Implementation of Inclusive Education in the Division of Camarines Norte

Implementation of Inclusive Education in the Division of Camarines Norte

Roma Ester Ajero Barco

Naga College Foundation, Inc. 2023 Naga City, Region V

DOI : https://dx.doi.org/10.47772/IJRISS.2024.8110187

Received: 30 October 2024; Accepted: 12 November 2024; Published: 17 December 2024

ABSTRACT

The study was conducted to explore the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte, it answered the following problems: (1.) The profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte; (2.) The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs; (3.) The significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices; (4.) The behavior of the special education teachers and parents; (5.) The issues and challenges; and (6.) The intervention program proposed to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The study employed descriptive research. The respondents were 116 Receiving Teachers and 105 parents. The study utilized Survey-questionnaire checklist. Focus group discussion was conducted for triangulation of data. Descriptive and inferential statistics were applied to facilitate the interpretation of the data gathered by the researcher.

Findings of the study: (1). As to enrolment, School G has the highest number of enrollees with 72 or 20.6% as compared to School B with only 58 or 16.6% enrollees out of 349 learners. As to human resources with special designation as Receiving Teachers, School G, D and A has the highest number of receiving teachers. As to budget allocation for schools with inclusive education, School A and School J has the higesst budget of Php 120,000.00. As to equipment, facilities and services, School A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H have manual alphabet while School A,E,H,G have chart slides on sign language and mirror for speech correction. For visual impairment, only three schools, Schools A, G, H have snellen charts required for eye check-ups and only one school with model on eye mechanism. Available equipment to 10 secondary schools catering learners with learning disability includes tests used for assessment. As to services provided by the schools to learners with special needs, eight school, Schools A,C,D,E,G,H,I have identification and referral process and assessment services; all schools adapted the K to 12 Curriculum for LWDs and only six schools developed Individualized Educational Plan (IEP); (2). the implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements got an average weighted mean of 2.93. (3). The study failed to correlate between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs (4). The behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners got an average weighted mean of 2.74 and 2.65. (5). There were 76 or 65.52% out of 116 teachers’ encountered issues and challenges along lack of training to cater different exceptionalities. There were 89 or 84.76% out of 105 parent’s encountered issues and challenges along behavioral issues of their child; (6). An Intervention Program in the form of Toolkit for Schools addresses the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The following conclusions were deduced: (1). The profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 varies. (2). The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting were interpreted as agree. (3). The profile of the schools are not correlated with the implementation practices; (4). Teachers and parents of learners with special needs agree as to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart. (5). Teachers and parents encountered various issues and challenges in the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. (6). Implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte may be addressed as reflected in the objectives and activities presented in the proposed intervention program.

Keywords: Inclusive Education; Special Education Program; Learner with Special Educational Needs

THE PROBLEM

Introduction

Education is thought to be essential to one’s development and prosperity. It prepares young people for living life as meaningfully and effectively as possible in society. It is mostly conducted in the classroom through varied learning experiences guided by their parents and teachers and are based on a curriculum set by the Department of Education.

Schools provide the context for a child’s first relationship with the world outside their families, enabling the development of social relationships and interactions. They should provide a quality education for all children and are instrumental in changing discriminatory attitudes. Respect and understanding grow when students of diverse abilities and backgrounds play, socialize, and learn together.

Within a school, the school principal, teachers, parents and other school stakeholders are involved in ensuring that the child can access their education and achieve their goals. The school principals play a crucial role in setting the priorities for learning in the school, with their values, commitment, knowledge and skill, they can make a difference. Effective leadership by the principal is especially important if schools are to be truly inclusive and meet the educational needs of an increasingly diverse student population.

Every child has the right to education. That includes children with disabilities. The Convention on the Right of Persons with Disabilities goes further to stress that inclusive education is a fundamental human right for every child with a disability. An inclusive education system is one that accommodates all students whatever their abilities or requirements, and at all levels – pre-school, primary, secondary, tertiary, vocational and life-long learning. It has education environments that adapt the design and physical structures, teaching methods, and curriculum as well as the culture, policy and practice of education environments so that they are accessible to all students without discrimination. UNICEF (2017)

In addition, inclusive education involves transforming the whole education system – legislation and policy, systems for financing, administration, design, delivery and monitoring of education, and the way schools are organized. It requires changes to the system as it involves the commitment and resources across education ministries and throughout the school, it needs support to teachers and students working and learning in inclusive environments, respect for diversity and participatory learning, partnership with parents, teachers organizations of people with disabilities and tracking progress on a regular basis. UNICEF (2017)

Around the world, children are excluded from schools where they belong because of disability, race, language, religion, gender, and poverty. But every child has the right to be supported by their parents and community to grow, learn, and develop in the early years, and, upon reaching school age, to go to school and be welcomed and included by teachers and peers alike. When all children, regardless of their differences, are educated together, everyone benefits, thus the main aim of inclusive education. (Open Society Foundation, May 2019)

At its most basic, David (2015) stated that inclusive education means educating learners with special educational needs in regular education settings. This process involves the transformation of schools to cater for all children. David (2015) elaborated the notion that inclusive education (IE) is a multifaceted concept, which he summarized in a formula consist of vision, placement, adapted curriculum, adapted assessment, adapted teaching, acceptance, access, support, resources and leadership. Inclusive education depends on educators at all levels of the system being committed to its underlying philosophy and being willing to implement it. This means that education systems and schools should articulate an inclusive culture in which there is some degree of consensus around values of respect for difference and a commitment to offering all pupils access to learning opportunities.

Accordingly, inclusive education highlights opportunities for an equal involvement of individuals with disabilities (physical, social and emotional) when possible, into typical education, but leaves accessible the probability of individual selections and possibilities for special aid and accommodations for persons who need it and want it (Rasmitadila & Tambunan, 2018).

In the Philippines, Republic Act 10533 section 8, s. 2013 mandates that: “Inclusiveness of enhanced basic education shall mean the implementation of programs designed to address the physical, intellectual, psychosocial, and cultural needs of learners, which shall include, but shall not be limited to, the following: programs for gifted and talented, programs for learners with disabilities, madrasah program, indigenous people education program and programs for learners under difficult circumstances “ Thus, Special Education is one of the programs of inclusion as mandated by this Act.

In a news article by Yang (2022) she stated that the Former President Rodrigo Duterte signed RA 11650, s. 2022 otherwise known as “Instituting a Policy of Inclusion and Services for Learners with Disabilities in Support of Inclusive Education Act”, a law which guarantees free early and basic education to learners with special needs, affirming the country’s commitment to make quality education accessible to everyone. Section 5 of RA 11650 Cleary states that all schools, whether public or private, shall ensure equitable access to quality education to every learner with disability, such that no learner shall be denied admission on the basis of disability. While this mandate is highly emphasized among public schools, data on the enrolment of students with disabilities stood at 93,895 for the School Year 2021 to 2022, lower by 74%, compared to its pre-pandemic figure of 360,879, as revealed by citing statistics.

In addition, the Philippines has also been working to develop policies that support inclusive education. One such policy is the creation of Special Education (SPED) schools, which are designed specifically for students with special needs. These schools provide services and accommodations, such as smaller class sizes, specialized instruction, and adaptive technology, which help ensure that these students can thrive in an academic setting. Data from DepEd showed that for 2016-2017, the total enrollment in SPED under DepEd is 238, 576. Of this number, 110, 346 are in elementary (68, 372-graded and 41, 974-non-graded) and 128, 230 in secondary. There are only 678 schools in 258 divisions that offer the Special Education program. Of this number, 501 schools are in 195 divisions for Elementary and 177 schools in 63 divisions for Secondary.

The implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools is vital to fostering social inclusion, academic success, the development of life skills, and the protection of human rights. The Philippines must prioritize the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools to ensure that all students, including those with special needs, have equitable access to and support in order to reach their full potential.

While inclusive education is an essential aspect of providing equitable access to education for learners with special needs, there are several challenges that the Philippines faces in implementing inclusive education in secondary schools. Ideally, there should be an offering the special education programs and services in every public school. But some schools are not offering special education programs due to a number of reasons such as lack of special education teachers, challenge in terms of teacher-pupil ratio, attitude of many most principals and teachers when it comes to promoting inclusive setting and lack of facilities and learning materials. Another reason is that most teachers teaching children with learning disabilities did not receive any special needs education training from the school, they feel that they are not qualified to teach the children with learning disabilities.

The Division of Camarines Norte is composed of 70 public secondary schools, for this school year only 10 or 14.28 % out of 70 secondary schools are offering special education classes with only 349 learners officially enrolled in the Learners Information System (LIS). It has an enrolment of 92,642 learners from Kindergarten to Senior High School. (SDO-Planning Division). In Camarines Norte National High School, where the researcher is currently the designated Special Education Coordinator, there are a total of 3,929 learners from Grade 7 to Grade 12 officially enrolled in Learners Information System (LIS) but only eight learners are classified as learners with special education needs with 16 receiving teachers.

Additionally, learners from regular classes of this school also received lower grades from their teachers not realizing their own potential. One of the identified reasons is that most of the learners have learning difficulties thus they could not meet up with expected competencies resulting in a lower grade. The researcher has experienced how challenging and difficult it is to cater these learners inside the classroom plus on the implementation of the special education program in the school which involves the cooperation of the regular teachers as they become the receiving teachers of these students.

It was then decided to conduct this study to explore the inclusion of students with special needs in public secondary schools which was used to propose an intervention program to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023.

Statement of the Problem

This study was conducted to explore the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte for School 2022 – 2023. Specifically, the following questions were answered:

1. What is the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of

1. enrolment,
2. human resources,
3. budget allocation, and
4. equipment, facilities, and services?

2. What are the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along:

1. identification and placements,
2. developing individual education plan,
3. assistance, and
4. reporting?

3. Is there a significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs?

4. What are the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart?

5. What are the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte?

6. What intervention program may be proposed to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte?

Assumptions of the Study

This study has the following assumptions;

1. The profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for school year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation and equipment, facilities, and services provided varies.
2. Each secondary school implementing inclusive education differ in terms of implementation practices along identification and placements, developing, assistance, and reporting.
3. Teachers and the parents of learners with special needs have different behavior pertaining to development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart.
4. The teachers and parents encountered issues and challenges in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.
5. An intervention program proposed by the researcher addressed the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in implementing inclusive education for learners with special needs in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Hypothesis 

The study anchored on the hypothesis that there is a significant relationship between the profile of the public secondary schools and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs.

Significance of the Study

This research study explored the inclusion of students with special needs in selected public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. As such, this study is beneficial for the following:

Learners with Special Needs. Significant benefits can be gained by both typical and atypical learners when the education process will be more child/ student focused as it is the hope of this study. This study could lead to more parent involvement, increased teacher commitment, more appropriate services and more improved school environment which ultimately be beneficial to the child with special needs.

Teachers. This study will benefit them as such will give them a basis for gaining a new perspective, proper values, attitudes, as well as competencies that communicate and reflect inclusion as they address the educational needs of both the learners with special education needs and the regular students at the same time in mainstreaming. The roles, responsibilities and priorities of teachers can be more expounded with the results of this study.

Receiving Teachers. They serve as advocates for students with disabilities and special needs. Their role includes ensuring that all school officials and employees understand the importance of inclusion and how to best implement inclusion in all school activities. Findings of this study will guide them in proposing school programs and activities to cater their learners and in requesting inclusion-focused professional development activities—especially programs that help general education teachers better understand inclusion best practices—or providing information to community members about success rates of inclusive teaching. They were the ones with direct contact to parents of their learners, thus, parents and families should receive regular updates on a child’s academic, social, and emotional development through phone calls, emails, and other communication means.

Special Education Program Coordinators. Findings of this study will be utilized by Special Education Program Coordinators in terms of providing support and assistance to the learners including, but not limited to, assessment and evaluation, administrative support as needed for specialized programs, assistance to learners in collaboration with the parents and the facilitation of student placements. Findings will also serves as basis to establish and maintain effective working relationships with individuals and groups; conduct effective meetings and conferences; communicate concepts and information accurately orally and in writing including the preparation of formal statistical reports, case histories, assessment, and intervention records; demonstrate effective liaison relationships with parents, schools, and agencies; coordinate activities from many sources for the benefit of an individual student; organize work and provide effective services within a limited timeframe; develop, coordinate and deliver relevant training to parents and professional development to staff and assist with program development.

Parents. With this study, the parents/ families of children with disability can be made more aware of their rights in the special education process as they have the most direct and positive impact on their child’s education. They could take an increased level of participation and enhance relationships with those professionals who are delivering special education services.

Guidance Counselors. The result of this study is very crucial as basis in intitiating and special education guidance and counselling programs and activites that will cater the individual learning disability and promote well-being of the learners.

School Administrators. The result of this study will yield information about issues and challenges of the teachers and parents which will serve as the basis for modification of school processes and policies related to special education. They can be more aggressive to conceptualize and implement best practices in the field of special education. In the process they can also lead in drawing policies, lobbying for resources, and in advocating for the cause of special education.

Division Supervisor for Special Education. This study is critical for the division as it will serve as the basis for future training and seminars for the teachers, administrators and key personnel to support the gradual success of the implementation of inclusive education through assisting with instructional strategies, classroom management and appropriate methodology applicable in teaching mainstream education.

