Foundation of Special and

Inclusive Education
 Special Education v/s Inclusive Education: How are they
similar or different?

Coco goes to an inclusive school. She is a part of an inclusive classroom

with 27 other students, with and without disabilities. 28 different brains,
personalities, interests and quirks. All learning and growing together in
the same classroom. Coco also attends a special education class for a
part of the day, in a small group, where she works on her reading, writing
and communication skills. She feels included, heard and supported in
both the settings, and loves going to school!
How is her special education class different from
her inclusive classroom? Are these practices distinct
or interrelated? Does a school need both in order to
be inclusive?
Special education is the practice of providing individualised
instruction and support to students with disabilities or learning
difficulties. It is designed to be need-based and individualised, which means
that every student in special education will have a different plan depending
on their needs, abilities and goals. This field has historically been associated
with special/segregated schools or homeschooling, which were the options
for students with disabilities before integration became a practice.
For the past few decades, schools in India have integrated students with
disabilities (typically mild to moderate) in mainstream schools, due to
which special ed has become an essential requirement within those
schools. The purpose of special ed is to provide support, to students with
disabilities and to teachers. Its purpose is not necessarily to teach class
content, but to build the academic and developmental skills required
to be successful and independent learners. 
In a typical mainstream school, students with disabilities who may not be
performing at the grade level, and may exhibit a gap in their skills, will
benefit from special ed classes. For example, Coco who is in the 4th grade
is still reading at a 2nd grade level. She receives special education support
to build upon her reading skills, while she continues to learn the same
content and participate in the mainstream classroom alongside her
typically developing peers.
Inclusive education, on the other hand, is the practice of educating students
with disabilities alongside their peers without disabilities, in the same
classroom. It is meant for ALL learners. Inclusive ed is based on the premise
that all students develop and learn differently, and therefore one fixed
way of teaching and learning cannot ensure successful outcomes for all.
Inclusive ed is not just limited to including students with
 

disabilities, but is responsible for ensuring that their

needs are met in the mainstream classroom as well.
Implementing inclusive education requires flexible
curricula that have been designed keeping in mind
diverse learners.
This is to ensure that multiple pathways are provided to students to
reach the same goal, as opposed to the traditional ‘one size fits all’
methodology. There is evidence that suggests that inclusive ed benefits
not only learners with disabilities, but those without disabilities as
well, and helps build the capacity of teachers and school systems.
 Hereis a mind map that attempts to convey how I view
the relationship between special ed and inclusive ed.
While they are two distinct practices, that may exist by
themselves, each practice is stronger and more effective
when these co-exist.
 As per my experience with Indian schools, so far, special education has existed
without inclusive classroom practice. Due to this, oftentimes the responsibility of
educating students with disabilities falls on the special educator(s). This results in
students spending a lot of their school day outside the mainstream classroom, in a
small group setting. While this may be helpful in schools where teachers or
classrooms are not equipped to meet the needs of all, this goes against the idea of
inclusion.
  Segregating students with disabilities, not providing
them with the education they deserve within the
classroom, is unfair, ableist, and deprives them of an
equitable quality education and social integration.
 An inclusive school will ideally have both the practices
feeding into each other. Special education services will
ensure that students with disabilities are able to develop
the skills required to access the general curriculum and
receive appropriate support, along with 
accommodations and modifications needed to be
successful.
 Inclusive classroom practices will help students feel more included
and at par with their peers, thus reducing the extent to which the
special educator may be responsible for their learning. While the onus
of Special Education lies primarily with Special Educators, the onus
of Inclusive Education lies with ALL teachers, as well as the entire
school community. 
 Consistent collaboration among special ed and general ed
(mainstream) teachers helps understand and meet the
diverse needs of our students, and builds the capacity of
all educators, thus creating stronger education systems.
Inclusive Education in the Philippines

