OPINIONS OF ELEMENTARY SCHOOL STUDENTS ON INCLUSIVE EDUCATION

Abstract

Since recently there has been a widespread assertion that the children with special needs should be included in regular elementary schooling. With this in mind, the author of the following article:
- Demonstrates how societal attitudes toward those children started to evolve in the 1960s, and continue to change through the time;
- Attempts to seek the answers to the following four questions:
Who has difficulties learning?
What sorts of obstacles those children face?
What to do to reduce those obstacles to a minimum?
What resources do we have available to remove those obstacles?
The answers to those questions can sometimes be found in peculiar places. The author of this article has found them among the students of a regular elementary school. The author has designed the student’s questionnaire with ten questions. He has received very interesting answers that we similar, or, in some cases, even more appropriate than those offered by adults. The children have expressed the desire for overcoming societal separation and isolation of children with special needs. They have demanded that every child is given an equal opportunity for its development. They have demonstrated readiness to alter their working methods in order to enable the children with special needs to join them in the process of upbringing and learning.