Civil Society Organizations. Civil society organizations are important actors in social accountability processes that follow up on the equality generating effect and on the effectiveness of public education policies. With the findings of this study, they may raise concerns related to the impact of the policies on the marginalized groups´ education situation in the area. They can contribute with valuable information and arguments for shaping the education policies in favor of the poorest and most marginalized population groups. They can also advocate for monitoring that the learning goes beyond traditional reading and writing skills and to promote that the children and adolescents are also taught diverse life skills, such as communication, problem-solving, critical thinking and reflection. They often have closer contacts with communities, and they can be the bridge so that learners parent or teacher concerns about the quality of education services reach policy makers.

Non-Government Organizations. They include several groups and institutions that are entirely or largely independent of government, and that have primarily humanitarian or cooperative rather than commercial objectives. Findings of this study will serve as basis for the NGOs in terms of providing services and initiating advocacies on inclusive education specifically to learners with special needs. They can imitate a variety of services, ranging from institutional care, to educational projects, and financial support.

Publishers and Authors. A publisher is a group or person who is responsible for bringing the book to the public for reading purposes. The book publisher participates in the major steps of developing, marketing, producing, printing, and distributing the book. The book publisher negotiates with authors over intellectual property rights, rights to distribute, and rights to change the book. Findings of this study will help authors and publisher specifically on developing books catering needs of diverse learners.

Curriculum Planners. Curriculum planning develops well-coordinated, quality teaching, learning and assessment programs which build students’ knowledge, skills and behaviors in the disciplines, as well as their interdisciplinary and or physical, personal and social capacities. Findings of this study are of great help to curriculum planners since it will serve as their bases for identifying and organizing the instructional material and or basis for curriculum modifications suited to the learning needs of the learners.

Other researchers. Results of this study can provide the empirical basis for future research on inclusive education and its processes. It could also pave the way for research on variables not taken up in this study.

Scope and Delimitation

This study was conducted to explore the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte for School 2022 – 2023.

It explored the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment, human resources, budget allocation, and equipment, facilities, and services. It determined the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting. The researcher also determined if significant relationship exists between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs. Likewise, the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart was also determined by this study.

Moreover, the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte was also determined. And based on the findings of the study, the researcher proposed an intervention program to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. This study exclude the enrolment of learners not identified as learners with special needs, teachers without learners with special needs and not identified as receiving teachers, regular MOOE of the school were not included in this study. It was also delimited to school year 2022-2023 only. This study excludes students attending private secondary schools in Camarines Norte as well as those enrolled in other inclusive education programs such as Muslims, Indigenous People, and children in conflict with the law.

Definition of Terms

Terms to be used in this study are defined conceptually and operationally here. Given the methodological limitations of this study, clarifications will aid in understanding the context and constructs of the proposed investigation.

Inclusive Education. This refers to the process of addressing and responding to the diversity of needs of all learners by moving towards the end goal of full participation, presence and achievement in learning, cultures, and communities, and eliminating, exclusion within and from education. It involves accommodation, modification, adaptation and individualization in content, approaches, structures, and strategies with a common vision that covers all learners of the appropriate age range, and conviction that it is the State’s responsibility to educate all children. It also focuses on achieving quality education that fosters diversity and flexibility towards full participation of all learners with disabilities. (DepEd Order No. 44, s. 2021)

Profile. Profile refers to a description of a person, group or organization that contains the details and information that someone needs. In this study, it refers to the profile of the selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte in terms of enrolment, human resources, budget allocation and equipment, facilities and services.

Enrolment. Enrolment as the act of putting yourself or someone else onto the official list of members of a class, college or university, or group. In this paper, it refers to the number of special education learners as reflected in the Learners Information System (LIS) in selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte. (Cambridge Dictionary, 2020)

Human Resource. This refers to the number of individuals in each organization to achieve organizational goals. In this paper, it refers to the number of teaching and non-teaching personnel in selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte. (Cambridge Dictionary, 2020)

Budget Allocation. It refers to an integral component to an annual financial plan, or budget, of all organizations. They indicate the level of resources an organization is committing to a department or program. In this paper, it refers to Program Support Fund for secondary schools implementing inclusive education. (Sherman,2021)

Equipment, Facilities and Services. Equipment is defined as the necessary items for a particular purpose. Facilities are buildings, pieces of equipment, or services that are provided for a particular purpose. Educational service means any service which is directly/indirectly undertaken partly/entirely for the purpose of education and includes teaching and learning. In this paper, these refer to the learning materials and resources, school buildings and facilities and services provided to the learners with special needs in selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Implementation Practices. It refers to the process of conducting of planned, intentional activities that aim to turn evidence and ideas into policies and practices that work for people in the real world. In this study, this refers to the process done by the schools in providing all students especially those learners with special educational needs of the appropriate educational programs fitted to their capabilities and needs in terms of identification and placements, developing individual education plan,  assistance and reporting.

Identification. Is defined as the process of evaluating learners with disabilities that requires clinical analysis of the data collected which includes synthesizing qualitative and quantitative information by a qualified professional trained in human development, learning theory, assessment, developmental disabilities, neuropsychology while Placements refers to the process of how school provide learners with disabilities receive his or her education and related services. In this study, identification and placement refers to the process of how learners are evaluated by the school or team of experts for them to be tagged as leaners with special educational needs and the process on how learners with disability are integrated in the general classroom.

Individualized Education Plan (IEP). Refers to the systematic, purposive and developmental educational programming document of curricular and instructional priorities and contents designed to meet the learner’s special needs and aimed at ensuring mastery of learning for target skills and behaviors. This document will serve as one of the references and basis to show the learner’s progress in a specific component or part of the curriculum or program and, when necessary, will take the place of the regular report card or SF 9 which is being used in all regular schools. (DepEd Order No. 44, s. 2021) This paper determined the implementation practices of selected secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte implementing inclusive education along developing the individual education plan.

Development of Individualized Education Plan (IEP). In this study, this refers to the process of determining the learning goals of a learner with special educational needs based on the result of the assessment of the learner.

Assistance. defines assistance as the act of helping or assisting someone or the help supplied. In this study, it refers to the assistance provided to parents of special education learners. (Webster Dictionary, 2015)

Reporting. An account or statement describing in detail an event, situation, or the like, usually as the result of observation and inquiry. This paper determined the implementation practices of selected secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte implementing inclusive education along reporting.

Behavior. Refers to how someone conducts oneself or behaves. In this paper, it refers to the behavior of the Special Education teachers and parents of Learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart. As defined in Webster Dictionary (2015).

Issues. (Cambridge Dictionary) defines issues as a subject or problem that people are thinking and talking about. In this paper, this refers to the issues encountered by SPED teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Challenges. Cambridge Dictionary defines challenges as the situation of being faced with or something that needs great mental or physical effort to be done successfully and therefore evaluates a person’s ability. In this paper, this refers to the issues and challenges encountered by SPED teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Intervention. Cambridge Dictionary defines intervention as an action taken to improve something. In this paper, it refers to the Toolkit for Schools with proposed actions or program or activities to be conducted to address the implementation of inclusive education in selected secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Learners. refers to any individual, regardless of age, sex, gender, disability, ethnicity, cultures, and religion, enrolled in basic education to enhance his/her knowledge, skills, and values to improve the quality if his/her lifer to develop his/her potentials. (Sec. IV, 6 (d) of the Policy Framework on Inclusive Education in Basic Education). In this paper, it refers to the learners with special needs in selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Learners with Special Educational Needs (LSENS). This refers to the those learners who have difficulty seeing, hearing, walking or climbing steps, remembering or concentrating, and communicating which require special education services and modification of school practices to access educational opportunities and the general education curriculum. In this study this refers to the students receiving special education program and services based on their exhibited disability. (Department of Education, 2016, p. 2)

Special Education (SPED). This refers to a set of educational programs and/or services designed to address the needs of learners with disabilities through educational plans and instruments which will bring them to the highest level of their potential and capacity. (Handbook for SPED, 1987 as cited in DepEd Order No. 44, s. 2021) In this paper, special education refers to the educational programs and services designed to address the needs of the identified learners with special needs in selected secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte.

NOTES

1. UNICEF (September 2017) Inclusive Education: Understanding Article 24 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
2. The Power of Letting Children Learn Together (2019) https://www.opensocietyfoundations.org/explainers/value-inclusive-education
3. David, M. (2015). Inclusive Education Is A Multi-Faceted Concept. College of Education, University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand; https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/EJ1128952.pdf
4. Rasmitadila, A.R. Suryantitambunan & R. Rachmadtullah. (2018). Readiness of general elementary schools to become inclusive elementary schools: A preliminary study in Indonesia. International Journal of Special Education, 33(2), 366–381. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329442047
5. Bhalla, M. (2020) Special Education v/s Inclusive Education: How are they similar or different? https://mahimabhalla.medium.com/special-education-v-s-inclusive-education-how-are-they-similar-or-different-3f1127a013a8
6. Republic Act 10533- An Act Enhancing the Philippine Basic Education System by Strengthening its Curriculum and Increasing the Number of Years for Basic Education, Appropriating Funds Therefor and for Other Purposes https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/2013/05/15/republic-act-no-10533/
7. Yang, A. (2022). Philippines guarantees learners with disabilities with free basic education. https://www.philstar.com/headlines/2022/03/16/2167714/philippines-guarantees-learners-disabilities-free-basic-education
8. Republic Act No. 11650. Instituting a Policy of Inclusion and Services for Learners with Disabilities in Support of Inclusive Education Act. https://mirror.officialgazette.gov.ph/2022/03/11/republic-act-no-11650/
9. Merriam-Webster. (n.d.) Assistance. In Merriam-Webster.com dictionary. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/assistance
10. Merriam-Webster. (n.d.) Behavior. In Merriam-Webster.com dictionary. https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/behavior
11. Fraser, Sherman (2021). The uses of Budgetary Control. Small Business – Chron.com. Retrieved May 1, 2023, from https://smallbusiness.chron.com/uses-budgetary-control-31142.html
12. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/challenge
13. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/enrolment
14. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/human-resource?q=Human+Resource
15. DepEd Order No. 44, s. 2021. Policy Guidelines on the Provision of Educational Programs and Services for Learners with Disabilities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program
16. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/intervention?q=Intervention
17. IV, 6 (d) of the Policy Framework on Inclusive Education in Basic Education
18. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/profile
19. Cambridge Dictionary (2020). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. https://dictionary.cambridge.org/us/dictionary/english/reporting
20. Handbook for SPED, 1987 as cited in DepEd Order No. 44, s. 2021

REVIEW OF RELATED LITERATURE AND STUDIES

The purpose of this chapter is to provide an overview of the related literature and studies as a foundation to determine the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Inclusive Education

Inclusive education is the most effective way to give all children a fair chance to go to school, learn and develop the skills they need to thrive. Inclusive education means all children in the same classrooms, in the same schools. It means real learning opportunities for groups who have traditionally been excluded – not only children with disabilities, but speakers of minority languages too. Inclusive systems value the unique contributions students of all backgrounds bring to the classroom and allow diverse groups to grow side by side, to the benefit of all. UNICEF (n.d)

According to UNESCO, inclusive education is seen as a process of addressing and responding to the diversity of needs of all learners through increasing participation in learning, cultures and communities, and reducing exclusion from education and from within education. The goal is that the whole education system will facilitate learning environments where teachers and learners embrace and welcome the challenge and benefits of diversity. Within an inclusive education approach, learning environments are fostered where individual needs are met and every student has an opportunity to succeed. (www.ibe.unesco.org)

Inclusive education also means that all students attend and are welcomed by their neighborhood schools in age-appropriate, regular classes and are supported to learn, contribute and participate in all aspects of the life of the school. It is about how the school develop and design their schools, classrooms, programs and activities so that all students learn and participate together. It is about ensuring access to quality education for all students by effectively meeting their diverse needs in a way that is responsive, accepting, respectful and supportive. (inclusiveeducation.ca)

Moreover, students participate in the education program in a common learning environment with support to diminish and remove barriers and obstacles that may lead to exclusion. Inclusive education is carried out in a common learning environment; that is, an educational setting where students from different backgrounds and with different abilities learn together in an inclusive environment.

In addition, common learning environments are used for most the students’ regular instruction hours and may include classrooms, libraries, gym, performance theatres, music rooms, cafeterias, playgrounds and the local community. A common learning environment is not a place where students with intellectual disabilities or other special needs learn in isolation from their peers.

Inclusion is not simply integration or mainstreaming of students who were once characterized as different or special compared to the mainstream. Inclusion removes systemic barriers that persist in legacy systems that were designed with a narrower understanding of who belonged in normal society. It reconfigures physical and social structures to welcome diversity such as abilities, culture, ethnicity and gender identity. Pending the removal of barriers, additional supports may be required to ensure that all individuals’ rights to access and inclusion are respected. (inclusionbc.org/our-resources)

Meanwhile, equitable access to inclusive education for ALL students with disabilities is a fundamental human right. It is not an optional program nor is this right dependent on individual beliefs, student abilities or organizational priorities. The right of all students with disabilities to access inclusive education without discrimination was recognized by Articles 5 and 24 of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities. The UN CRPD was ratified by 176 countries, including Canada.

