Professional Credential Program: Impacting Early Childhood Inclusive Learning Environments

Document Type

Article

Publication Date

1-29-2020

School

Education

Abstract

For more than three decades, the inclusion of children with disabilities in early childhood education settings has been developing worldwide in educational research, policy, and real-world practice. The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of a Special Needs Inclusive Practices Credential Program with early educators working in the southeastern region of the United States. Researchers used the Inclusive Classroom Profile (ICP) with a pre-post research design to measure inclusive practice change. Initial results from this study revealed a statistically significant effect on all but two items for the initial cohorts (i.e. 1 and 2). After revising the PD for cohort 3 the analyses did not identify any items from the ICP that were not statistically significant. Importantly the overall analyses (including all 3 cohorts), revealed a statistically significant for within subjects on the total pre- and post-test score of the Inclusive Classroom Profile (ICPTM) (2016), Wilk’s Lambda = .49, F (1, 82) = 83.92, p = .000. The analysis did not identify any items that did not result in a statistically significant change between pre and post evaluations of all cohorts.

Publication Title

International Journal of Inclusive Education

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