School type recommendations after Joint Learning – Pedagogical diagnostics at the transition from primary to secondary school for children with special educational needs

• Applicants: Dr. Katrin Lintorf; Professorin Dr. Stefanie van Ophuysen; Professorin Dr. Sina Schürer
• Subject Area: General and Domain-Specific Teaching and Learning
• Term: since 2022
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 516027054

The transition from a primary school (PS) with Joint Learning (JL) to a secondary school is an important status passage in the educational biography of children with special educational needs (SEN). Parents decide between further JL at a general school and schooling at a special needs school after a mandatory consultation with the PS teacher.We investigate the PS teachers’ recommendation concerning children with SEN in the areas of learning and social emotional development for a special-needs vs. general school in the consultation process using the example of the German federal state NRW. We describe the design of the diagnostic process using theoretically based quality criteria and identify predictors of the teacher recommendation by means of two closely related sub-studies.Sub-study 1: Qualitative case studies in eight PSs with varying degrees of inclusive profile shed light on the quality of the diagnostic process in particular, using a variety of methodological approaches (e.g., expert interviews with principals, problem-centered interviews with regular/special education teachers, document analyses). The quality criteria we use are: (a) the targeted use of various diagnostic methods to generate valid information, (b) multi-professional cooperation as a way to achieve a comprehensive, multi-perspective view on the individual child, (c) systematic documentation for sustainably secured information processing, and (d) individual diagnostic action as a practice implemented on the school level.Sub-study 2: The subsequent quantitative cross-sectional online survey focuses on predictors of the recommendation. Teachers and principals from a large random sample of PS in NRW are surveyed to determine the relative importance of child characteristics (e.g., academic achievement, work behavior), family (e.g., parental support, social status), school structure (e.g., availability/accessibility of secondary schools, school collaborations), and the recommending teacher (e.g., attitudes toward inclusion) on the recommendation for or against further joint schooling. Moreover, the study serves as a quantifying generalization of findings on the design of the diagnostic process.From the qualitative study, conducive or challenging conditions and a more or less constructive way of dealing with them in the context of the pedagogical-diagnostic process can be derived. Their dissemination is verified by the subsequent quantitative study. By examining the importance of family, school structure, and teacher characteristics, the quantitative study provides an important contribution to research on inequality or fairness of the recommendation at the elementary school transition of children with SEN.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Austria
• Cooperation Partner: Professor Dr. Timo Lüke