The increasing awareness about the rights of children with disability to have access to the same educational services as children without a disability has led to the idea of inclusive education. (UNESCO, 2021) Decades of research has consistently General Comment No. 4 (the Right to Inclusive Education), released by the UN CRPD Committee in 2016 and conclusively proven that inclusive education benefits all students and strengthens schools and education systems. A Harvard-led 2016 review of 280 studies from twenty-five countries found inclusive educational settings confer substantial short and long-term benefits for students with and without disabilities. This was affirmed by the European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education in 2018 and in a 2017 meta-analysis of outcomes for 4,800,000 students which found learning environments that include students with disability have no detrimental impact, and some positive impact, on academic performance of non-disabled peers.

As cited by (UNESCO, 2021), the United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Conference on Special Needs Education issued a consensus report on the education of students with disabilities. The resulting Salamanca Statement, signed by representatives of ninety-two countries and twenty-five organizations, states that those with special educational needs must have access to regular schools. The statement affirms that inclusive regular schools are the most effective means of combating discriminatory attitudes, creating welcoming communities, building an inclusive society and achieving education for all.

Moreover, the Salamanca Statement was part of a global movement toward inclusive education and offered guidelines for action at the national, regional, and international levels. The Statement called for governments to promote, plan, finance, and monitor inclusive education programs within their education systems

In addition, in the years since the Salamanca statement, the international community has continued to promote the inclusion of people with disabilities in society. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) binds its 161 signatory states to ensure that persons with disabilities can access an inclusive, quality and free primary education and secondary education on an equal basis with others in the communities in which they live. Article 24 of the convention requires states to ensure an inclusive education system at all levels for people with disabilities as well as opportunities for life-long learning. Article 24 also stipulates that students with disabilities must not be excluded from general education, that reasonable accommodations and individualized supports must be provided for them, and that people with disabilities should have access to tertiary education, vocational training, and adult education on an equal basis with non-disabled students.

The term special education needs was introduced by OECD, (2019) and recommended models of integration and inclusion for students with SEN in mainstream settings through curriculum modifications, additional resources and specialized training for teachers. Education policies for students with SEN can have considerable impacts on students’ short and long-term well-being, which must be acknowledged in all its dimensions, which include academic, social, psychological, physical and material outcomes. They also have overarching equity and inclusion outcomes at the system level and broader labor market, social, and societal outcomes.

Different approaches to governing diversity, inclusion and equity for students with SEN can have a considerable impact on students’ short- and long-term well-being. Overall, countries can have different governance arrangements in place that can result in differences in SEN policies and that can co-determine the effectiveness of system- and school-level approaches to inclusive education. Examples of how countries address SEN via governance include setting educational goals for inclusion and equity for students with SEN and having centralized and decentralized regulation frameworks. Other policy areas linked to governance arrangements include approaches to providing education to students with SEN and arranging their educational curricula. (OECD, 2019)

Equity and inclusion are overarching principles that should guide all education policies across countries to ensure appropriate education provision for all groups of student populations. These principles are reflected in the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), the objectives of sustainable development set by the United Nations for 2030, which are at the core of international agendas. In particular, SDG 4 Quality Education, the Sustainable Development Goal focused on educational objectives, envisions inclusive education as a main outcome to be reached by 2030. Target 4.5 of SDG 4 explicitly tackles “equal access to all levels of education for all, including for persons with disabilities” (United Nations, 2016).

At the national level, many countries have developed strategic plans for diversity, equity and inclusion in their education systems. In the specific field of SEN, goals range between short-term targets of including students with SEN in mainstream settings to longer-term goals of equity and inclusion that respect the diversity of individual students’ educational needs. One of the most recent examples of setting education goals for the inclusion of students with SEN comes from France. Starting from the 2019-20 academic year, France introduced a new plan, Pour une école inclusive (For an inclusive school), to address students’ SEN and assist their families quickly and effectively by establishing district- and school-level support services.

The OECD (2019) defines regulatory policy as policy related to achieving governmental objectives through the use of regulations, laws, and other instruments to deliver better economic and social outcomes. In this review, regulatory frameworks include national and international regulations on special education needs and inclusive education. Various international treaties and documents assert the rights of students with SEN to inclusive education. All OECD member countries are signatories of the Salamanca Statement (Section 1.2.1) and the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). Thus, all countries have national legislation and frameworks to regulate the inclusion of students with SEN in education systems.

In the Philippines, all laws and policies as to the right of the people to access quality and relevant education are anchored in 1987 Philippine Constitution, Article XIV, se. 1-2 mandates the State to protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality education at all levels and to take appropriate steps to make such education accessible to all. It also mandates the State to establish, maintain, and support a complete, adequate, and integrated system of education relevant to the needs of the people and society; establish and maintain a system of free public education in the elementary and high school levels. Without limiting the natural right of parents to rear their children, elementary education is compulsory for all children of school age.

It also mandates to establish and maintain a system of scholarship grants, student loan programs, subsidies, and other incentives which shall be available to deserving students in both public and private schools, especially to the underprivileged; encourage non-formal, informal, and indigenous learning systems, as well as self-learning, independent, and out-of-school study programs particularly those that respond to community needs; and provide adult citizens, the disabled, and out-of-school youth with training in civics, vocational efficiency, and other skills. (1987 Philippine Constitution, Article XIV, se. 1-2)

Relatively, the Implementing Rules and Regulation of the Republic Act 10533 section 8 mandates the inclusiveness of enhanced basic education. Specifically, it mandates the implementation of programs designed to address the physical, intellectual, psychosocial, and cultural needs of learners, which shall include, but shall not be limited to programs for the gifted and talented which refer to comprehensive programs for the gifted and talented learners in all levels of basic education; programs for Learners with Disabilities which refer to the comprehensive programs designed for learners with disabilities which may be home-, school-, center- or community-based; Madrasah Program, a comprehensive program using the Madrasah curriculum prescribed by the DepEd, in coordination with the Commission on Muslim Filipinos, for Muslim learners in public and private schools.

Another law is the Republic Act 9155 known as the Governance of Basic Education Act of 2001 which mandates the State to protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality basic education and to make such education accessible to all by providing all Filipino children a free and compulsory education in the elementary level and free education in the high school level. Such education shall also include alternative learning systems for out-of-school youth and adult learners. It shall be the goal of basic education to provide them with the skills, knowledge and values they need to become caring, self- reliant, productive and patriotic citizens.

The school shall be the heart of the formal education system. It is where children learn. Schools shall have a single aim of providing the best possible basic education for all learners. This is where the policy and principle for the governance of basic education shall be translated into programs, projects and services developed, adapted and offered to fit local needs. The State shall encourage local initiatives for improving the quality of basic education, it also ensure that the values, needs and aspirations of a school community are reflected in the program of education for the children, out-of-school youth and adult learners. Schools and learning centers shall be empowered to make decisions on what is best for the learners they serve. (Republic Act 9155 section 2, 2001)

The Presidential Decree 603 otherwise known as the Child and Youth Welfare Code Article 3 also mandates the rights of the child. Republic Act 7610 otherwise known as Special Protection of Children Against Child Abuse, Neglect, Cruelty, Exploitation and Discrimination section 13 mandates the Non-formal Education for Working Children wherein DepEd shall promulgate a course design under its non-formal education program aimed at promoting the intellectual, moral and vocational efficiency of working children who have not undergone or finished elementary or secondary education. Such course design shall integrate the learning process deemed most effective under given circumstances.

Republic Act 11650 known as “Instituting a Policy of Inclusion and Services for Learners with Disabilities in Support of Inclusive Education Act”, section 2 mandates the State to protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality education at all levels and shall take appropriate steps to make such education accessible to all. It shall recognize, protect, and promote the rights of all learners with disabilities, including those belonging to ethnic, religious, or linguistic minorities or persons of indigenous origin, to education compulsory and accessible to them by ensuring that no learner with disability is deprived of the right of access to an inclusive, equitable, and quality education, and promote lifelong learning opportunities for them.

Anchored on these Acts are the DepEd Orders specifying the mandates of the department as to inclusion and special education. DepEd Order Number 72, series of 2009 known as Inclusive Education as Strategy for Increasing Participation Rate of Children. Accordingly, Special Education in the Philippines has only served 2% of the targeted 2.2 million children with disabilities in the country who live without access to a basic human right: the right to education. Most of these children live in rural and far flung areas whose parents need to be aware of educational opportunities that these children could avail of.

The Department of Education (DepED) has organized the urgency to address this problem and therefore, guarantees the right for these children to receive appropriate education within the regular or inclusive classroom setting. Inclusive education embraces the philosophy of accepting all children regardless of race, size, shape, color, ability or disability with support from school staff, students, parents and the community.

A comprehensive inclusive program for children with special needs has the following components: Child Find. This is locating where these children are through the family mapping survey, advocacy campaigns and networking with local health workers. These children shall be visited by Special Education (SPED) teachers and parents should be convinced to enroll their children in SPED Centers or schools nearest their home. Another component is assessment, this is the continuous process of identifying the strengths and weaknesses of the child through the use of formal and informal tools for proper program grade placement. Existing SPED Centers in the Division shall assist regular schools in the assessment process.

Next is Program Options wherein regular schools with or without trained SPED teachers shall be provided educational services to children with special needs. These schools shall access educational services from SPED Centers or SPED trained teachers. The first program option that shall be organized for these children is a self-contained class for children with similar disabilities which can be mono-grade or multi-grade handled by a trained SPED teacher. The second option is inclusion or placement of the child with disabilities in general education or regular class where he/she learns with his/her peers under a regular teacher and/or SPED trained teacher who addresses the child’s needs.

The third option is a resource room program where the child with disabilities shall be pulled out from the general education or regular class and shall report to a SPED teacher who provides small group/one-on-one instruction and/or appropriate interventions for these children. Moreover, curriculum modifications in one of the components, which shall be implemented in the forms of adaptations and accommodations to foster optimum learning based on individual’s needs and potentials. Modification in classroom instructions and activities is a process that involves new ways of thinking and developing teaching-learning practices. It also involves changes in any of the steps in the teaching-learning process. Curriculum modifications shall include service delivery options like cooperative or team teaching, consulting teacher program and others. The provision of support services from professionals and specialists, parents, volunteers, and peers or buddies to the children with special needs is an important feature in the inclusion program.

Moreover, parental involvement is one of the components, this plays a vital role in preparing the children in academic, moral and spiritual development. Parents shall involve themselves in observing children’s performance, volunteering to work in the classroom as teacher aide and providing support to other parents. District and school-based special education and regular teachers, administrators and parents need to collaboratively develop and facilitate the most effective program for children with disabilities. This program shall be included in the School Improvement Plan (SIP). Officials at the division, region and central offices shall provide the needed training on inclusive education to administrators, teachers and other school staff; regularly monitor the implementation of the program and provide the corresponding technical assistance needed and conduct evaluation to determine the effectiveness of the program and improve its implementation.

Relatively, DepEd Order Number 23, series of 2022 known as “Child Find Policy for Learning with Disabilities toward Inclusive Education articulates the processes in ensuring that learners with disabilities are identified, located, and evaluated to facilitate their inclusion in the general basic educational school system, provides means for the schools to monitor implementation of the child find process, promotes cooperative advocacy for children with disability and developmental delays among stakeholders in the communities.

This covers children, above the age of five, diagnosed with disabilities or observed to have developmental delays, requiring special education and related services in public and private schools offering basic education, including those in the Alternative Learning System, the Muslim Education Program, Indigenous Peoples Education, community learning centers and Out of School Children/Out of School Youth.

Another legal basis is DepEd Order Number 21, series of 2019 known as the Policy Guidelines on the K to 12 Basic Education Program illustrated the policy framework being adopted to provide an overall framework of implementation for programs that directly promote inclusive education and to ensure that every aspect of the K to 12 curriculum support system, across the governance levels of the Department, is responsive to the needs and demands of diverse learners.

DepEd Order 44, s. 2021 known as the “Policy Guidelines on the Provision of Educational Programs and Services for Learners with Disabilities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program” provide an overall direction for the Special Education (SPED) Program to ensure the provision of educational services to learners with disabilities in both public and private basic education institutions. This policy covers the provision of the educational services, assessment, curriculum, teachers, learning delivery, learning environment and resources, and roles and responsibilities of the different levels of governance. The department shall ensure that learners with disabilities are equally provided with opportunities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program.

Another legal order is DepEd Order Number 46, series of 2014 known as the Guidelines on the Implementation of Alternative Learning System for Persons with Disabilities Program which is designed to reach both the hearing and visually impaired learners and provide them with appropriate learning interventions through the ALS Basic Literacy Program (BLP) and the Accreditation and Equivalency (A&E) Program.

Moreover, DepEd Order Number 21, series of 2020 known as the Policy Guidelines on the Adoption of the K to 12 Transition Curriculum Framework for Learners with Disabilities articulates the principles, features and standards that will establish common understanding on the transition of LWDs in public and private schools nationwide. This anchored on the principles of inclusivity and equity which considers the LWDs individual interests, abilities, capacities, strengths and special needs. This policy puts further on what the field implementers can offer to LWDs in terms of their life pathway, which include but not limited to higher education, entrepreneurship, employment, middle level skills development, or functional life path.

