Stakeholders’ knowledge, implementation and challenges of inclusive Education in Kindergartens in Ejisu – Ashanti
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Date
2021-06-23
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Abstract
Inclusive Education has become necessary in the 21st century classroom with the changing needs of society. This means that kindergarten education should be considered to enable the children (age 4-5) with disabilities associate and learn with their counterparts without disabilities in the first stage of their education. Although studies have been conducted on Inclusive Education in Ejisu, very little is known about stakeholders’ (teachers, parents and pupils) knowledge, implementation and challenges in Inclusive Education in Kindergartens. The research adopted qualitative as well as quantitative method to study the knowledge that stakeholders (teachers, parents and pupils) have, the implementation and challenges of inclusive education in the kindergartens. Ejisu M/A Model Primary School, Ejisu M/A Experimental Primary school and Ejisu Presbyterian Primary School were selected with a total population of 881 for the studies. Both primary and secondary sources of data were used for the study. The instruments for the data collection were interview, questionnaire and observation with the use of simple random sampling and purposive sampling for the selection of the sample size of 268 from the population of the study. Data was analyzed using quantitative and qualitative analytical methods; descriptive statistics was mainly used for the quantitative and thematic analysis was used for the qualitative responses. Data gathered revealed that stakeholders (teachers, parents and pupils) have knowledge on Inclusive Education. However, parents who have children with disability have more knowledge on Inclusive Education unlike those without children with disability. Even though teacher’s knowledge on Inclusive Education was about children who have intellectual and physical disabilities and not including the economically impoverished, normadic children, gifted children among others as stated in the Inclusive Education policy of Ghana, not all teachers included such children in the school setting. The implementation of Inclusive Education in the Kindergartens is faced with numerous challenges which include insufficient facilities, teaching and learning resources and lack of education on the part of society and many more. The study concluded that for Inclusive Education to be effective, the provisions stated in the Inclusive Education policy should be adhered to. The study also recommends further research to include other stakeholders like the education officers, health workers, District / Municipal / Metropolitan Assemblies to assess their contributions of Inclusive Education.
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A thesis submitted to the School of Graduate Studies, Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Philosophy
Keywords
Stakeholders’ knowledge, Implementation Challenges, Inclusive Education, Kindergartens, Disabled Persons, Ejisu – Ashanti