 Inclusive education aims to mainstream students with special needs

in a flexible learning environment for acquiring quality education
that optimises their potential for holistic development. This goal
depends upon teachers who can attain inclusivity in the educational
system by shaping positive values, providing knowledge, and
developing the skills of exceptional students to cope with life's
challenges.
 Adopting this perspective, this study documents the experiences of forty-
three college teachers with deaf students in inclusive classes, in one
higher education institution in the Philippines. The descriptive
phenomenological approach of Colaizzi’s coding and categorising of the
participants’ responses, obtained from in-depth, individual face-to-face
and online interviews elucidates four themes that illuminate the
experiences of participants.
These themes are conveyed as challenging for harnessing their
creative/innovative minds to develop teaching tools for effective quality
education, opportunity to shape a brighter future of deaf students, and
undertake inspiring teaching. The highlighted themes are attributes that
can pave the way for more effective inclusive education in tertiary
institutions in the Philippines.
 The paradigm shift to an inclusive educational system where students with
special needs are mainstreamed into a regular learning environment with normal
students has been for many decades a goal for inclusive education advocates. A
global framework for inclusive education was advocated in a world conference
on special needs education in Salamanca, Spain in 1994 (Ainscow, 2016) and
has been a feature for UNESCO since its calls for Education for all (EFA) in
Jontiem,
 Thailand (1990), Amman, Jordan (1996), Dakar, Senegal
(2000), Geneva, Switzerland (2008), and Incheon, South
Korea (2015). UNESCO as a prime mover for inclusive
education has underscored that teachers' readiness,
knowledge delivery, and teaching practices are core
elements in an inclusive educational platform (UNESCO,
2015).
Filipinos have high regard for education as they believe this is valuable for uplifting
them from poverty, having a prosperous life, and achieving breakthroughs for the
country’s economic progress and industrial development. This valuing of education is
inscribed in the country’s fundamental law, the 1987 Philippine Constitution (Republic
of the Philippines, 1987) in which Article XIV, Section 1 states "The State shall
protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality education at all levels and shall
take appropriate steps to make such education accessible to all", which includes the
rights of persons with disabilities or students with special needs, specifically the deaf.
Through this mission of the government, the Republic Act (Republic Act 7277,
1991) known as the Magna Carta for disabled persons was enacted, which
proliferated into distinct regulated laws and policies to ensure rehabilitation, self-
development, and self-reliance of disabled individuals or students with special
needs (Ebol, 2000). Moreover, the latter enlightened the conceptualisation of
special education (SPED), later shifted to inclusive education in the country’s
educational system. The SPED program has found its place since the start of its
implementation in the late 1990s.
The SPED program has found its place since the start of its implementation in the late
1990s. Its goal was strengthened by Department of Education (DepEd) Orders which
drive education specialists to enact SPED programs in public schools across the country,
particularly the DepEd Orders 38 of 2015 [Guidelines on the utilization of SPED funds]
(DepEd Order 38, 2015), 6 of 2006 [Ordered secondary schools to offer SPED program]
(DepEd 96 Implementing inclusive education in the Philippines: College teacher
experiences with deaf students Order 6, 2006), and 11 of 2000 [Mandated each Division
to have at least one SPED centers to cater students with special needs] (DepEd Order
11, 2000).
The SPED program has become an imperative for responding to the growing number of
students with special needs who lack access to quality inclusive education (EFA, 2010).
The commitment of the Philippines to the United Nations Convention on the Rights of
Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD, 2008) pushed the government through the
Department of Education (DepEd) to shift the current educational system of special
education (SPED) into an inclusive education system where its main objective is to
mainstream students with special needs in the regular classroom to learn side by side
with normal students.
The paradigm shift to inclusive education challenges the higher education
institutions in the Philippines. Thus, to become responsive in the implementation of
inclusive education, the Commission on Higher Education (CHED) circulated
CHED Memorandum Order (CMO) 23 of 2000 [Quality education for learners with
special needs] (CHED, 2000; 2017) which urged higher education institutions to: 1.
Admit students with special needs. 2. Include SPED programs for teacher training
institutions. 3. Provide/modified accessible facilities and equipment for students
with special needs.