In the study of Raguindin et al. (2021) through a grounded theory approach, their qualitative research paper aimed at developing a framework as a means of understanding inclusive environments thriving in an inclusive Philippine setting. Thirty-two special education teachers from three private schools were interviewed, the data were triangulated through class observations. The emerging theory encapsulated three major dimensions to understand concepts of inclusive environment: engaging environment, affirming environment, and nurturing environment. An engaging environment points to having high-standard learning outcomes, promoting collaboration and communication among learners, teachers, and parents, and involving them in decision-making.

An affirming environment, on the other hand, denotes practicing expressive and receptive languages, imbibing the sacred worth of class members, and celebrating diversity. Finally, a nurturing environment can be achieved through interdependence and care for the needs of everyone. These dimensions are inter-related and are not standalone. Their paper advances that success in the diversified Philippine inclusive classroom context can be achieved through the interdependence of school community members. The question of the significance of the inclusive practices and principles should not be the primary concern of a particular context. Rather, involvement and interdependence to achieve an engaging, affirming, and nurturing environment matter. Ramifications to micro and macro integration of inclusion that support inclusive environments were also discussed. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on special education but the previous study developed a framework as a means of understanding inclusive environments thriving in an inclusive Philippine setting while the present one proposed an intervention program in the form of Toolkit for schools to guide them in the implementation of inclusive education.

The study of Malaluan (2021) determined the school’s profile and instructional leadership of School Heads in Paracale District. It determine the profile of the schools in Paracale District in terms of enrolment rate, dropout rate, promotion rate, learning progress and achievement, and school-based management level of practice. The level of instructional leadership of school heads as assessed by the faculty and school heads themselves along school-based review, contextualization and implementation of learning standards, teaching standards and pedagogies, teacher performance feedback, learner achievement and other performance indicators, learning assessment, learning environment, career awareness and opportunities, learner discipline and the issues and concerns encountered by the elementary and secondary schools in Paracale District along enrolment, dropout, promotion, learning progress and achievement, and school-based management level of practice based on the result of school monitoring and evaluation and adjustment system were also determined and based on the findings the researcher proposed actions to improve school’s profile and to address school head’s instructional leadership in Paracale District.

The study utilized descriptive research. Respondents were teachers and school heads. Survey questionnaire checklist, documentary analysis and focus group discussion were utilized for data gathering. Findings revealed that the school profile as to enrolment rate, dropout rate, promotion rate, learning progress and achievement and SBM Level of Practice of the elementary and secondary schools in Paracale District varies from one school to another. The level of instructional leadership of the school heads exceeded expectations of its practice. Issues and concerns were encountered by all schools in Paracale District. The proposed Management Plan- BE-LCP and capability enhancement activity address the instructional leadership of the elementary and secondary school heads in Paracale District in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The study recommended the need to improve and or enhance current leadership strategy to attain the mandate of public schools focusing on accessibility of the schools to improve the quality of elementary and secondary education offered by the schools. The conduct of capacity building as to on how to develop and contextualized learning standards is also recommended. Build and sustain collaborative partnership between and among students, teachers, families and communities. This study focused on catering diverse learners in the schools as one of the responsibilities of the school head while the present study also dealt on diverse learners specifically learners with special needs. They differ in the sense that the present study focused not only in leaners with special needs but on the implementation of inclusive education while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Implementation Practices to Inclusive Education

Inclusive education aims to mainstream students with special needs in a flexible learning environment for acquiring quality education that optimizes their potential for holistic development. This goal depends upon teachers who can attain inclusivity in the educational system by shaping positive values, providing knowledge, and developing the skills of exceptional students to cope with life’s challenges. Adopting this perspective, Dela Fuente, (2021) documented the experiences of forty-three college teachers with deaf students in inclusive classes, in one higher education institution in the Philippines. The descriptive phenomenological approach of Colaizzi’s coding and categorizing of the participants’ responses, obtained from in-depth, individual face-to-face and online interviews elucidates four themes that illuminate the experiences of participants. The themes derived from the transcriptions and analyses of narratives by the participants shed light on teachers’ personal experiences and actual teaching practices in a higher education institution in the Philippines.

Their experiences were challenging yet they adopted a positive perspective towards meaningful teaching and learning experiences. They explored and highlighted creative/innovative actions as they developed strategies for delivering quality education for inclusive classes. Notwithstanding their challenging role in attaining inclusivity and mainstreaming students with special needs in a regular learning environment together with the normal students/peers, teachers perceived an opportunity for professional development that motivated them to continue their role in shaping deaf students for a brighter future. That makes teachers’ teaching experiences inspiring. However, despite the progress towards full inclusivity in higher education institutions, there should be further modifications and interventions in the Philippines’ educational system, concerning the insufficient number of qualified and well-trained special education (SPED) teachers, and the limited teaching and learning resources to facilitate effective, efficient, and quality inclusive education in the country. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on the inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one did not dealt on experience of teachers.

Relatively, Muega (2019) conducted study on the knowledge and involvement of school teachers, school administrators, and parents of children with special needs (CSN) in the implementation of inclusive education (IE). One set of research questions was aimed at determining the participants’ concept of IE and how they are involved in its practice. The other set of questions was aimed at finding whether there is a significant difference among the answers given by the participant groups regarding their concept of and involvement in IE.

The problems related to IE were approached using grounded theory and quantitative analysis. Utilizing a modified survey questionnaire, data was collected from ninety-one participants who have a first-hand knowledge of and experience with inclusive schools located in Quezon City, Metro Manila, Philippines. Research hypotheses were tested after open coding had been completed and an answer was given to each qualitative research question. It has been found that the participants neither question nor resist the practice of inclusion in their respective general education settings. They admit, however, that they are not sure whether their understanding of IE conforms to widely accepted definitions.

The participants are in doubt whether their claimed practices are potent enough to be responsive to the requirements of high-level inclusive education. No significant difference was noted among the participants’ mean scores in the survey of their knowledge of IE and involvement in IE. This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on the involvement of school teachers and parents of children with special needs in the implementation of inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

State-funded teachers in the education department are recognized to be necessary in the implementation of inclusive education. They assume a fundamental job in the effective utilization of inclusive education as they are seen as critical during the time spent incorporating students with special needs into regular classes. Ecoben (2019) determined the level of awareness and attitudes of public-school teachers towards the implementation of inclusive education. It identify the demographic profile of the public-school teachers, their level of readiness in handling inclusive education in terms of awareness, attitude, and skills and the significant difference in the level of readiness of teachers towards inclusive education when grouped according to profile. Training program was proposed to enhance the awareness, attitudes, and skills of teachers towards inclusion. The study used a descriptive – quantitative method of research using both the quantitative and qualitative techniques of data collections. Frequency distribution, percentage, standard deviation, MANOVA, and descriptive statistics were used as statistical tools of this study.

The critical discoveries of the investigation unveiled that state-funded teachers’ status in dealing with inclusive education is progressively mindful on the significance of inclusive education. In any case, they need training, classes, and workshops because few mainstream teachers are new to mainstreaming. They are agreeable on inclusive education. However, they need refreshed hands-on training. Moreover, they are skilled in their own personal capacity, but they lack further trainings specifically on the crafting of Individualized Education Plans. Therefore, there is a need to have a separate subject on disability and inclusive education in the teacher training courses.

This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous study determined the level of awareness and attitudes of public-school teachers towards the implementation of inclusive education while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

In the study of Mulenga (2019) education is a right of every child whether he or she has a disability or not. This implies that all children with special education needs are supposed to access the needed education that will equip them with skills that are useful in their lives. The objectives of his study were; to establish school-based, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors that influence enrolment of children with special education needs at Kapoche Special School. The study also sought to establish effective ways of providing education to leaners with special education needs. The study was guided by Rieser’s social model of disability.

A descriptive survey technique was used to collect data from six officials from District Education office, 3 Head teachers, 3 Deputy Head teachers, thirty teachers and fifty-seven parents. The study used questionnaires for district officials, head teachers, deputy head teachers and teachers while interview guides were used for parents/guardians. Officials from district education office, head teachers, deputies and all special education teachers were picked using purposive sampling. Other respondents were picked using simple random sampling.

Data collected was analyzed according topics and themes as presented by individual participant’s opinions as well as using excel and presented in form of tables, charts and graphs. This study revealed the following school-based factors as having influence on the enrolment of children with special education needs in school; availability of qualified special education teachers, safety of children in school, a well-tailored curriculum, distance to school and lack of sensitization. Among the socio-cultural factors identified were; negative attitudes towards disabilities, lack of acceptance of children’s disabilities, discrimination of individuals with disabilities; overprotection of children with disabilities and lack of clear information on special education needs.

The study also revealed that socio-economic factors as having an influence on enrolment; parental level of education, parental income status, poverty and family size. The study concluded that the enrolment of children with disabilities at Kapoche Special School was highly influenced by many factors and it was imperative that the school and the community worked together to ensure that factors that lead to high enrolment of children with special education needs in school were enhanced. On the other hand, factors that lead to low enrolment should be addressed to ensure that they do not negatively affect enrolment. This is similar to the present study because they both dealt on special education but they differ since the present study did not established school-based, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors that influence enrolment but on the profile of the respondents schools as to enrolment.

Likewise, Bryd (2020) stated that including students with special needs in the general education classroom requires that teachers adapt their approaches to teaching to meet all students’ needs. However, general education teachers are not always fully aware how best to serve special populations. His study examined what skills and knowledge special education educators feel that general education teachers and teacher candidates need in order to work with students with special needs in the inclusive environment. The researcher interviewed twenty special educators to ascertain which skills and knowledge are most commonly cited as vital to successful general education teacher/student with special needs interactions.

Findings suggest that teacher education and professional development programs can benefit by providing a continuum of learning opportunities in three important areas. General educators should: first, make and carry out informed decisions, based on proper assessments data; second, develop appropriate understanding and compassion for students with special needs and their situations and third, learn to foster effective communication in and out of the classroom with all parties involved in educating this specific group of students. This study is similar to the present one because one of their variables was on human resources, however, they differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices.

Positive teacher attitudes are essential for success when children with special educational needs (SEN) are placed into mainstream classrooms. Saloviita (2018) surveyed teachers’ attitudes towards inclusion by using a large national sample and Teachers’ Attitudes towards Inclusion Scale (TAIS). A total of 1,764 Finnish basic-school teachers participated in the email survey. They included 824 classroom teachers, 575 subject teachers and 365 special-education teachers. The classroom teachers scored below and the subject teachers significantly below, the neutral midpoint of the scale. The special-education teachers’ mean scores were above the midpoint. About 20% of teachers were strong opponents of inclusion, and 8% were strong advocates. The attitudes towards inclusion had only weak associations with variables other than the teacher category. Teachers’ work orientation and self-efficacy had low associations with their attitudes towards inclusion. The results illustrate the attitudinal climate of teachers towards inclusion and indicate the existing potential for policy change. This is similar to the present study because they both dealt on inclusive education but differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices.

Relatively, Asri et al. (2022) described and explained the condition of early reading for special needs students in inclusive primary schools in Magetan regency, Indonesia; the teachers’ need for an Individualized Education Program (IEP) for early reading; and the development of IEP in early reading for special needs students. The research was planned to be conducted in four steps: exploration, model development, model testing, and dissemination. However, the current study explains the development of IEP at the exploration step. A descriptive qualitative method was used in the exploration step. Data were collected through document study, observation, and interview, and analyzed using the interactive model.

The research at the exploration step showed the following results: First, teachers faced many constraints while teaching early reading to special needs students; each special needs student faced a different obstacle which only a few teachers understood and tackled well. In addition, some obstacles also came from parents who are unaware of their children’s needs and cannot contribute to their studies. Second, teachers need IEP in early reading for special needs students to tackle the different obstacles. Based on the research results, a prototype for IEP in early reading for special needs students at inclusive primary schools in Magetan Regency was designed at the development step. This study is similar to the present study because they both focused on inclusive education, however, they differ since the present one also dealt on the implementation practices and challenges.

Likewise, developing the Individual Educational Plan (IEP) for learners with special needs are significant to ensure that varied and appropriate interventions, programs and services be provided to learners with special needs. Ismail et al. (2020) stated that Individualized Education Program (IEP) is urgently needed for each of the barriers faced by students with special needs since it will greatly help the success of the programs and or services being implemented to them. Moreover, Ismael et al. stated that students with special needs need IEP to ensure that learners with special needs can adapt in the classroom together with regular students, and the implementation of the IEP has a positive impact on the learning process of students with special needs so that they can achieve optimal development and provide the same opportunities as students in general in class. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on the development of IEP but they differ since the previous study dealt on the impact on the learning process of students with special needs while the present one is on parents and teachers implementation practices along developing IEP for learners with special needs. This study is similar to the present study because they both focused on inclusive education, however, they differ since the present one also dealt on the implementation practices and challenges.

