Israeli Arab teachers' attitudes on inclusion of students with disabilities

The paper describes a study done in middle schools, grades 7-9, in Israel of Arab teachers' attitudes towards inclusion in general and in their school in particular. A specially designed questionnaire was used for the survey. The sample was composed of 325 randomly selected middle school Arab teachers in Israel. Findings revealed conflicting attitudes. On the one hand, high commitment was reported by the teachers to the inclusion of students with special needs in regular education in the areas of learning, social inclusion and emotional development. Similarly, they reported a positive view of the feasibility of adapting teaching materials for their special needs students. On the other hand, teachers expressed the view that the inclusion of students with special needs does not contribute to the "regular" students in the academic studies and regarding the social and personal-emotional areas. They also did not feel that typical students benefited from the additional assistive technologies that are brought into their classroom. In addition, teachers did not see the benefits of inclusion to the overall schools' reputation. Three quarters of the respondents said that the school had no formal written statement concerning the inclusion of students with special needs. However, they were of the opinion that they had satisfactory opportunities to discuss issues concerning inclusion with their school administration (i.e. the school principal or his/her deputy) and they had fairly satisfactory assistance from the special education local area consultants. As far as accessibility goes, more than one half of the teachers expressed the view that their school was only partially accessible. Relations between school teachers and families were found to be very limited.