Restructuring for Inclusion: Changing Teaching Practices (Part II)

Karen Kilgore, Cynthia C. Griffin, Paul T. Sindelar, & Rodman B. Webb

Editor's Note: In the November 2001 issue of Middle School Journal (pp. 44-51) the authors explained the renewal process that the Coral Springs faculty underwent leading up to the changes in classroom practice discussed in this article.

How Teachers Changed Their Practices to Support Inclusive Classrooms

Coral Springs Middle School teachers took Coalition of Essential Schools' (CES) principles seriously. They were the topic of workshops, faculty meetings, retreats, and summer training at Brown University. Over time they became especially interested in the view that children are natural learners and that it was the teacher's responsibility to find strategies that work for individual children. Placing at-risk students in every class forced every teacher to abandon old methods that worked well in homogeneous classes but no longer worked in diverse classrooms. Teachers struggled. In team meetings, teachers shared strategies that worked and failed with particular children. Teachers offered their colleagues weekly workshops on innovative strategies. Coalition study groups read and discussed articles on teaching and learning. Special education teachers ran workshops describing specific learning disabilities and making accommodation suggestions. Gradually teachers came to believe that the strategies that helped children with special needs helped all children, even those without disabilities. Good teachers did not have one best teaching method, but an arsenal of approaches appropriate in different circumstances. Teachers began to read the conditions and select strategies that fit lesson goals and student needs. Teachers told us they were becoming better teachers. As one teacher put it, "When you teach kids with special needs, you do a better job of teaching in general."

Accommodating children with disabilities was difficult and some teachers looked for positions in schools where students were tracked. Most teams accepted the inclusion challenge, however, and looked for ways to make it work. Typically they began by planning lessons that provided learning opportunities for as many students as possible (Corbett, 1996; Schumm & Vaughn, 1991). These lessons worked well for most students, but teachers realized that some students were being left behind. The problem, they told us, was not simply with their teaching, but with the traditional curriculum that they were delivering with new methods. The material did not motivate students they found hardest to reach and teach.

To stimulate student interest, provide repetition, and increase rigor and depth of what they taught, teacher teams revamped the parts of the curriculum for which they were responsible. They designed and taught interdisciplinary lessons, organizing the teaching of concepts and skills across the curriculum. To make the new material more accessible to all students, they adopted a variety of instructional strategies, including cooperative learning and peer tutoring. Teachers paired or grouped students so that advanced students could assist their less advanced classmates. Increasing numbers of teachers began using computers to increase student motivation and productivity, supplement instruction, and enhance the curriculum in important ways. Most teachers agreed that new teaching strategies made them stronger teachers. As one teacher explained:

My standards are high. [Team members] have to figure out what [students] need to know and help them get and use that information. [I] may have to change assignments and the way I teach. That may look as if I have lowered my standards but [I haven't]. I adjusted my teaching only in order to raise [the students'] standards. We have no tracking here. But if we can show kids [with disabilities] that they can be successful, they will work hard and be better prepared. I want to prepare them for high school. If we tell them they can't, they won't.

CSMS teachers shared their successes and failures in team meetings and in weekly professional development sessions open to all teachers. They invited colleagues in to observe their classes, continuing the open-door policy initiated in 1989 when CSMS began its whole school reform efforts (see Kilgore & Webb, 1994). To facilitate conversations about teaching and learning, the CES coordinator posted a weekly list of teachers employing specific strategies and times when colleagues could observe their teaching. Co-teachers modeled teaching strategies on their teams. In Figure 1, we list the academic practices CSMS teachers used and shared. We define each strategy and cite research supporting its effectiveness.

As teachers increased their repertoire of teaching strategies and revamped the curriculum, they turned their attention to student assessment. Some worried that traditional "tell 'em-and-test 'em" methods did not measure what at-risk students were learning or acknowledge how much progress they were making. As one teacher put it:

I have seen little measurable achievement gain. I'm not sure how to measure it. We need some more alternative assessment instruments.

