Interactive Activity
Many people define inclusive education as the participation of individual disabled children/students rather than to the an active process of creating community that values each member. In this activity, the goal is to encourage educators to look at the environmental factors that underly the classroom dynamic, as opposed to seeing individual children/students as the cause of disruptions.
It is important to look at the environment and all environmental factors (including physical space, social relationships, and the temporal environment) as sites for accessibility. The goal is not about one or two children, but creating a community where there is recognition that the group as a whole has responsibility for inclusion.
This case study is designed to consider how changes in curriculum can affect the structure and pacing of the day including how everyone in the room is relating to each other, as well as how this may be impacting children and educators in the classroom community. This case study shares the educator viewpoint on changes in a classroom followed by discussion questions.
Case Study - Educator Viewpoint
- A child care centre (Apple Kids Centre) has recently implemented approaches that are derived from How Does Learning Happen? (HDLH) Daisy is a Registered Early Childhood Educator working at Apple Kids. Daisy has been in the field for more than 20 years and she is not sure what is expected of her in this new environment but she is open to learning. When HDLH was first introduced, she read most of it, and found that it seemed intuitive. However, over the past few months Daisy has noticed several changes in the centre.
- For one thing, Apple Kids has always used a schedule of themes that they would work on each week. For example, Mondays were for cooking, Tuesdays for sports, Wednesday was science, Thursday was a community walk, and Friday was for families to come in and do an activity. These themes helped to know what was going to happen each week. In addition, the day was structured with snack, lunch, washroom, reading, play and outdoor time each day. With the implementation of HDLH, these routines have been adjusted with an emphasis on asking children what they would like to do. As a result, the day is getting less and less structured. Daisy finds this difficult and she is spending more of her time writing down what the children are saying and asking to do. She sometimes feels that what she is writing down is not particularly relevant but she has to show that she is participating.
- For example, the children wanted to play hockey, so Daisy used her small budget to buy 10 hockey sticks. When she brought them into the class, the children played with them for a few minutes and quickly became bored. Daisy is frustrated because both her time and resources are quickly depleted. She feels has less time to do what she did before, including spending one-on-one time with Sarah, a child who uses mobility aids and who Daisy sees as having very high needs.
- Daisy also has a new student who has just moved into the neighbourhood. This student, Nelly, is Autistic (her family says she has Asperger’s although this diagnosis is no longer accepted within the diagnostic criteria), which Daisy does not know anything about. Nelly seems to want other children to listen to her and she becomes quite angry if she does not feel heard. Since Nelly arrived, Daisy feels that the behaviour of the group has declined significantly, with a lot more silliness, and even some aggressive behavior.
- One student, Michael, has been biting. Another educator in the room, Lucy, is refusing to work with Michael because she says that Michael is violent and she should not have to be exposed to his outbursts. Michael has thrown objects at her in the past and told other children that he will “kill them”.
Discussion Questions
- Is it really because of Nelly that behaviour has changed? What else might be causing that change?
- What about Michael? What do we know about him, what strategies might you use to support him?
- What about Lucy's behaviour and concerns? How can we address the role of the educator
in the environment?
- Note: Think of roles and responsibility, training, supports, consistent staff, etc.
- What are Sarah, Nelly, Michael, Daisy, and Lucy teaching us about what is happening in this classroom? From a universal design standpoint, what could be better… and what about differentiated instruction? What kinds of ableism are evident in this scenario?
- What factors in the physical, social and temporal (time or pacing) environment do you
think you could change?
- Note: Often we think the children/students are the problem, but we can always change different components of the environment.
- Examine the routines in the classroom, as opposed to the characteristics of the
children. What routines in your
classroom could you change that would allow you to adapt the physical, social or temporal environment
of your class?
- Note: Think about daily transitions since these happen often in a classroom or program.
- How could routines-based questioning be used to start conversations that coincide with
an anti-ableism stance in
this classroom?
- Note: Look at the environment rather than focusing on an individual child. Routines can be part of a classroom that has a flexible temporal routine. Routines can provide important structure for students, that allows them to anticipate upcoming activities and to envision their role in a group setting, and they can prepare everyone to have some flexibility.
Follow up Questions
- Did some of the children in the case take up more of your attention than others? Does
this matter?
- Note: This is often used as an argument against inclusion. But you can draw attention to how the environment is creating that situation as much as the children/students. And in this case, it is the child/student with an identified disability who is getting less attention. Disability justice tells us there will always be differences in what is necessary for care, but that is what it means to be inclusive and enact anti-ableist education.
- What about Sarah? Was she lost in the new environment? Or was she not actually being included in the earlier environment?
Page updated June 2026.