Similarly, ensuring constant communication to parents for regular assessment of progress is important to ensure involvement and engagement of the parents. Yuen as cited by Asri (2020) stated that the success of inclusive education is determined by the availability of special education teachers, parents’ participation, social interaction, and supports from the environment. This is similar to the present one since they both focused on the teachers and parents of learners with special need but they differ in the sense that the previous study dealt on teachers and parents involvement and engagement while the present one focused on the behavior of the teachers and parents in developing IEP for learners with special need. This study is similar to the present study because they both investigated inclusive education but they differ because the present study also dealt on implementation practices.

As stated by Sullivan (2015) parents as members of the individualized education program (IEP) team, they should participate in all decisions about their child’s educational program. Research on parents’ perceptions of their experiences in their children’s individualized education program (IEP) meetings however, documents a lack of meaningful participation and involvement in decision making. In this study, a researcher-developed survey was utilized to investigate the perceptions of parents of children with disabilities in grades three through five. Thirty-four parents completed an online survey and were asked to rate their agreement, using a five point Likert-type scale, with a series of twelve statements about their experiences in IEP meetings.

In this study, two open-ended questions provided qualitative data on parents’ descriptions of their best and worst experiences at IEP meetings. The results of this study indicate parents are not participating in decision-making about their child’s educational program. Fifty-six percent of parents disagreed with the statement that their school’s team listens and responds to the concerns the parent has about their child’s school program. In addition, fifty-nine percent of parents indicated they did not have enough time to read reports before decisions were made at IEP meetings. No significant differences in parent perceptions were found across groups of parents (including parents of boys versus girls, parents from different socioeconomic groups, parents with different educational backgrounds, parents of children in different grades or parents of children with different disabilities).

The results of this study indicate that parents continue to struggle to participate meaningfully in the decision-making responsibility of the IEP team. Limitations in the sample size, representativeness of the sample, and statistical power of this study should be considered when interpreting the results. This study is similar to the present study because they both investigated inclusive education and participation of parents in the preparation of IEP but they differ because the present study also dealt on implementation practices and challenges faced by parents and teachers.

Additonally, Ilik et al. (2019) stated that all individuals who are responsible for the education of learners with special needs must actively participate in Individualized Education Programs (IEP). Moreover, IEP is a common ground encouraging educators and parents to work together on an education plan. Descriptive survey model enables to organize data according to the themes put forward by the research questions and to present it by considering questions and dimensions. The purposive sampling method was used in this study to obtain more detailed information regarding the opinions of special education teachers and parents with children with special needs about the preparation and implementation process of IEP. Twenty two (22) teachers and twenty five (25) parents participated in the study. Data were analyzed through content analysis. It was found that most of the parents do not know anything about IEP.

It was also found that parents are not involved in the IEP process and they are not invited by the school/institution. As for the opinions of teachers, it was found that they have some problems about getting the parents to involve in the IEP process. It was seen that teachers are lack of knowledge regarding how to include parents in the IEP process. This study is similar to the present study because they both investigated inclusive education and participation of parents in the preparation of IEP but they differ because the present study also dealt on implementation practices and challenges faced by parents and teachers.

The study of Adaza et al. (2021) described the teaching experiences of non-SPED teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education. The study was done within the qualitative framework, employing multiple case study design for which five (5) participants were chosen through purposive sampling and were interviewed. The audio- recorded interviews were transcribed and analyzed using qualitative template analysis, and the emergent themes were noted. The study showed that participants have common struggles and hardships in handling children with special needs in teaching in an inclusive education.

They further resolved in the use of strategies to cater the needs of these children. The result of this study will help the school administration to shape a professional development initiative for non-SPED teachers in the promotion of children’s wellness with several foci within school practice. This study is similar to the present study since they both involved the challenges of non-SPED teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Moreover, the study of Verzo (2017) entitled “Exploring The Transition Programs Of Special Education In Selected Schools In The Division Of Camarines Norte”, she revealed that most of the teachers do not have trainings on specific disability or skills needed for the transition program; there are 4 exceptionalities and/or disabilities which served as respondents/key informants in the present study who are undergoing a transition program in some of the selected SPED schools in the Schools Division Office (SDO) of Camarines Norte namely intellectual disability, hearing impairment, autism and speech disorder; teachers qualification vary in terms of position, educational qualifications, number of years in teaching SPED students and number of trainings and seminars attended.

Moreover, the study revealed that there are different transition programs being implemented in the Division of Camarines Norte; there are different successful strategies which are used in the SDO CN along with the implementation of transition program in Special Education; there is a range of challenges met by SPED implementing schools in the transition program. It was recommended that teacher’s professional growth and development should be prioritized to improve further the delivery of transition program in the selected special education centres in the Schools Division Office of Camarines Norte; the Local Government Unit (LGU) should allocate budget in line with the implementation of transition program.

Parent –school partnerships must be strengthened and sustained and aside from the transition programs introduced in the SDO-CN, it was also recommended to focus the transition programs on these three domains namely: daily living skills, personal and social skills and employment skills and based on the students personal preferences; reinforce teacher skills pertaining to strategies, and interventions; strengthen the commitment of the teachers who played important roles as mentors and friends throughout the process and teachers need to understand several features of grading systems for all students for it has particular implications for students with disabilities who may be at risk for low or failing grades. This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on special education but they differ in the sense that the previous study explored the transition program of special education while the present one is on the implementation practices along identification and placement, developing IEP, assistance and reporting.

Similarly, Quinones, (2022) uncovers the awareness, readiness and the perceived roles of senior high school teachers on special education where descriptive and exploratory research using a focused group discussion approach was employed. The data were culled from the researcher developed and validated instruments responded by thirty senior high school teachers selected following snowball technique, considering their experiences in handling special learners. The data were qualitatively and quantitatively coded, analyzed, interpreted and presented. Findings revealed that respondents are “moderately aware” of special education, its philosophy, goals and mechanisms, and “somewhat ready” in handling LSN in their respective classes. “Academic coach,” “counselor” and “motivator” were ranked highest as perceived roles in the inclusion of special learners.

The study concluded that attempt to include special learners in regular classes will truly educate them as inclusion is deemed necessary for these learners to proceed to tertiary and acquire a career after. The study recommended that senior high school teachers should train themselves on special education. Thus S.H.I.E.L.D. (Senior High School Inclusive Education for Learning and Development), a capacity building program for senior high school teachers, is proposed. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on special education but the previous study uncovers the awareness, readiness and the perceived roles of senior high school teachers on special education while the present study on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Meanwhile, Sagun et al. (2020) Detection and Intervention (EDI) is a system of services that promote development in the critical early years of childhood. It serves as an invaluable support to achieve Inclusive Education (IE). With limited literature regarding perspectives from public schools regarding EDI, this research engaged the stakeholders from public schools of Filipino Children with Disability (CWD) to describe outcomes of EDI. Three focus group discussions participated in by 21 public school teachers and three key informant interviews of four school administrators from three cities in Metro Manila, namely Taguig, Paranaque, and Pateros, were conducted.

In addition, through comparative analysis using NVivo 11, three major themes emerged: (1) child outcomes seen in the skills and occupational performance of CWD; (2) systemic outcomes experienced in the surrounding context, encompassing the family, school and community, and (3) factors affecting EDI outcomes. Results suggest the need to have concrete strategic action to address system bottlenecks in EDI, imperative for successful IE. The importance of the environment where CWD partake in should be addressed for inclusion, equally important with addressing the capabilities of the CWD. Healthcare practitioners should take the initiative in advocating for coordination of medical and educational professionals to facilitate meaningful participation of CWD in education. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one also dealt on implementation practices and challenges.

Meanwhile, Adiputra et al (2018) classified parents’ perceptions about the application of inclusive education in schools. Researchers interviewed 177 respondents with parents’ criteria from elementary school-age children (7-12 years) in six districts in Lampung. Furthermore, the results were analyzed based on educational and socioeconomic status (ESES). There are two groups of parents’ perception responses, namely a group of parents who support and a group of parents who reject, which is then classified based on cognitive, behavioral, facility and social aspects. The perception of parents with low ESES was 30 parents with 25 agreed, and 4 refused. Parents’ perceptions with moderate ESES, 41 parents with 10 agreed, and 7 refused. While the perception of parents with ESES was high, as many as 38 parents with, 18 agreed, and 4 refused. In general, ESES does not affect the perception of parents. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on inclusive education and participation of parents but they differ in the sense that the present one also dealt on implementation practices and challenges.

Moreover, Adams et al (2016) teacher-parent collaboration in inclusive education in primary and secondary schools in Malaysia. Recent inclusive education policy developments within Malaysia have increased teachers’ accountability to effectively meet the needs of all students. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on inclusive education and participation of parents but they differ in the sense that the present one also dealt on implementation practices and challenges.

Likewise, Khairudin et al (2016) on the perceptions of special education teachers in Malaysia about their interactions with general education teachers. Concerns are raised about the content and approach of teacher training programs in Malaysia and the adequacy of current policy and legislation governing the provision of education for students with disability in inclusive educational settings. This study is similar to the present study since they both involved teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Inspired by social constructivist approaches to learning, teacher educators supporting inclusive education argue that child development depends not only on inherited capacities, but it is also constructed by shared social values, access to educational institutions, technologies (including assistive technologies), and other relevant social resources as well as quality of support provided to the child and opportunities to participate fully and equally in a community.

Teacher educators and policy makers would agree that it is true that current educational systems (schools, teachers, initial education of teachers, practices, technologies, teaching and learning materials, etc.) in many countries have been established based on an assumption that “regular” education, schools, and teachers should work only with “typical” children and other children need to be educated in a specially designed and segregated environment, that is, “special” education (Zgaga, 2019; Koutsouris et al., 2020). However, they would argue that in such an environment, children cannot develop a sense of belonging nor can become full members of the society because of marginalized status and limited opportunities to grow with others (Koller et al., 2018).

Moreover, in a special education, setting relationships, practices, and technologies tend to be adapted to their constraints instead of being designed to enable children to fully participate in education and society in spite of constraints. Similarly, parents, teachers, and kindergarten/school leaders favoring inclusive education would argue for social justice ideas: the importance of growing up within the community and learning at a kindergarten/school close to their home. A father of a child with speech difficulties, who was contacted by an author of this article and asked why he favored his child attending a regular kindergarten instead of a specialized kindergarten, pointed out as: “I can’t distinguish my child, who has special (or rather specific) needs, from any other child. How can I agree with her being placed in a school which labels her directly and indirectly as a person who does not fit the norm? Especially when attending kindergarten, she is as special and as normal as every other child who she plays with and a child who plays with her. This should be the norm for any healthy development of a child.” Arcidiacono et al. (2021).

Similarly, a teacher and master student (Konetski-Ramul, 2021) and a head of support specialists services (Labi, 2019) urged for not separating students with special needs easily to special classes or special schools, e.g., Labi (2019) pointed out as: “If today we separate one quarter of children for fear that their involvement could negatively affect the well-being of the other three quarters of children, then as adults there are people in the labor market, in families, or even in the queue at the store, who cannot cope with each other. It is more sustainable to grow together, learn from each other and cope with each other throughout the school journey.” Many parents of special needs children would also argue that the most important goal for them is for their children to adapt to society and learn to live with other people. To illustrate this idea, a mother of a young child with multiple disabilities pointed out during a public speech in Estonia that her family’s “goal is to support him so he would become a taxpayer.”

In order to have an equal opportunity, all children need to be educated in regular education that have conditions, capacities, and resources to be able to adapt to the children needs, capacities, and constraints. Following this, in a case when a school, teachers, discourses, practices, and technologies are not aligned with the needs of some students, it cannot be an acceptable reason for the exclusion of the child, but for adapting the education to the child and his/her learning and developmental needs. Arcidiacono and Baucal (2020).

The majority of Estonian teachers has adopted learner-centered views about education as reported in international comparison studies, such as TALIS 2013, 2018, and a smaller group has also learned to implement these in practice (many Estonian teachers are still rather traditional and subject-oriented in their teaching practice; OECD, 2014, 2020; see also Leijen and Pedaste, 2018).

Teachers who have accepted the child-centered view might not consider a class as a unified mass, instead they might perceive children anyway as special and different, notice variety, individual differences and adapt their teaching accordingly (Breeman et al., 2015). Following, adapting their teaching for a child with special needs would not be so different from any other adaptation of teaching for the child’s needs and interests.

Challenges of Inclusive Education

Despite the growing international consensus on inclusion, many students with disabilities around the world continue to face challenges when attempting to enroll in regular schools. Recent research conducted by UNICEF in thirteen low- and middle-income countries indicates that children with disabilities account for a disproportionate percentage of children out of school. A survey of school enrolment in India indicated that despite the near-universal primary school enrolment of students without disabilities, more than one-third of students with disabilities are not enrolled in school of any type. Among Indian children with intellectual disabilities, including children with Down syndrome, it was estimated that nearly half were not enrolled in school (UNESCO Institute for Statistics & UNICEF, 2015).

Although accurate data are scarce, available information indicates that rates of inclusion vary widely from country to country, even within the same region (UNESCO Institute for Statistics & UNICEF, 2015). In some CRPD-signatory nations, students with disabilities are still routinely counselled to enroll in segregated schools or are denied admission to inclusive schools (Zero Project, 2016). These data also indicate that in some countries, included students struggle with poorly trained teachers and inaccessible school buildings and curricula. In brief, countries around the world have pledged to support inclusion for people with disabilities. There has been a substantial expansion in the degree to which students with disabilities attend school alongside their non-disabled peers, but this progress has been uneven. Many countries have enacted policies to promote inclusion, while others have been slow to shift from a segregated education model. Even in countries that have high rates of students with disabilities in the general education classroom, education that is truly inclusive may not be the norm.