Figure 1. Teaching Practices for Differentiation

Academic Practices	Description	Supporting Literature
I. Planning for the Group
A. Interdisciplinary, Thematic Units	Lessons involving reading, writing, speaking, and listening related to a selected theme are taught across the various content areas.	Kataoka & Lock (1995); Swicegood & Parsons (1991)
B. Cooperative Learning	In cooperative learning methods, students work together in teams to master material initially presented by the teacher.	Johnson & johnson (1986); Johnson (1991); Slavin (1990); Warger & Rutherford (1996)
C. Peer Tutoring	Peer tutoring involves two students; one who tutors and assists another in learning and/or practicing a skill. Classwide peer tutoring is a well-known type of peer tutoring that involves all students in a class who are paired and work simultaneously.	Fuchs, Fuchs, Mathes, & Simmons (1997); King-Sears & Bradley (1995); Topping (1987)
D. Small Group Instruction	Small groups of 3 to 8 students can make it easier for the teacher to keep students engaged, monitor individual and group performance, and provide feedback during instruction.	Rosenberg, O'Shea, & O'Shea (1991); Westber (1996)
E. Computer-Assisted Instruction	Computer use in inclusive classrooms allows teachers to individualize; provides needed repetition, systematic feedback & reinforcement; defines & objectively measures progress; and, collects & analyzes students performance data.	Bender & Bender (1996); Male (1997)
II. Monitoring Student Progress
A. Authentic Assessment	Authentic assessment is a process where students not only complete or demonstrate desired behaviors, but addomplish them in a real-life context. It is dependent on solid classroom practices & various tools to evaluate student learning.	Baron & Boschee (1995); Leslie & Jeff-Simpson (1997); Paulsen (1997)
III. Providing Special Assistance
A. Accommodations & Modified Assignments	Use the Rubber Band Theory, an accommodation is a simple stretch of the rubber band that provides a strategy to help a student reach an objective. A modification implies that the shole rubber band may need to be moved down to reach the student. It includes working at the student's grade level, that may require using a different curriculum.	Wood (1998)
B. One-to-One Instruction	In 3 to 5 minutes of teacher-to-teacher instruction, a student can understand a concept, recieve corrective feedback, understand directions, or feel motivated to contnue working. For students with learning problems, this kind of instruction may need to be schedled daily.	Holliins, King, & Hayman (1994); McDonnell, McLaughlin, & Morison (1997)
C. Explicit Instruction	New ways of using tacher-directed lessons in the inclusive classroom may include the use of mini-lesseons. A mini-lesson is a brief explanation or demonstation aimed art helping students with a skill or concept about which the teacher has observed them having difficulties.	Zemelman, Daniels, & Hyde (1993)
IV. Grading Students with Disabilities
A. Grading	Alternative to traditional grading systems used in schools should be considered. The Individualized Education Plan (IEP) provides an alternative for grades for students with exceptionalities.	Hargis (1990)

Authentic and alternative assessment proved useful, but some teachers still struggled over grading. Teachers disagreed on how to grade students with disabilities. Some believed all students should be measured against a single yardstick, regardless of their different abilities and disabilities. Others believed that children with disabilities should be challenged to do their best work and graded on their progress and effort. This issue was not solved two years into the project and sometimes teachers on the same team disagreed on something as fundamental as how students should be graded.

Efforts to include hard-to-teach and hard-to-reach students raised several difficult issues at Coral Springs and forced the faculty and staff to rethink their beliefs and teaching practices. The faculty and staff grappled with significant questions: What teaching methods can achieve high standards in a heterogeneous class? What teaching methods are most effective when working with individual students who present challenging problems? Can we find or invent more effective teaching strategies? Do our teaching strategies fit our learning objectives? What methods of assessment are adequate and equitable for assessing student progress in a heterogeneous class? These questions dominated faculty discussions of the inclusion model.

Summary

During the 1995-96 and 1996-97 school years, CSMS made progress in bringing their inclusion model in closer compliance with the school's vision. They significantly increased the number of children in included classes and assigned students in natural proportions across teams. CSMS faculty and staff believed that they had developed a successful inclusion model that benefited most at-risk students. Children with special needs and their teachers were at last full members of the CSMS community. The school was proud of its accomplishments, but it was not satisfied. The same reflective process that identified the need for an inclusion program in the beginning, now identified problems and possible improvements. Faculty identified "high maintenance" students who needed intensive interventions unavailable in the general education classroom. Personnel and resources, however, were unavailable for alternative educational interventions because all available resources were devoted to the inclusion model. Faculty believed that the school needed additional resources to adequately meet the needs of all their students.

Discussion and Implications

Typically special education programs have existed—literally and figuratively—on the margins of public education. General and special education programs, even when operating in the same school, have worked independently of one another, each with its own staff, goals, philosophies, teaching practices, and management strategies. Consequently, successful inclusion entails much more that the reassignment of students with disabilities into general education classes.

