Students with Special Needs in Digital Classrooms during the COVID-19 Pandemic in Turkey
Gulcihan Yazcayir 1 * , Hasan Gurgur 2
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1 Usak University, TURKEY2 Eskisehir Anadolu University, TURKEY* Corresponding Author

Abstract

In this study, the aim is to examine how special education provided for students within inclusive education has continued at home during the pandemic. This study has employed phenomenology as the research method because this design enables researchers to make in-depth analysis and description. Purposeful sampling method was utilized to determine the participants of the study. Research participants consists of 15 voluntary parents of students with special needs who continued their education through inclusive education conducted in general education classes. Participating parents’ children were between 9-to-14 years of age and were studying at a grade between the 3rdand 8th grades. Research data have been collected through semi-structured interviews and analyzed by inductive method. research results have shown that all students, including those with special needs, have continued their schooling via distance education provided by Turkish Ministry of National Education through EBA TV and the official website of the Ministry. In addition, participants have reported that some teachers conducted online lessons and shared worksheets with all students via the WhatsApp group. However, several issues of concern have also been noted as follows: students with special needs could not follow the lessons on TV regularly, many of them did not attend online lessons, and their teachers did not give feedback about their activities. Moreover, none of the students with special needs received support education services, and there was no communication and cooperation among teachers, families, and students. Furthermore, the findings have indicated that children were unwilling and unable to adapt to distance education.

License

This is an open access article distributed under the Creative Commons Attribution License which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.

Article Type: Research Article

PEDAGOGICAL RES, 2021, Volume 6, Issue 1, Article No: em0088

https://doi.org/10.29333/pr/9356

Publication date: 03 Jan 2021

Article Views: 4396

Article Downloads: 1383

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