Switzerland
This pilot experience aimed to try a new form of inclusion for children with special needs in a mainstream classroom, giving them the opportunity to develop social skills through relationships with their peers and differentiated and personalised teaching. The collaboration between teachers with different experiences and training should allow every single child to develop their own personal skills. The project aimed to promote daily interactions between children from the special school and children from the mainstream school and assumed that such interactions would bring reciprocal benefits.
Outcomes
- Consensus-building process at a social and institutional level (municipality, public administration, school, families)
- Inclusion in a more general reform process, which involved compulsory schooling and had inclusive education as a milestone
- Reference to the tradition of the Canton Ticino pre-primary school to pay particular attention to the topic of inclusion
- The low number of children registered to special schools in Ticino, when compared to the national average
- External recognition: The experience was observed with interest by political institutions who considered it to be relevant. This was shown by their willingness to invest economic resources in the project. A similar project at the University of Teacher Education in Canton Ticino also took place
- Collaboration: All stakeholders were involved. The process was based on common ground principles and their meaning for the social and scholastic community.
Read more in the Inclusive Early Childhood Education activity’s project example from Switzerland.