Inclusion, at CSMS, was part and parcel of an ambitious, school-wide, improvement effort. It is within this broad restructuring framework that the impetus for inclusion began and was sustained at CSMS. Our research confirms Darling-Hammond's (1997) conclusion that reforms succeed in schools "that are responsive to students, that foster relationships, and that support teacher learning … [in schools with] high levels of competence and community" (p. 32). Several factors were instrumental in the transformation of the school culture at CSMS and the implementation of inclusive education: a system of democratic governance, a culture of collaboration, commitment to and capacity for professional growth, strong supportive leadership, and concern about equity and the success and well-being of individual students.

System of democratic governance. We have found, as have others researching inclusion (Chesapeake, 1997) and other school reforms (Fullan, 1991; Rudduck, 1991), that inclusion and restructuring reforms work best when teachers share in school decision making. Prior to implementing inclusion, CSMS had a long history of shared governance and had embarked upon a restructuring process to institute several major school reform efforts (Kilgore & Webb, 1994; Kilgore, Webb, & the Faculty, 1997; Webb & Kilgore, 1995). Embedded in CSMS's shared governance is the practice of collective problem solving (Kilgore, Webb, & the Faculty, 1997). At CSMS, shared decision making served as the foundation for addressing the complex and thorny issues involved in inclusive education.

Culture of collaboration. Lasting changes occur when stakeholders build collaborative cultures, rally behind a vision, and build reforms into the organization of the school. When teachers work in relative isolation—without the guidance of a school vision, the assistance of "critical friends," the support of professional development, or the discipline of accountability—they typically resist school reforms, especially those that threaten classroom autonomy. Teachers are more likely to embrace school-improvement reforms, alter classroom practices, and accommodate children with disabilities in their classes (Chesapeake, 1997), if traditional norms of noninterference (Goodlad, 1983; Lortie, 1975) are replaced by norms of trust (Ashton & Webb, 1986), collaboration (Little, 1982), collegiality (Pugach & Johnson, 1995), and professional development (Lieberman 1988b).

Over time, CSMS had developed a collaborative culture among faculty and staff through the development of their shared governance structure, their involvement in the Coalition of Essential Schools (CES), and their ongoing professional development. Through inclusion, CSMS teachers fashioned collaborative relationships with special education co-teachers. Within CSMS's open and collaborative climate, teachers redefined their roles, accepted greater responsibility for all student learning, shared teaching ideas, allowed others to suggest curricular and instructional modifications, and developed a greater sense of personal and collective teaching efficacy (Webb & Barnash, 1997).

Commitment to and capacity for professional growth. As Little (1982) found, lasting site-based reforms are most likely in schools where the organizational culture supports experimentation, collegiality, conversations about teaching, and professional growth. In such schools, "teachers engaged in frequent, continuous, and increasingly concrete and precise talk about teaching practice. Teachers teach each other the practice of teaching" (p. 331). Lieberman (1988b, 1995) and others (Darling-Hammond & Sclan, 1996) described the workplace conditions necessary to support the ongoing professional development of teachers. In such schools the opportunity for shared work and shared study is prominent and time for such work is built into the day. Material and human assistance are adequate and accomplishments of individuals and groups are recognized and celebrated.

At CSMS, teachers served as educators and mentors to colleagues. Instead of making decisions in isolation, teachers at CSMS make decisions in consultation. Through shared study in the CES and other reform efforts, CSMS stakeholders built a shared professional language and created a shared vision for inclusion. According to CSMS faculty and staff, informed teachers, willing to take risks, are the keys to successful reform. Our research at CSMS suggests that inclusion is most likely to be accepted and supported by faculty and staff when schools alter traditional cultures, transform themselves into learning communities and have developed the capacity for continual professional growth (Senge, 1990).

Strong leadership. The role of the principal changes in schools that are successful in their reform efforts. In implementing inclusion, the type of leadership provided by the principal is critical to its success (Hines & Johnston, 1996; Mamlin, 1999; Servatius, Fellows, & Kelly, 1992). CSMS's principals perceived their role as multifaceted: to nurture and share leadership with the faculty and staff (Aronstein, Marlow, & Desiltets, 1990; Foster, 1986); to provide support and encouragement while creating a risk-free environment for innovation (McPhail-Wilcox, Forbes, & Parramore, 1990); and to set high expectations and communicate the importance of teaching and learning (Foster, 1986; Lieberman, 1988a, 1995).

