Browsed by
Category: Inclusion and Mainstreaming

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Building Self-Determination in Childhood

Building Self-Determination in Childhood

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I’ve previously written about the importance of giving neurodivergent people more self-determination in childhood.  Indeed, I think all children, including the neurotypicals, could probably benefit from increased self-determination and autonomy.  Isn’t it rather strange that entering adulthood in our society, legally speaking, gives one full rights to autonomy overnight where previously one’s autonomy was legally minimal?  An abrupt transition, for sure!  Why not give people more practice exercising autonomy in childhood? It certainly seems like giving more opportunities for self-determination…

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Photograph depicting serried rows of empty desks and chairs in a school classroom.
Self-Determination in Childhood

Self-Determination in Childhood

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One of the most interesting discussions I’ve ever had in the autism world was at a conference I was involved in organizing back when I was an undergraduate student.  We had organized some panels on different stages of autistic people’s experiences in life and we found that numerous people had particularly negative thoughts about their childhoods.  In particular, they were talking about how relieved they were to be out of school.  To provide a little background, this was not necessarily…

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The Social Model and the Mainstream School

The Social Model and the Mainstream School

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Anyone who reads this blog regularly has probably noticed by now that I spend a lot of time talking about educational placement.  It is a very important topic, because the suitability of an educational placement is going to have a major influence on an individual’s future.  I certainly believe that my successful placement in a distance-learning high school program is responsible for many of my own achievements in adulthood. Basically, my opinion about educational placement is that we need choices. …

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Falsifiability, Resources, and School Placements

Falsifiability, Resources, and School Placements

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I want to deal with a possible objection to my views on educational placement (which you can find described here). I think the universal inclusionists – those who want all children to be educated in the mainstream – use rhetorical trickery to paper over the weaknesses in their arguments.  They define “inclusion” as being a state in which all students are meaningfully and fully included as part of a mainstream school community.  Any case where a student is not meaningfully…

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Inclusion and Mainstreaming: What is To Be Done?

Inclusion and Mainstreaming: What is To Be Done?

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Over the last few months, I’ve written a lot of posts sharing my thoughts on inclusion and mainstreaming.  In those posts, I’ve spent a lot of time complaining about the way things are done today (especially in North America), but I’ve spent relatively little time describing the urgent changes I think we need. Probably the most complete description of my thoughts so far is found in this post, where I explain how I disagree with both of the major views…

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The Meaning of Inclusion

The Meaning of Inclusion

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On this blog, I’ve spent a lot of time criticizing the idea that everyone should be forced to attend mainstream schools, regardless of whether they want to or not.  In doing so, I’ve sometimes suggested that I am opposed to “inclusion” itself, but that’s not exactly correct.  Previously, I’ve never really unpacked the difference between the concepts of mainstreaming or integration and the concept of inclusion, even though there is a very important distinction between them.  I want to clarify…

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Independence in Specialized Schools

Independence in Specialized Schools

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I have some serious doubts about the mainstream schools.  I worry about bullying in the mainstream schools, social isolation in the mainstream schools, social skills in the mainstream schools, mental health in the mainstream schools, and sensory distress in the mainstream schools, among other things.  Because of all of these problems with the mainstream, I think we need alternative options. But I will admit to some worries about specialized schools as well.  They do have some of their own problems,…

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Sensory Sensitivities in the Mainstream School

Sensory Sensitivities in the Mainstream School

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It’s been a whole ten days since my last criticism of the mainstream schools, so I think it’s about time I got back to it.  As I argued earlier, this is an extremely important issue – where someone spends their days for the duration of their school career is going to have a bigger influence than any limited, short-duration set of intervention sessions. The sensory demands of the mainstream schools are one of the biggest challenges they impose on us. …

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Mental Health in the Mainstream Schools

Mental Health in the Mainstream Schools

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Today, I’ll be continuing my assault on the idea that everybody should be forced to attend all-inclusive mainstream schools with a sixth post on the subject.  We’ve already heard how autistic students in the mainstream can be bullied and isolated.  Furthermore, I’ve argued that the mainstream does little to help us learn social skills and instead probably delays social learning.  We’ve also discussed how educational placement decisions are made and we’ve discussed why all of this is so critically important….

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Schools and School Placements are Very Important

Schools and School Placements are Very Important

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If you read this blog, you might notice that I have devoted a lot of time to the question of inclusion and specialization in the school system.  Why am I so obsessed with schools and school placement? Well, I admit I hadn’t really thought about that question for the longest time – I just knew, from my own experiences and my observations of a couple of specialized schools in the community, that school placement can make a real difference in…

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