Special needs education or special education refers to separate schools, classes, or instruction specifically designed for students categorized as having special educational needs (SEN) (UNESCO, 2017). Special education is defined as an ‘education designed to facilitate the learning of individuals who, for a wide variety of reasons, require additional support and adaptive pedagogical methods in order to participate and meet learning objectives in an educational program. (UIS-UNESCO, n.d.) The reasons may include different physical, behavioral, intellectual, emotional, and social capacities. ‘Educational programs in special needs education may follow a similar curriculum as that offered in the parallel regular education system, however they take individuals’ particular needs into account by providing specific resources like specially trained personnel, equipment, or space) and, if appropriate, modified educational content or learning objectives.’ (UIS-UNESCO, n.d.).

While it is increasingly understood that the future of education may lie in identifying students with diverse combinations and intensities of needs rather than labelling students with SEN unidimensional, the review acknowledges that many countries still employ condition-specific understanding and labelling of SEN. Given the comparative nature of the review mapping policy approaches in place, the cross-country analysis may, at times, still employ condition-specific lenses. Countries do not only differ in terms of SEN definitions but also with respect to broader regulations related to individuals with SEN. (OECD, 2019).

Developing teachers and teaching assistants’ capacity to address students with SEN represents a main policy area that can determine the effectiveness of inclusive education policies. As such, it should be promoted starting from initial teacher education (ITE) and continuing with teacher practicum, mentoring and professional development. Continuous professional development is an important tool in ensuring that practicing teachers can respond to students’ individual needs and promoting inclusive education building upon the knowledge and skills acquired in initial teacher education programs.

School principals play a crucial role in preparing schools to address students with SEN. School leaders can enhance co-operation and the sharing of skills and practices among teachers to promote inclusive education (OECD, 2018). Principal leadership also appears to be particularly important to stimulate teachers to develop new teaching practices and attend continuous professional development on SEN.

School-level interventions are important policy areas to promote inclusive education settings for students with and without SEN (OECD, 2019). Main school-level interventions refer to the distribution of financial and human resources to support students with SEN, learning strategies, the use of assistive technology, and engagement of families and the local community. Overall, students with SEN can be enrolled in different typologies of classes within and outside mainstream school settings.

Across OECD countries, students with SEN can be enrolled in different types of classes inside and outside of mainstream settings, and their support can be delivered in the forms of individualized or small group-based learning. Different strategies can be more or less suitable depending on students’ specific needs.

Career and education guidance is one of services provided by the schools to students with special education needs. Generally, students with SEN tend to have higher dropout rates from school than their peers (European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education, 2016). Furthermore, individuals with disabilities are more likely to be unemployed compared to individuals without disabilities, as reflected in national statistics such as the U.S. July 2019 Disability Employment Statistics.

Career and educational guidance can become important tools to help address and reduce graduation, employment and income gaps for students with SEN. In some education systems, Special Education Needs Co-coordinators (SENCos) are school-level staff members responsible for coordinating the provision of services and support to students with SEN. They also serve as important intermediaries among different schools, as well as between the school, the community and families. Furthermore, SENCos can play important roles in providing education and career guidance. (European Agency for Special Needs and Inclusive Education, 2016).

In an early positional article by Farrell (n.d), some problems with inclusive education were identified: the lack of knowledge of how to actually create classrooms that were truly inclusive, the persistence of segregated educational practices, and the diverse opinions among teachers and parents about its appropriateness, for example. In a recent theme number of the International Journal of Inclusive Education (Magnusson, 2019), it appears that these problems are still with us to a large extent. The lack of knowledge concerning how to create inclusive classrooms involving all pupils has also been pointed out in a recent review (Göransson and Nilholm, 2014).

Meanwhile, Budiyanto et al (2020) conducted a study to inform future directions of the Inclusive Indonesian Classrooms project and, more broadly, contribute to the training of teachers of children with autism in Indonesia. Their research produced original findings about the education of children with autism within Indonesia. The data indicated that this group of children were being educated within regular, inclusive and special settings. This was occurring against backdrop in which most teachers were unfamiliar with the teaching approaches most often used with autistic children in other countries, and where taboo and stigma play a role in some stigmatizing beliefs about autism, which includes the stigmatization of teachers. The notion of using a Lesson Study approach for teacher development was suggested. There was an evidence that this approach transfers well to the Indonesian context and can support the development of new culturally sensitive classroom practices. A recommendation from this research is that the Inclusive Classrooms project should pilot and evaluate this means of teacher development. Furthermore, in relation to stigmatization, there is evidence of the importance of teachers having access to information in Bahasa Indonesian. The research has elicited some specific areas for future research, which improve understanding of the interplay between Indonesian culture, pedagogies, and the education of children with autism.

This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on special education but the present study on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Consequently, Sheehy et al (2019) This research compared the responses from those working in inclusive, special and regular schools regarding their epistemological and pedagogical beliefs. The results showed that teachers in inclusive schools expressed stronger social constructivist beliefs than those in other schools. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on inclusive education but the present study on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Likewise, Bari et al (2014) investigated the readiness of special education trainees on inclusive education. Based on the data analysis, it is found that the percentage and the readiness of special education trainees are at a high level. However, innovation in teaching and practical training still need to be provided sufficiently in order to provide an opportunity for trainees to get hands on experience. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on inclusive education but the present study also dealt on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP.

As cited by Arcidiacono and Baucal, (2020) and Nelis and Pedaste (2020), inspired by social justice ideas, many European countries have developed policies and implemented practices to promote inclusive education. Accordingly, more children with special education needs are nowadays learning with their peers in mainstream schools and the number of special schools has decreased. Although this is a trend in different countries in Europe and in the Global North, there are several challenges. Most notably, there is still no clear understanding of inclusive education. Arcidiacono et al. (2021)

Researchers, policy makers, and teacher educators have diverse understandings (Haug, 2017; Van Mieghem et al., 2018; Kivirand et al., 2020), which range from the idea that special education is itself a form of inclusive education, to the observation that all children are, for the majority, learning together in an inclusive setting (Hornby, 2015; Kivirand et al., 2020). Magnússon (2019) has concluded that the “implementations, interpretations and definitions of the concept vary greatly both in research and in practice, between countries and even within them.

These different discourses are present in several societies, but the debates are more heated in contexts which more recently have started to implement inclusive education practices, such as Eastern Europe and former Soviet countries (Stepaniuk, 2019). One of the reasons for so many challenges in the latter context is the past experience of a strongly segregated educational system. This historical context is illuminated in the views of teachers, parents, and the general public.

Similarly to many Eastern European countries, Estonia has a long special education tradition, which is influencing acceptance of the principles and the actual practices of inclusive education. These principles have been established at the legislative level in Estonia since 2010, most notably the law states that students with special needs have the right for studying in their schools of residence with their peers (Basic Schools and Upper Secondary Schools Act, 2019).

In accord with the changes in the legislative framework, the number of pupils with special educational needs in mainstream schools has increased; however, another phenomenon has appeared – the number of students enrolled in special classes in mainstream schools has also increased (Räis et al., 2016). These special classes are often taught by teachers of special education and not by regular teachers. Although many school leaders understand the need for inclusive education, their main concern is a lack of availability of support specialists – including special needs teachers, speech therapists, and phycologists (Räis and Sõmer, 2016).

Although the expertise of support specialists is highly valued in Estonian schools and kindergartens, more and more teachers have recognized the importance of their own professional development related to supporting diverse learners. For example, the comparison of TALIS 2013 and TALIS 2018 survey data (OECD, 2020) showed that teachers’ participation in professional development activities related to supporting diverse learners has significantly increased in Estonia and at the same time teachers indicated that training in this area is for them still the largest need for professional development. Consequently, diverse in-service training courses are available for teachers.

An analysis of the course content at one of the major universities in Estonia providing teacher education showed that the core content of these courses has tended to focus on didactical methods of teaching students with special educational needs rather than on strategies of inclusive pedagogy. However, more recent in-service courses have emphasized social justice, possibilities for participation, and inclusive pedagogies as well (e.g., Kivirand et al., 2021).

In one of such articles (Ehala, 2020) pointed out that inclusive education is a mirage created by our sense of justice, but its implementation puts young people in a learning environment that is not in line with their home preparation and developmental needs. They are just too special and different so that everyone could learn together in a way that no one suffers.” He concluded that we simply need different kinds of environments for different children.

As cited by Arcidiacono et al. (2021) many of these ideas are also pointed out by some teachers. In 2019, a new educational strategy was prepared for Estonia and in this process, several meetings were held in different places across the country. Many teachers were critical regarding the recent policy reform related to inclusive education. On the one hand, teachers are concerned about the learning process and outcomes of the regular children and, on the other hand, their own preparation to support students with special needs. Working with special needs students requires specialized knowledge and expert skills, which many teachers simply do not have.

Similar to these views, a group of master students wrote an article in a national newspaper in June 2020 (Kupper et al., 2020) where they stated that although they support the idea of inclusive education, it is only justified if it is carefully organized and sufficient support is available. They also added that inclusive education is certainly not suitable for students with more severe special needs. They point out as: “Inclusion may not be effective in case the teacher does not receive enough support and guidance regarding how to work with a special needs student and the rest of the class at the same time. If, figuratively speaking, the teacher’s strength does not overcome the situation, then the increase in behavioral problems, drop-out rates and developmental delays are real dangers.”

In contrast to voices arguing for creating different learning environments for different children, scholars, policy makers, teachers, and parents in favor of inclusion for all stress, in different talks and articles, that all children in a society should have an equal right to get adequate opportunities to develop wellbeing, agency, identities, and competences in order to become capable to participate fully and equally in the society (Felder, 2019). This objective cannot be reached if some children are educated in a segregated context.

Meanwhile, Labrague (2018) conducted study entitled “Children with Special Education Needs in the Public Elementary Schools of Catbalogan City, Philippines, presented the kind of students with Special Education Needs (SEN) enrolled in Special Education (SPED) centers or schools. The paper used secondary information from CSWD of Catbalogan and from SPED delivering schools. Data showed that out of 471 persons with disabilities scattered in the fifty-seven barangays of Catbalogan, only eighty-six were at school. CSWD record did not classify the kind of disability and the age. Most of the disable persons are found in Mercedes, Guindapunan, and Pangdan but there were also several in the island barangays of Basiao and Bagonon.

The top SEN cases are speech hearing impairment, Down syndrome, autism, learning disability and ADHD comprising about 31.4, 23.3, 15.1 and 11.6 and 6.9% of the population. The rest has intellectual disability, cerebral palsy and visual impairment. Students with SEN are enrolled in four schools; one of which is the lone SPED center in the second district of Samar. Other students with SEN cannot access SpEd classes due to distance. The special facilities and expertise needed to handle students with SEN is seen as the greatest challenge to the Department of Education in attaining its goal to provide an inclusive education for all types of exceptional children.

This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on special education but they differ in the sense that the previous study explored on the special education needs cases while the present one is on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

The study of Rosales et al. (2019) documented the inclusive education programs of Western Mindanao State University; identify appropriate strategies that train students with special needs in the inclusive education program; recognize support and challenges in including students with special needs in the university; described the living-experiences of students with special needs included in the general education program; document insights and lived-experiences of stakeholders on the Inclusive Education Program of Western Mindanao State University. The study specifically aimed to identify the support provided by the university for students with special needs; described the advantages and disadvantages of inclusive setting in the university in the following levels: SEE, SSS, STEP; describe the challenges met by students with special needs in the university; determined strategies on inclusive education programs for Persons with Disabilities or Students with Special Needs.

The study utilized a qualitative phenomenological study. The purposive sampling design was utilized in selecting the respondents. An in-depth interview was conducted to determine the themes that evolved from the study. Observations and Focus Group Discussion were also conducted that aided in validating interview transcripts gathered by the researchers. This study enlisted a total of sixty (60) respondents that includes vulnerable individuals such as students with hearing impairment; students with visual impairment; students with learning disabilities; students with autism; students with cerebral palsy and those who are physically challenged. Other stakeholders included teachers and students in the regular education program, staff, administrators and parents also took part as respondents of the study. Transcripts from interviews were coded to elicit themes of the study. Frequency counts were utilized until data on the insights and lived-experiences of stakeholders reached the point of saturation.

The following are the main and highlighted findings of the conducted study: First, it was revealed that personal impressions depend on individual experiences at a given period. Second, Inclusive Education program opens opportunities for learning as well as enhancing one’s social skills. Third, the challenges that stakeholders experienced were instructional approaches and teaching strategies, parents support toward their child’s academic requirements, the manner that regular teachers deal with educational adjustments in teaching students with special needs and coping strategies towards discrimination. Fourth, the results of the study affirmed the belief that barriers should be eradicated through carefully differentiating the tasks in a range of ways, building in access strategies, and using a range of teaching strategies.