Concern about equity and the success and well-being of individual students. Through involvement in CES, CSMS faculty and staff examined the inequities and achievement gaps that occur in public schools, including their own. In an inclusion statement, in other school documents, and most importantly, in school conversations, CSMS stakeholders reiterated their commitment to "academic excellence and personalization for all students, including the hard-to-reach, hard-to-teach, at-risk child." The development of an inclusion model was consistent with the school's overall restructuring efforts for the purposes of improving the performance of all students.

Complexity of the task
Inclusion, as one CSMS principal stated, is not about children with disabilities—it's about whether educators are willing to accept responsibility for educating all students in a personalized and motivational way. For schools to take on the challenge of educating all students, she explained, stakeholders must be willing to question their basic assumptions about schooling and to embark on a process of re-creating schools to become responsive and flexible institutions. We agree with CSMS stakeholders, inclusion is about more than students with disabilities and our beliefs about how and where they learn best. Inclusion is about schools and the extent to which they are capable of providing a meaningful and personal education for all students.

References

Aronstein, L. W., Marlow, M., & Desiltets, P. (1990). Detours on the road to site-based management. Educational Leadership, 47(7), 61-63.

Ashton, P. T., & Webb, R. B. (1986). Making a difference: Teachers' sense of efficacy and student achievement. New York: Longman.

Baron, M. A., & Boschee, F. (1995). Authentic assessment: The key to unlocking student success. Lancaster, PA: Technomic.

Bender, R. L., & Bender, W. N. (1996). Computer-assisted instruction for students at risk for ADHD, mild disabilities, or academic problems. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Chesapeake Institute. (1997). Research finding frameworks: A compendium of cross-project findings. Washington, DC: Author.

Corbett, N. L. (1996). Project PART interns' plans and decisions for students who are hard to teach and manage. Unpublished doctoral dissertation, University of Florida.

Darling-Hammond, L. (1997). The right to learn: A blueprint for creating schools that work. San Francisco: Jossey Bass.

Darling-Hammond, L. & Sclan, E. M. (1996). Who teaches and why: Dilemmas of building a profession for twenty-first century schools. In J. Sikula, T. J. Buttery, & E. Guyton (Eds.), Handbook of research on teacher education (2nd ed., pp. 67-101). New York: Macmillan.

Foster, W. (1986). Paradigms and promises: New approaches to educational administration. Buffalo, NY: Prometheus Books.

Fuchs, D., Fuchs, L. S., Mathes, P. G., & Simmons, D.C. (1997). Peer-assisted learning strategies: Making classrooms more responsive to diversity. American Educational Research Journal, 34(1), 174-206.

Fullan, M. (1991). The new meaning of educational change. New York: Teachers College Press.

Goodlad, J. (1983). The school as workplace. In G. Griffin (Ed.), Staff development. The eighty-second yearbook of the national society for the study of education, part II (pp. 36-62). Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Hargis, C. H. (1990). Grades and grading practices: Obstacles to improving education and to helping at-risk students. Springfield, IL: C.C. Thomas.

Hines, R. A., & Johnston, J. H. (1996). Inclusive classrooms: The principals' role in promoting achievement. Schools in the Middle, 5(3), 6-11.

Hollins, E. R., King, J. E., & Hayman, W. C. (1994). Teaching diverse populations: Formulating a knowledge base. Albany, NY: State University of New York Press.

Johnson, D. W. (1991). Learning together and alone: Cooperative, competitive, and individualistic learning. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice Hall.

Johnson, D. W., & Johnson, R. T. (1986). Mainstreaming and cooperative learning strategies. Exceptional Children, 52(6), 553-561.

Kataoka, J. C., & Lock, R. (1995). Whales and hermit crabs: Integrated programming and science. Teaching Exceptional Children, 27(4), 17-21.

Kilgore, K., & Webb, R. B. (1994). Blue Lake Middle School and the dynamics of school reform. New York: Columbia University, Teachers College, National Center for Restructuring Education, Schools, and Teaching.

Kilgore, K., Webb, R. B., & the Faculty and Staff of Coral Springs Middle School. (1997). Making shared decision making work. Middle School Journal, 28(5), 3-13.

King-Sears, M. E., & Bradley, D. F. (1995). Classwide peer tutoring: Heterogeneous instruction in general education classrooms. Preventing School Failure, 40(1), 29-35.

