The University of Southampton
University of Southampton Institutional Repository

Teachers’ views about school-based professional development for promoting inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools

Teachers’ views about school-based professional development for promoting inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools
Teachers’ views about school-based professional development for promoting inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools
Most countries recognise inclusive education, but the practice is inconsistent due to its complexity and variability in implementation. The Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013– 2025 emphasises the importance of quality-inclusive education. However, Malaysia’s context, including its diverse ethnicity, language, culture, religion, besides education and school systems, has implications for implementing and promoting inclusive education. This research explores teachers’ significant yet overlooked views of inclusion and schoolbased continuous professional development (CPD). The aim is to understand better the requirement for the promotion of inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools, focusing on practitioners’ views. This interpretative, exploratory, qualitative study employed multiple methods to obtain rich and in-depth data. There were 76 participants from five National primary schools, and 25 teachers were interviewed individually and 51 participated in eight focus-group interviews. Ten classroom observations were conducted prior to the individual interviews. The data were analysed thematically by the inductive approach, using NVivo software. Theories of inclusive education and the 'Cognitive Activation in the Mathematics Classroom and Professional Competence of Teachers' (COACTIV) model of teachers' professional competence were adopted to analyse teachers’ views. In the model, four aspects of competences were identified as needing improvement through professional development: beliefs, values and goals; motivational orientations; professional knowledge; and self-regulation. The results show that teachers view inclusive education as a challenging concept to implement. Such views are influenced by multiple factors, such as miscommunication between departments, sociocultural attitudes to disability, educational systems, insufficient facilities, and teachers’ lack of knowledge and skills. The analysis of data reveals that teachers’ views about school-based CPD in promoting inclusion are influenced by factors that correspond to the COACTIV model. In parallel, the study highlights the importance of the Malaysian context and structures within the education system in forming teachers’ views on inclusion and relevant CPD. The findings will be of value in developing teacher training programmes and informing the potential topics for school-based CPD programmes.
University of Southampton
Binti Salleh, Rosmalily
49793003-0e1f-4352-8c69-599bdf7abfa9
Binti Salleh, Rosmalily
49793003-0e1f-4352-8c69-599bdf7abfa9

Binti Salleh, Rosmalily (2020) Teachers’ views about school-based professional development for promoting inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools. Doctoral Thesis, 564pp.

Record type: Thesis (Doctoral)

Abstract

Most countries recognise inclusive education, but the practice is inconsistent due to its complexity and variability in implementation. The Malaysia Education Blueprint 2013– 2025 emphasises the importance of quality-inclusive education. However, Malaysia’s context, including its diverse ethnicity, language, culture, religion, besides education and school systems, has implications for implementing and promoting inclusive education. This research explores teachers’ significant yet overlooked views of inclusion and schoolbased continuous professional development (CPD). The aim is to understand better the requirement for the promotion of inclusive education in Malaysia’s primary schools, focusing on practitioners’ views. This interpretative, exploratory, qualitative study employed multiple methods to obtain rich and in-depth data. There were 76 participants from five National primary schools, and 25 teachers were interviewed individually and 51 participated in eight focus-group interviews. Ten classroom observations were conducted prior to the individual interviews. The data were analysed thematically by the inductive approach, using NVivo software. Theories of inclusive education and the 'Cognitive Activation in the Mathematics Classroom and Professional Competence of Teachers' (COACTIV) model of teachers' professional competence were adopted to analyse teachers’ views. In the model, four aspects of competences were identified as needing improvement through professional development: beliefs, values and goals; motivational orientations; professional knowledge; and self-regulation. The results show that teachers view inclusive education as a challenging concept to implement. Such views are influenced by multiple factors, such as miscommunication between departments, sociocultural attitudes to disability, educational systems, insufficient facilities, and teachers’ lack of knowledge and skills. The analysis of data reveals that teachers’ views about school-based CPD in promoting inclusion are influenced by factors that correspond to the COACTIV model. In parallel, the study highlights the importance of the Malaysian context and structures within the education system in forming teachers’ views on inclusion and relevant CPD. The findings will be of value in developing teacher training programmes and informing the potential topics for school-based CPD programmes.

Text
Lily thesis 4 May 2020
Available under License University of Southampton Thesis Licence.
Download (44MB)
Text
Permission to deposit thesis _Lily_signed_RW
Restricted to Repository staff only

More information

Published date: May 2020

Identifiers

Local EPrints ID: 448255
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/448255
PURE UUID: 113a245a-0b37-4455-b510-67d8a90bef71
ORCID for Rosmalily Binti Salleh: ORCID iD orcid.org/0000-0001-5735-5492

Catalogue record

Date deposited: 16 Apr 2021 16:31
Last modified: 16 Mar 2024 09:44

Export record

Contributors

Author: Rosmalily Binti Salleh ORCID iD

Download statistics

Downloads from ePrints over the past year. Other digital versions may also be available to download e.g. from the publisher's website.

View more statistics

Atom RSS 1.0 RSS 2.0

Contact ePrints Soton: eprints@soton.ac.uk

ePrints Soton supports OAI 2.0 with a base URL of http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/cgi/oai2

This repository has been built using EPrints software, developed at the University of Southampton, but available to everyone to use.

We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. If you continue without changing your settings, we will assume that you are happy to receive cookies on the University of Southampton website.

×