Fifth, the effect of inclusion on stakeholders provided a venue for learning and training students with special needs to cope with the educational activities. Sixth, realization is present among regular teachers on the utilization of the appropriate strategies and assessment for students with special needs. Seventh, at first, parents were hesitant and apprehensive of inclusive education, but when interviewed it was found out that along with the implementation of inclusive education they were thankful and appreciative of the effort extended and provided by the university. Last, the supports were provided in various levels and form (e.g. utilization of gadgets, computers with speech synthesizers, voice recorders, braille typewriters, talking calculators, laptops, iPods, writing and drawing materials, catechism, guidance and counseling including scholarships were provided).

The study recommends the conduct of Sensitivity Orientation for Regular Teachers and students before classes will formally start; conduct of seminar workshops on teaching strategies for teachers in handling students with special needs in inclusive settings and; parents should continuously support their child in the academic, social, spiritual and financial aspects. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous study identified the assistance and support provided for students with special needs; the challenges met and determined the strategies on inclusive education programs for persons with disabilities or students with special needs while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Relatively, Toquero, C.M.D. (2021) People with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) are confronted with diverse challenges as COVID-19 caused tremendous disruption in face-to-face educational settings. Apart from this situation, teachers are also facing difficulties in making their lessons adaptive and responsive to the educational learning needs of people with SEND. This article explores the challenges, strategies, and prospects of teachers for inclusive education during the pandemic. Using a qualitative approach, the researcher gathered data through Messenger chatbot and emails from five special education teachers in the Philippines.

Findings revealed that the teachers’ experience educational apprehensions, intermittent virtual socialization, and psychological crisis. Nevertheless, the teachers assisted the parents in supervising their children with disabilities’ through online communication, homeschooling, parental engagement, psychological safety, and empathetic language strategies. The special education teachers also look forward to inclusivity in school policies and government-driven emergency interventions for people with developmental disabilities.

This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous stud explored the challenges, strategies, and prospects of teachers for inclusive education during the pandemic while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

In the study of Andrews (2019) the quality of school facilities and equipment affects students in two ways. Firstly, a lack of facilities limits the ability of a student to achieve various learning and extra curricula activities. Secondly, a lack of facilities has a negative impact on a teachers’ job satisfaction, which undermines their motivation to teach. Likewise, Octavia et al. (2020) determined how school facilities affect school quality at vocational high school in Pati, Central Java, Indonesia. The approach and methods used in the study was evaluation research using a discrepancy model. The data were collected by observation, interview, and documentation. Meanwhile, the analysis used interactive model by Milles and Huberman. The results showed that the school facility at vocational high school in Pati is up to standard of Regulation of National Education Minister Number 40 Year 2008. The value of school infrastructure is 72.5% or adequate category, while school facility is 84.3% or adequate category. School facilities become one of the factors in supporting student learning achievement and teacher performance. Therefore, learning achievements can be improved through improved the school facilities. These studies are similar to the present study because they both focused on school facilities and equipment in an inclusive classroom but they differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices and challenges.

In the study of Kozikoğlu et al. (2021), they examined teachers’ attitudes and challenges they experienced concerning Individualized Education Program (IEP). The study employed explanatory sequential design. The respondents were consists of 100 teachers working in the central districts of Van, Turkey within 2019-2020 academic year. Findings demonstrated that teachers have positive views about the IEP process, and the implementation of IEP is useful and essential. Concerning the challenges they experience during the IEP process, the teachers think that they do not have sufficient information about the planning, implementation and assessment/evaluation processes of IEP, the school/classroom is physically inadequate, and the classes are crowded in the implementation of IEP. In addition, it was found that as the positive attitudes of the teachers towards IEP increased, the challenges they encountered during the IEP process decreased.

The study suggested that teachers should receive in-service training, physical conditions be improved, the class size be reduced, and cooperation should be provided between the family, classroom teachers and guidance counselor in order to conduct IEP in a healthier way. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the present one focused not only on the challenges but on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP.

Similarly, Parveen et al. (2018) assessed the challenges the schools confront while implementing Inclusive education and assessed the role of teacher in making Inclusive education a success in the schools in the district of Srinagar, Ganderbal, Pulwama and Baramulla. Survey method and interview schedules were employed to collect the required data. All the concerned groups’ viz., teachers, parents, students, resource persons and administrators were contacted in this regard. The data reveals that Inclusive education is still fumbling with problems of policy implementation, an environment that is not conducive for practice. The success of inclusive education is hindered by other factors like community’s attitude towards disability, lack of adequate involvement of all stakeholders among others.

The finding suggests that there is lack of human capital in schools that offer inclusive education settings. The human capital here is defined as the capacity, qualifications and expertise of the teachers in handling students with special abilities. The teachers felt that they were incapable to differentiate the learning activities for the students. Students with disability tend to disrupt the classroom with behavior issues. Majority of the teachers felt that the biggest challenge in dealing with students with disabilities is the lack of knowledge and skills they require to understand these students’ behavioral needs. Because they are not as cognitively developed as their peers, the teaching-learning process is not as effective as it could be.

The teachers also felt that there were inadequate teaching and learning resources available to cater for the students with special needs, hence making it very challenging for the teachers to successfully teach a concept to the students. Resources are extremely limited. There is lack of infrastructure, trained teachers because of the insufficient funding. These insufficient facilities affect the success of the inclusion and those who are involved in the program. Government involvement is very less as compare to the non-governmental organizations. As such; more is still needed to be done in order to ensure that the best is achieved from the objectives of inclusive education.

The study recommends that collective responsibilities be taken by the families, communities, schools, developmental agencies and the government. To understand and attend the issues of the students with disabilities training of teachers is necessary. Teachers have to treat special needs students differently based on their learning level standards. The effectiveness of students with learning differences in the general education classroom requires that educators be trained in the informative strategies to help learning. Teachers must be confident, competent, and skillful to handle any situation in inclusive setup. Their attitude regarding inclusive education and about the education of the disabled children needs to be modified. Resources are also found insufficient and needs to be addressed.

Resources such as adequate and trained teachers, infrastructure, orientation of the concerned about Inclusive education be prioritized, and concept of inclusive education within the education system be evaluated. In order to provide a quality education for special needs students in the general education classroom, all of the necessary resources must be available for both the students and the teachers. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the present one focused not only on the challenges but on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP.

The study of Realuyo (2017) entitled “Opening Doors Leading to Inclusion”, made a profile of differently-abled learners in Labo West District in terms of age, gender source of family income, number of siblings in the family, and learning disability. This study highlighted the ways of teachers in handling these learners considering their rights as children, improving access to inclusive education, demonstrating holistic approach of meaningful education, and creating awareness and participation among stakeholders. Moreover, the challenges that have come across them in dealing with those learners were also discussed. As the output, this designed an intervention that would aid these teachers in meeting the expectations of differently-abled learners in the locale of the study.

Based on her study, the profile of the differently abled learners determines the need to address their disabilities and difficulties to maximize their fullest potentials marked by utilizing their strengths and similarities while polishing their weaknesses and difficulties. Dealing with challenges in handling differently-abled learners connotes utilizing multi-level instruction of varied teaching approaches, disciplining them, and communicating with parents which necessitate organizing educational provisions and considering external factors in order to build an inclusive learning environment. Meeting the expectations from differently-abled learners resembles meeting the standards expected from these learners who are hoped to perform and excel like typical students do.

It was recommended that local schools should create partnership with other government and non-government agencies that will help them address the needs of differently-abled learners, participation of parents and guardians be stressed in order to further coordinate with external stakeholders who can help in the goal of the Department to intensify the gear towards accommodating CWDs in regular schools, training program for teachers handling differently-abled learners be conducted in the Division and reinvent the curriculum in order to design lessons which are suited to the needs of these learners.

This is similar to the present study because they both focused on learners with special needs and the challenges in handling differently-abled learners but they differ since the present study focused not only on the challenges in implementing inclusive education but also on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs and the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP.

Similarly, Allam et al. (2021) determined the issues and challenges of special education (SPED) teachers in teaching children with learning disabilities in the City Division of Ilagan Isabela, Philippines. The 15 SPED teachers were served as the respondents of this study using purposive sampling technique. Qualitative Research Method (QRM) was utilized to determine the issues and challenges of the teachers. Thematic analysis was employed to interpret the data. The analyses on the sharing of the key informants regarding their collective description of their challenges as SPED teacher led to the emergence of five distinct themes that include, choosing appropriate strategy and motivation; identifying individual needs; challenging but fulfilling; acceptance and patience; and respect one is right. Most teachers teaching children with learning disabilities did not receive any special needs education training from the school, they feel that they are not qualified to teach the children with learning disability.

Moreover, teachers assigned in SPED classes lack of strategies in dealing with learners with disabilities. This study revealed that the classrooms for children with learning disabilities in Division of Ilagan at large have poor learning environment to support the SPED such as lack of budget, curriculum guide, Instructional Materials (IMs) and even school facilities. It could be concluded that placement of learners with special needs in an inclusive classroom with ordinary learners is not enough with no proper support. Learners with disability did not receive all the necessary support and services for accessing the curriculum facilities; and stakeholders’ supports is very minimal to support the needs of the students enrolled in SPED classes.

On the other hand, issues and problems were solved technically to sustain the positive working environment among school heads, teachers and stakeholders. The Department of Education Training and Development in collaboration with regional in service officers should organize continuous professional development opportunities on inclusion strategies of learners with SPED needs. The implementers of the SPED programs shall strictly adhere to the policies, and the strong support of the stakeholders shall be encouraged by formulating active organization spearheaded by the school head.

This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on the issues and challenges of special education (SPED) teachers in teaching children with learning disabilities but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

On the other hand, the study of Schechter (2018), the most common specific learning disabilities such as dyslexia and other language disorders), attention deficit disorder; mental illness, psychological, or psychiatric conditions; and health impairment or conditions. However, many of these learners never received special education services of any kind. These students tend to have relatively mild levels of disability, which explains why they slipped through the cracks during high school: While their peers with more serious disabilities were able to secure accommodations, tutoring, counseling, and other services, their own challenges never seemed quite serious enough, in the eyes of teachers and school staff, to warrant diagnostic tests or the creation of an individual education program (IEP). And because their disabilities were mild, they were able to struggle through high school and earn a diploma even without receiving such services. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on learning with disabilities in an inclusive setting but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Synthesis of the State-of-the-Art

The related studies reviewed have similarities and differences with the present study. Articles about inclusion and special education and its theoretical underpinnings were cited and reviewed. Republic Acts and DepEd legal bases used in this research were likewise analyzed. Foreign and local studies were revisited by the researcher and were used to enrich the discussion of the study. Further, the behavior, the issues and challenges encountered by teachers and parents noted in the different studies were also considered in this study.

Raguindin et al. (2021) developed a framework as a means of understanding inclusive environments thriving in an inclusive Philippine setting. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on special education but the previous study developed a framework as a means of understanding inclusive environments thriving in an inclusive Philippine setting while the present one proposed an intervention program in the form of Toolkit for schools to guide them in the implementation of inclusive education. Moreover, Malaluan (2021) determined the school’s profile and instructional leadership of School Heads. This study focused on catering diverse learners in the schools as one of the responsibilities of the school head while the present study also dealt on diverse learners specifically learners with special needs. They differ in the sense that the present study focused not only in leaners with special needs but on the implementation of inclusive education while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Dela Fuente, (2021) documented the experiences of forty-three college teachers with deaf students in inclusive classes, in one higher education institution in the Philippines. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on the inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one did not dealt on experience of teachers. Muega (2019) study on the knowledge and involvement of school teachers, school administrators, and parents of children with special needs (CSN) in the implementation of inclusive education (IE). This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on the involvement of school teachers and parents of children with special needs in the implementation of inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education. Ecoben (2019) determined the level of awareness and attitudes of public-school teachers towards the implementation of inclusive education. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous study determined the level of awareness and attitudes of public-school teachers towards the implementation of inclusive education while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Likewise, Mulenga (2019 established school-based, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors that influence enrolment of children with special education needs and established effective ways of providing education to leaners with special education needs. This is similar to the present study because they both dealt on special education but they differ since the present study did not established school-based, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors that influence enrolment but on the profile of the respondents schools as to enrolment. In addition, Bryd (2020) examined what skills and knowledge special education educators feel that general education teachers and teacher candidates need in order to work with students with special needs in the inclusive environment. This study is similar to the present one because one of their variables was on human resources, however, they differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices. Saloviita (2018) surveyed teachers’ attitudes towards inclusion. This is similar to the present study because they both dealt on inclusive education but differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices.

Relatively, Asri et al. (2022) described and explained the condition of early reading for special needs students in inclusive primary schools the teachers’ need for an Individualized Education Program (IEP) for early reading; and the development of IEP in early reading for special needs students and Ismail et al. (2020) on Individualized Education Program (IEP) for each of the barriers faced by students with special needs. These study is similar to the present study because they both focused on inclusive education, however, they differ since the present one also dealt on the implementation practices and challenges. Yuen as cited by Asri (2020) success of inclusive education is determined by the availability of special education teachers, parents’ participation, social interaction, and supports from the environment. This study is similar to the present study because they both investigated inclusive education but they differ because the present study also dealt on implementation practices.

