is
imposed on top of our impairments; by the way
we are unnecessarily isolated and excluded
from full participation in society. Disabled people
are therefore an oppressed group in society.”
(UPIAS, 1976, p.3)

9. The Social Model of Disability
• Challenges the medical model that disability is a medical problem requiring
"treatment".
• Disability is not the ‘fault’ of an individual disabled person.
• Disability is caused by how society is organised in terms of the physical,
organisational and attitudinal barriers society presents.
• The barriers are the problem, not the individual.
For example, a person who users a wheelchair to support his/her mobility is
not disabled in an environment when transport, buildings and their facilities
are accessible to everyone.

10. A question
A question posed on a university questionnaire using the medical
model:
What problems does your disability cause you in accessing the
university's facilities?
Re-word the question using the social model of disability’s perspective.
What barriers are there in the design of the
university's facilities that prevent you from
making full use of them?

11. The SEN Code of Practice - 2001
• All schools and teachers are responsible to meet
the needs of all individuals.
• Reflects the Social Model of Disability – barriers
created by schools and society need to be
removed so children with SEN can access
education provision.
https://www.education.gov.uk/publications/standard/publicationDetail/Page1/DfES%2005
81%202001

12. DFeS 2001: The SEN Code of Practice
• Children with SEN:
– should be educated alongside other children in mainstream
schools.
– have full access to a broad and balanced education including the
National Curriculum.
– the school, the local authority and other professionals work in
partnership with parents.
– a child’s wishes should be taken into account in the light of their
age and understanding.
– there is close co-operation between all agencies concerned and
a multi-disciplinary approach is taken to resolving issues.

13. Levels of intervention for pupils with SEN in England
School Action – where the teacher or the school’s SENCO decides to provide
something for the child additional to or different from the school’s usual differentiated
approach to help children
11.4% of the school population were identified at School Action level, approximately
916,000 pupils in January 2010.
School Action Plus – where the school consults specialists and requests help from
external services.
6.2% of the school population were at School Action Plus level, approximately 496,000
pupils in January 2010
Statement – where the child requires support beyond that which the school can provide
and the local authority arranges appropriate provision.
2.7% of the school population or 221,000 pupils had a statement of SEN in January 2010.
(Statistics from DfE, 2011, p.18 )
https://www.education.gov.uk/publications/standard/publicationDetail/Page1/CM%208027

14. Children with SEN should be educated alongside other
children in mainstream schools (DfES, 2001)
Arif’s story:
“After the report, I never really attended a mainstream English lesson
ever again at either primary or secondary school. I didn’t attend a
Maths lesson either until I was about halfway through secondary
school – year 9 I think. I always had a specialist support teacher
working with me at my primary school.”
“I had a ‘special’ timetable all the way through secondary school. I was
sometimes in classes with my year group, but lots of my lessons
were in the learning support centre with specialist teachers. It was
like I only attended part of the school. At times I felt more excluded
than included.”
Arif says he felt more excluded than included; What is your
definition of inclusion?

15. Inclusion
Green Paper 1997 - Excellence for All
“By inclusion we mean not only that pupils with SEN should wherever
possible receive their education in mainstream school, but also that
they should join fully with their peers in the curriculum and the life of
the school. For example, we believe, that… children with SEN
should generally take part in mainstream lessons rather than being
isolated in separate units.”
(DfES, 1997, p.44)
Ofsted (2000, p.7) “effective schools were educationally inclusive
schools”
In inclusive schools, (Ofsted, 2000, p.13) “the teaching and learning
achievements, attitudes and well being of every person matter.”

16. Integration
• Locational integration: children with SEN are located in
a special class or unit, but on the same site as the
mainstream school.
• Social integration: children with SEN are located in a
special class or unit, but on the same site as the
mainstream school, but socialise with mainstream
children at a break or lunchtime.
• Functional integration: children with SEN are taught for
part, or all, of the timetable in mainstream classes.
(Warnock Report, 1978)
http://www.educationengland.org.uk/documents/warnock/

17. Are functional integration and inclusion the same?
• Are children fully included if they are being taught in a mainstream
classroom alongside children who do not experience difficulties in
accessing the curriculum?
Think of your experiences in schools and early year
settings.
– Were all children equally included and able to share
experiences?
– Were children with SEN learning in a separate area of the
classroom, or were they learning with children who do not
experience learning difficulties?
– Is it possible, or in the best interests of all children for full
inclusion to take place all of the time?

18. Inclusion vs academic accountability and standards
• Schools are judged against children’s academic attainment.
• E.g. Primary school success is judged by how many children
achieve a level 4 in all subjects by the end of key stage 2.
• A tension for schools: achieving targets set in relation to children’s
academic attainment vs supporting children who may never achieve
academic success as defined by the UK government.
“Inclusion… is not about figures, politics or…dogma, it is, about beliefs,
faith, caring and the creation of community… It is about human
rights and human beings.” (Allan, 2003, p.178)

19. New legislation
• Proposed Children & Families Bill - introduced in
parliament in spring 2013. Aim is for it to gain royal
assent by spring 2014.
http://www.education.gov.uk/a00221161/
• Green paper published March 2011 by DfE: Support and
aspiration: A new approach to special educational needs
and disability - A consultation.
www.education.gov.uk/publications/standard/publicationDetail/Page1/CM%208027#down
loadableparts

20. Proposals
• A new approach to identifying SEN through a single Early Years
setting-based category and school-based category of SEN.
• A new single assessment process and Education, Health and Care
Plan by 2014.
• Local authorities and other services to set out a local offer of all
services available.
• The option of a personal budget by 2014 for all families with children
with a statement of SEN or a new Education, Health and Care Plan.
• Parents know what they can reasonably expect their local school,
local college, local authority and local services to provide.
• Greater control for parents over the services they and their family
use.

21. References
Allan, J. 2003. Productive pedagogies and the challenge of inclusion. British Journal of
Special Education, 30(4): pp.178-179
CSIE, 2005. Evidence to the UK Parliament’s Inquiry into Special Educational Needs.
Available at: www.inclusion.uwe.ac.uk/csie/campaigns.htm [accessed 17 June 2006)
DfES. 1997. Excellence for All Children. Green Paper, 22 October 1997. London: HMSO.
Hodkinson, A. & Vickerman, P. 2009. Key Issues in Special Educational Needs and
Inclusion. London: Sage Publications Ltd.
UPIAS. 1976. Fundamental Principles of Disability. London: Union of the Physically
Impaired Against Segregation.
Ofsted. 2000. Evaluating Educational Inclusion: Guidance for Inspectors and Schools.
London: Office for Standards in Education.

22. Further Reading
Hodkinson, A. & Vickerman, P. 2009. Key Issues in Special Educational Needs and
Inclusion. London: Sage Publications Ltd.
Smith, C., From Special Needs to Inclusive Education in Sharpe, J., Ward, S. & Hankin,
L. (eds). 2009. Education Studies – An issues-based approach. Exeter: Learning
Matters Ltd. Chapter 14. (Ebook)
Woolfolk, Hughes, M. and Walkup, V., 2013. Psychology in Education. Harlow: Pearson.
Pp146-160. (Ebook)
Very Useful Website
http://complexneeds.org.uk/