Dissertations

Date of Award

5-2017

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Doctor of Education (EdD)

Department

Educational Leadership

Advisor

Dr. Diana Julian

Abstract

The purpose of this dissertation was to determine if teacher attitudes towards inclusive education were influenced by the variables of gender, age, educational level, teaching level, and number of special education courses taken for regular general education teachers in rural school districts in South-Central Arkansas. Next, the purpose of the study was to determine the predictive effects of teaching years at the teachers’ current level, total years teaching experience, and years of special needs teaching experience on perception of inclusion for regular general education teachers in rural school districts in South-Central Arkansas. Third, the purpose of the study was to describe what types of inclusive education training methods were perceived as being the most and least beneficial for regular general education teachers in rural school districts in South-Central Arkansas.

Teachers in three small, rural school districts located in Southcentral Arkansas were chosen as the accessible population for this study. These three schools share a special education supervisor. During the course of the data collection, 211 certified teachers were employed for the 2014-2015 school year. Of the 211 teachers, 78 teachers viii completed and returned the survey. Of the 78, 72 survey results were usable for Part 1 of the analyses. Of the usable data, the majority of the returns were females.

To address the first main hypothesis with its five subsections, five one-way ANOVAs were conducted using the following teacher traits: gender, age, educational level, teaching level, and number of special education courses taken in undergraduate and/or graduate school as the five independent variables with the overall attitude toward inclusion serving as the dependent variable for each. The results of this study are in contrast to many that suggest teacher’s gender, age, degree level, grade level teaching, and number of special education courses taken are significant influences on a positive teacher attitude.

To address the second hypothesis, a multiple regression was conducted to determine the predictive relationship between teaching years at their current level, total years teaching experience, and years of special needs teaching experience on the perception of inclusion for regular general education teachers in rural school districts in South-Central Arkansas. In this study, no predictors significantly contributed to the model. However, results indicated that overall in this study, the general attitude of teachers was more positive toward inclusive education.

For the research question, the rankings were compiled from the survey regarding the most and the least beneficial in obtaining training about inclusion. Time for consultation with special education teachers was the most beneficial method. School building level ranked second, and district level in-service training method was third. College/University coursework was the least beneficial method but was only one point higher than being provided articles to read. All other methods were evenly distributed.

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