Leslie, L., & Jett-Simpson, M. (1997). Authentic literacy assessment: An ecological approach. New York: Longman.

Lieberman, A. (1988a). Teachers and principals: Turf, tensions, and new tasks. Phi Delta Kappan, 69, 648-53.

Lieberman, A. (Ed.) (1988b). Building a professional culture in schools. New York: Teachers College Press.

Lieberman, A. (1995). Restructuring schools: The dynamics of changing practice, structure, and culture. In A. Lieberman (Ed.), The work of restructuring schools: Building from the ground up (pp. 1-17). New York: Teachers College Press.

Little, J. W. (1982). Norms of collegiality and experimentation: Workplace conditions of school success. American Educational Research Journal, 19, 325-340.

Lortie, D. C. (1975). Schoolteacher: A sociological study. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Male, M. (1997). Technology for inclusion: Meeting the special needs of all students. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Mamlin, N. (1999). Despite best intentions: When inclusion fails. The Journal of Special Education, 33(1), 36-49.

McDonnell, L. M., McLaughlin, M. J., & Morison, P. (1997). Educating one & all: Students with disabilities and standards-based reform (Committee on Goals 2000 and the Inclusion of Students with Disabilities, Board on Testing and Assessment, Commission on Behavioral and Social Sciences and Education, National Research Council). Washington, DC: National Academy Press.

McPhail-Wilcox, B., Forbes, R., & Parramore, B. (1990). Project design: Reforming structure and process. Educational Leadership, 47(7), 22-25.

Paulsen, K. J. (1997). Curriculum-based measurement: Translating research into school-based practice. Intervention in School and Clinic, 32, 162-167.

Pugach, M. & Johnson, L. (1995). Collaborative practitioners, collaborative schools. Denver: Love Publishing Co.

Rosenberg, M. S., O'Shea, L., & O'Shea, D. J. (1991). Student teacher to master teacher. New York: Macmillan.

Rudduck, J. (1991). Innovation and change. Philadelphia: Open University Press.

Schumm, J. S., & Vaughn, S. (1991). Making adaptations for mainstreamed students: General classroom teachers' perspectives. Remedial and Special Education, 12(4), 18-25.

Senge, P. (1990). The fifth discipline: The art and practice of the learning organization. New York: Doubleday.

Servatius, J. D., Fellows, M., & Kelly, D. (1992). Preparing leaders for inclusive schools. In R. A. Villa, J. S. Thousand, W. Stainback, & S. Stainback (Eds.) Restructuring for caring and effective education: An administrative guide to heterogeneous schools (pp. 267-283). Baltimore: Brooks.

Slavin, R. E. (1990). Cooperative learning: Theory, research, and practice. Boston: Allyn and Bacon.

Swicegood, P. R., & Parsons, J. L. (1991). The thematic unit approach: Content and process instruction for secondary learning disabled students. Learning Disabilities Research and Practice, 6, 112-116.

Topping, K. J. (1987). The peer tutoring handbook: Promoting co-operative learning. Cambridge, MA: Brookline Books.

Warger, C. L., & Rutherford, R. B. (1996). Social skills instruction: An essential component for learning. Preventing School Failure, 41(1), 20-23.

Webb, R. B. & Barnash, K. (1997). Coral Springs Middle School: School climate and school improvement. Gainesville, FL: University of Florida, College of Education, Research and Development Center for School Improvement.

Webb, R. B. & Kilgore, K. (1995). Restructuring and the dilemmas of school improvement. Just and Caring Education, 1(2), 163-179.

Westberg, J. (1996). Fostering learning in small groups: A practical guide. New York: Springer.

Wood, J. W. (1998). Adapting instruction to accommodate students in inclusive settings. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Merrill.

Zemelman, S., Daniels, H., & Hyde, A. (1993). Best practice: New standards for teaching and learning in America's schools. Portsmouth, NH: Heinemann.

Karen Kilgore is an assistant scholar in the Department of Special Education at the University of Florida, Gainesville. E-mail: kkilgore@coe.ufl.edu

Cynthia C. Griffin is an Associate Professor of Special Education at the University of Florida, Gainesville. E-mail: ccgriffin@coe.ufl.edu

Paul T. Sindelar is a Professor of Special Education at the University of Florida, Gainesville. E-mail: pts@coe.ufl.edu

Rodman B. Webb is a Professor of Educational Psychology at the University of Florida, Gainesville. E-mail: rwebb@coe.ufl.edu