Inclusive Education and Home-Schooling: History
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Contributor:
Chris Forlin
,
Dianne Chambers

There has been strong movement internationally towards inclusive education. As part of this movement, researchers and practitioners have examined the structures and practices of schools to attempt to determine the most appropriate environment and pedagogies to support the needs of all learners. This examination has resulted in a range of approaches being adopted by systems and schools to ensure that the needs of all learners are being met. At the same time there has been a noticeable increase in the number of parents of learners with additional learning needs choosing to home school their child.

  • whole school approach
  • inclusion
  • parents
  • parent perceptions of home-schooling scale
  • disability
  • additional learning needs (ADL)

1. Inclusive Education

When considering the implementation of what tends to be generalized under the banner of ‘inclusion’, several significant issues arise. Without any regulated definition of inclusion internationally, and often an enormous variety of understanding within countries, policies to inform inclusive educational practices and local interpretations of them may vary quite dramatically [1]. With inclusion being seen in Australia as multifaceted, incorporating a holistic approach, there are national core values which emphasize presence, participation, and achievement for all children and youth [2]. Nevertheless, within Australia, each of the eight states and territories are autonomous in their educational policy, thus leading to no uniform provision of how inclusive education is enacted or supported [3][4]. There is, however, some federal funding for states which is allocated according to the level of support needed to include any child who has been formally identified with a disability. This funding is regulated through the Nationally Consistent Collection of Data (NCCD) (nccd.edu.au).
Within education in Australia, there are three distinct systems, consisting of government, Catholic, and independent schools. Both government and Catholic schools are operated under a state-wide coordinating body. Independent schools do not have an overarching education body and act individually. Across all three systems, a range of schooling options may be offered from full inclusion into a mainstream classroom, inclusion on the site of a mainstream school but in a separate classroom or centre for some or all of the school day, or placement in a segregated special school (government system only). While parents have been increasingly consulted regarding preferred placement options, the final decision for government schools remains with the state-based education departments, and for Catholic and independent schools, with individual schools. Including all students in the life of the school through a whole school approach should, theoretically, support the needs of all students. Such an approach aligns closely with the principles of the holistic approach promoted in Australia. In the 10-year national workforce strategy for Western Australian education, published in 2021 [5], it is proposed that a support team will be established if a child is diagnosed with a learning disability. This holistic approach should include the parent(s), school staff and service providers as necessary. Support services are to be determined collaboratively to ensure the best education and support is available to meet a child’s unique needs. Additional behavioral support is also available to parents through the National Disability Insurance Scheme that was implemented in 2013 for learners formally identified with a disability [6].
A holistic approach also requires that teachers feel confident and have the skills to be able to cater for the needs of all learners within increasingly diverse classrooms [7]. It has been found that this approach to inclusion may support learners with special needs by addressing some of the disadvantages experienced by them that may lead to issues such as school drop-out and disengagement and in enhancing feelings of belonging and acceptance [8][9]. In addition to supporting the development of students with disabilities and those experiencing disadvantage, a holistic approach to inclusion can also result in increased benefit for all learners, including developing meaningful friendships, acceptance of difference and diversity, and preparation for an inclusive society [10][11].
Within the holistic Australian model, in-school support takes a pre-emptive approach in providing multi-tiered structures to address the needs of students in the areas of academic development, behavior, or social interactions [12][13][14]. Whilst a whole school approach would appear to be a logical and practical approach to supporting the needs of all students, there are some challenges in implementation for this method. All teaching staff and general staff in the school must be on board with the approach and have appropriate training and support to implement any modifications to the environment and curriculum that are required to support all students [7]. While the challenges may be evident, it is important that schools taking this approach work diligently to ensure that all parties are included and have a role in helping all learners to thrive.

2. Home-Schooling

Although much of the recent literature around home-schooling is concerned with schooling during the COVID-19 pandemic [15][16], home-schooling or home education has been evident since the 1970s, even though there has been a significant increase since 2020 [17], and has also been seen in a variety of modes, variously supported by legislation and policy. Home-schooling, or home education, refers to the practice of providing education to children within their home environment, rather than a formal school institution [18]. The type of education provided can be structured, unstructured (sometimes called unschooling), or a combination of these approaches, with differences in the way content and pedagogy are defined [19][20]. In some cases, home-schooling is combined with traditional schooling, where the student attends a mainstream school for some of their education and is home-schooled for the remainder.
The geolocation of the student impacts on the legislation or regulations that must be addressed when considering home-schooling [21], with it being illegal in some countries (e.g., Germany, Spain, Portugal, Brazil) and very much accepted in others (e.g., Australia, France, the USA, Finland, Ireland, the UK). The legislation varies greatly regarding required education for learners, with broad terms used in some instances (i.e., the UK simply states that the child must have an education, with no specific information as to where or how), and is very prescriptive in other cases (i.e., in Austria, there are strict conditions around home-schooling). In some countries, such as the USA, individual states or territories have varying legislation regarding home-schooling [22], which can be difficult if families move between jurisdictions often for employment or other reasons. In Australia, children need to be either in school, or to be home-schooled between the ages of 5 and 17 years [23]. Education authorities in each Australian State and Territory recognize home-schooling as an alternative to the classroom and require that parents are registered with the state education authority [24].
Across all jurisdictions in Australia, in 2018, there were approximately 20,000 registered home educated learners [25] and the trend towards home-schooling was seen to be increasing [24]. From analysing government data from Western Australia between 2017 and 2021 [5], the increasing trend for home-schooling learners is evident. The actual number of students registered as being home-schooled increased from 3064 in 2017 to 4562 in 2021. By comparing these data to the increase in the number of students enrolled in public schools across the same time frame, it was possible to calculate the relative percentage increase in students being home-schooled. In Table 1, it can be seen that the overall increase in home-schooling across the five years is dramatic. Compared to the 5.41% increase in public schools, there was a five-fold increase in home-schooling. Much of this increase occurred between the latter years from 2019 to 2021. Although these years incorporated the need for off-site schooling during COVID outbreaks, these figures only include families who formally registered for home-schooling, and not those who were required to keep their children at home during interim periods. In WA, unlike some other jurisdictions in Australia, schools mainly remained open during the pandemic with only very minimal closures.
Table 1. Increase in home-schooling in WA from 2017 to 2021.
Years Public School Increase Home-Schooling Increase
2017–2021 (5 years) 5.41% 24%
2017–2019 (3 years) 2.86% 6.88%
2019–2021 (3 years) 2.60% 18%
Throughout the past decade, researchers have identified an increasing upward trend in the number of parents choosing to home-school their children, which was evident even before the COVID-19 pandemic but has seen a continued acceleration in recent years [18]. There is also an increasing diversity in people who chose to home-school their children, often in response to their beliefs (ideology, religion), and/or social factors (class, ethnicity) [21]. Dissatisfaction with traditional schooling is increasingly cited as a reason for choosing home-schooling for learners with disability or additional learning needs (ALN). Concerns include issues about safety, lack of religious grounding, behavior problems, lack of support for students with disabilities, lack of high-quality outcomes, or simply not meeting the educational and/or social needs of the student [24]. Often it is a combination of reasons that lead parents to search for alternative ways to educate their children. Decisions for home-schooling, however, are very context specific, although they can be generalized as either proactive or reactive. Proactive decisions are based on core family beliefs and philosophical reasons, or reactive decisions are in response to perceived negative or unsuitable schooling. This research considers decisions made by parents of children with or without a specific learning need.

This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/educsci13060571

References

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