Further, Sullivan (2015) and Ilik et al. (2019) on parents’ perceptions of their experiences in their children’s individualized education program (IEP). This study is similar to the present study because they both investigated inclusive education and participation of parents in the preparation of IEP but they differ because the present study also dealt on implementation practices and challenges faced by parents and teachers. Adaza et al. (2021) described the teaching experiences of non-SPED teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education. This study is similar to the present study since they both involved the challenges of non-SPED teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education. Moreover, Verzo (2017) explored the transition programs of special education in selected schools. This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on special education but they differ in the sense that the previous study explored the transition program of special education while the present one is on the implementation practices along identification and placement, developing IEP, assistance and reporting.

The study of Quinones, (2022) and Budiyanto et al (2020) on awareness, readiness and the perceived roles of senior high school teachers on special education. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on special education but the previous study uncovers the awareness, readiness and the perceived roles of senior high school teachers on special education while the present study on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education. Sagun et al. (2020) engaged the stakeholders from public schools of Filipino Children with Disability (CWD) to describe outcomes of Early Detection and Intervention (EDI). This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one also dealt on implementation practices and challenges.

Likewise, Adiputra et al (2018) and Adams et al (2016) classified parents’ perceptions about the application of inclusive education in schools. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on inclusive education and participation of parents but they differ in the sense that the present one also dealt on implementation practices and challenges. Khairudin et al (2016) on the perceptions of special education teachers about their interactions with general education teachers. This study is similar to the present study since they both involved teachers teaching children with special needs in an inclusive education but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Similarly, Sheehy et al (2019) working on inclusive, special and regular schools regarding their epistemological and pedagogical beliefs. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on inclusive education but the present study on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP. Bari et al (2014) investigated the readiness of special education trainees on inclusive education. This study is similar to the present study since they both focused on inclusive education but the present study also dealt on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP. Labrague (2018) presented the kind of students with Special Education Needs (SEN) enrolled in Special Education (SPED) centers or schools. This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on special education but they differ in the sense that the previous study explored on the special education needs cases while the present one is on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Moreover, Rosales et al. (2019) documented the inclusive education programs; identify appropriate strategies that train students with special needs in the inclusive education program; recognize support and challenges in including students with special needs; described the living-experiences of students with special needs included in the general education program; document insights and lived-experiences of stakeholders on the Inclusive Education Program. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous study identified the assistance and support provided for students with special needs; the challenges met and determined the strategies on inclusive education programs for persons with disabilities or students with special needs while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Toquero, C.M.D. (2021) on people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND) confronted with diverse challenges as COVID-19. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the previous stud explored the challenges, strategies, and prospects of teachers for inclusive education during the pandemic while the present one focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Meanwhile, Andrews (2019) and Octavia et al. (2020) on school facilities and equipment and its effects to students. These studies are similar to the present study because they both focused on school facilities and equipment in an inclusive classroom but they differ since the present study also dealt on implementation practices and challenges. Kozikoğlu et al. (2021), they examined teachers’ attitudes and challenges they experienced concerning Individualized Education Program (IEP). This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the present one focused not only on the challenges but on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP.

Consequently, Parveen et al. (2018) assessed the challenges the schools confront while implementing inclusive education and assessed the role of teacher in making inclusive education a success in the schools. This study is similar to the present one since they both focused on inclusive education, but they differ in the sense that the present one focused not only on the challenges but on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents in the development and implementation of IEP. Realuyo (2017) highlighted the ways of teachers in handling these learners considering their rights as children, improving access to inclusive education, demonstrating holistic approach of meaningful education, and creating awareness and participation among stakeholders. This is similar to the present study because they both focused on learners with special needs and the challenges in handling differently-abled learners but they differ since the present study focused not only on the challenges in implementing inclusive education but also on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs and the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP.

In addition, Allam et al. (2021) determined the issues and challenges of special education (SPED) teachers in teaching children with learning disabilities. This study is similar to the present study since their focused is on the issues and challenges of special education (SPED) teachers in teaching children with learning disabilities but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education. Schechter (2018) focused on children with learning disabilities. This study is similar to the present one because they both dealt on learning with disabilities in an inclusive setting but they differ in the sense that the present one is also focused on the profile of the schools, the implementation practices of the schools for learners with special needs, the behavior of parents and teachers in the development and implementation of IEP and the issues and challenges they encountered in the implementation of inclusive education.

Gap Bridged by the Study

From the readings reviewed, the researcher eyed on many topics about inclusion of students with special needs in an inclusive classroom settings. There were also differentiated instruction and enriching the teaching strategies of teachers to meet the needs of the learners. There were also some which focused on inclusive education which serves as the key to promote the goal of the government to make everyone avail the free, compulsory and public education. There are studies highlighting on enhancing the roles of parents and everyone in the learning community to make learners achieve better.

However, there was no study or literature found which specifically tackled on the inclusion of students with special needs in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte focusing on the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in terms of enrolment, human resources, budget allocation, and equipment, facilities, and services; implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting; the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. Therefore, this is the gap bridged by the study.

Theoretical Framework

To have a more comprehensive and accurate review, analysis and discussions of the concepts of the study, the researcher applied three theories for the theoretical basis of this research. These theories are Gardner’s Multiple Intelligences, Vygotsky’s Sociocultural Theory and Skinner’s Theory of Behaviorism and

The Theory of Multiple Intelligences (Kendra, 2023) stressed on the importance of placing equal attention on individuals who show gifts in the other intelligences: the artists, architects, musicians, naturalists, designers, dancers, therapists, entrepreneurs, and others who enrich the world in which we live. Intelligence is often defined as our intellectual potential; something we are born with, something that can be measured, and a capacity that is difficult to change.

This theory suggests that traditional psychometric views of intelligence are too limited. Gardner first outlined his theory in his 1983 book Frames of Mind: The Theory of Multiple Intelligences, where he suggested that all people have different kinds of “intelligences.” In order to capture the full range of abilities and talents that people possess, Gardner theorizes that people do not have just an intellectual capacity, but have many kinds of intelligence, including musical, interpersonal, spatial-visual, and linguistic intelligences. Kendra, (2023)

The theory of multiple intelligences enjoys considerable popularity with educators. Many teachers utilize multiple intelligences in their teaching philosophies and work to integrate Gardner’s theory into the classroom. Cerruti (2013) the theory of multiple intelligences proposes a major transformation in the way our schools are run. It suggests that teachers be trained to present their lessons in a wide variety of ways using music, cooperative learning, art activities, role play, multimedia, field trips, inner reflection, and much more. Bowker (2020)

It is observed in the local school setting that the school focuses more of its attention on linguistic and logical-mathematical intelligences. A high esteem is given to highly articulate or logical people while giving lesser attention and reinforcement to those with other intelligences. Sometimes, they are labeled “learning disabled or underachievers.” Some of them are not addressed based on their unique ways of thinking and learning. With the theory of Gardner, this will somehow change the philosophy of many in redesigning the way they educate the learners in an inclusive learning abode. With this, each child will have the opportunity to learn in ways which are harmonious with their unique minds.

Sociocultural theory stresses the role that social interaction plays in psychological development. It suggests that human learning is largely a social process, and that our cognitive functions are formed based on our interactions with those around us who are “more skilled.” Sociocultural theory focuses on how mentors and peers influence individual learning, but also on how cultural beliefs and attitudes affect how learning takes place. According to the sociocultural perspective, our psychological growth is guided, in part, by people in our lives who are in mentor-type roles, such as teachers and parents. Other times, we develop our values and beliefs through our interactions within social groups or by participating in cultural events. Kendra (2022).

Moreover, it views human development as a socially mediated process in which children acquire cultural values, beliefs, and problem-solving strategies through collaborative dialogues with more knowledgeable members of society. It explains how individual mental functioning is related to cultural, institutional, and historical context; hence, the focus of the sociocultural perspective is on the roles that participation in social interactions and culturally organized activities play in influencing psychological development. From this perspective, mental functioning of the individual is not simply derived from social interaction; rather, the specific structures and processes revealed by individuals can be traced to their interactions with others. Mcleod (2023)

As learners participate in a broad range of joint activities and internalize the effects of working together, they acquire new strategies and knowledge of the world and culture. Typically this tenet has been illustrated by examining the interactions between individuals with disparate knowledge levels, for example, children and their caregivers, or experts and novices, or learners to their teachers. This brought them in broader perspectives shaped by the interaction made. This starts the building of learning based from the interpretations during interactions. This later yields creating of experience which occurred from interaction, negotiation, and collaboration with people. This theory works in the present study in the sense that with cooperation and collaboration between parents, teachers starts the building of learning based from the interpretations during interactions.

Skinner’s Theory of Behaviorism states that behaviors are learned through interaction with the environment through a process called conditioning. Thus, behavior is simply a response to environmental stimuli. Behaviorism is only concerned with observable stimulus-response behaviors, as they can be studied in a systematic and observable manner. Mcleod (2023).

It emphasizes the role of the environment on an individual’s development. Preparing the environment for appropriate reinforcement is a major goal. It continues to influence what goes on in schools, especially for some special education programs. It also includes behavior modification and programmed learning. Both of these rely heavily on immediate reinforcement, in which a child has to exhibit the “right” behavior or produce the “correct” answer in order to be positively reinforced.

In education, advocates of behaviorism have effectively adopted this system of rewards and punishments in their classrooms by rewarding desired behaviors and punishing inappropriate ones. Rewards vary, but must be important to the learner in some way. In using this behavioral theory, the teacher considers the difficulties that a child has in being with the learning environment. This entails understanding of children, including their similarities and their differences. Whenever a teacher gives drills and exercises, considering the curiosity and prior knowledge of the learner is to be given emphasis. Teachers also frequently use reinforcement to shape behavior in the classroom. Kendra, (2023)

These three theories works on the present study in the sense that the concepts of multiple intelligences and behaviorism were considered in developing the intervention programs and reinforcement to advance and enrich the development of the learners academically with the supervision and guidance of their teachers and parents.

Last but not least, Roma Ester Ajero Barco’s (2023) Researcher’s SPECIAL – DEAR Theory (Strengthening Parents Engagement and Community Involvement Advancing Learners Development and Enriching Academic through Reinforcement) asserts that the greatest way to accomplish “Quality Education for Everyone” is through strengthened and collaborative engagement and school community involvement to advance development of learners and to enrich their academic performance through reinforcement.

When there is strong support coming from the entire school community stakeholders for the program, policy and curriculum implementation; provision of various services promoting the holistic development of diverse learners, inclusive education can be executed successfully. This approach emphasize strong focus on the continuous engagement and involvement of parents, teachers, school human resource and the community whom must have an active role in supporting school programs and activities with considerations of the individual differences and intelligences of diverse learners and giving rewards and or reinforcement to those learners with special needs.

Figure 1 Theoretical Paradigm. Diagram illustration of the various theories supporting successful implementation of Inclusive Education

Conceptual Framework

The conceptual framework of the study is based on the systems approach.

A researcher made survey was used to find answer to the questions and variables answered by the respondents.

The input for this study were the profile of public secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation, equipment, facilities, and services provided. The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting were also explored in this study. The gathered data on the profile of the schools and implementation practices were subjected to statistical treatment to determine if significant relationship exist between the two variables.

It also explored the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart was also one of the inputs. Added to these inputs were the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

A careful interpretation of insights and views gathered was done before working on the output of the paper. Lastly, an intervention program in the form of Toolkit for Schools was proposed to address the implementation of special education in selected secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Figure 2 Conceptual Paradigm. Implementation of Inclusive Education

NOTES

1. UNICEF (n.d) https://www.unicef.org/education/inclusive-education
2. International Bureau of Education. (n.d.). What is “inclusive education”? – international bureau of education. Retrieved March 16, 2023, from http://www.ibe.unesco.org/fileadmin/user_upload/Policy_Dialogue/48th_ICE/Press_Kit/Interview_Clementina_Eng13Nov.pdf
3. What is inclusive education? Allfie (the alliance for inclusive education). Allfie. (2019, October 7). Retrieved March 16, 2023, from https://www.allfie.org.uk/definitions/what-is-inclusive-education/
4. (2021). Sub-education Policy Review Report: Inclusive education. GCED Clearinghouse. Retrieved May 1, 2023, from https://www.gcedclearinghouse.org/resources/sub-education-policy-review-report-inclusive-education
5. OECD (2019), OECD Strength through Diversity Project: Education for Inclusive Societies.
6. United Nations (2016), https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/sdg4
7. 1987 Philippine Constitution, Article XIV, se. 1-2
8. Republic Act 9155 known as the Governance of Basic Education Act of 2001 https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/2001/08/11/republic-act-no-9155/
9. Republic Act 11650 known as “Instituting a Policy of Inclusion and Services for Learners with Disabilities in Support of Inclusive Education Act”, section 2
10. DepEd Order Number 72, series of 2009 known as Inclusive Education as Strategy for Increasing Participation Rate of Children
11. DepEd Order Number 23, series of 2022 known as “Child Find Policy for Learning with Disabilities toward Inclusive Education https://www.deped.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2022/05/DO_s2022_023.pdf
12. DepEd Order Number 21, series of 2019 known as the Policy Guidelines on the K to 12 Basic Education Program
13. DepEd Order 44, s. 2021 known as the “Policy Guidelines on the Provision of Educational Programs and Services for Learners with Disabilities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program” https://www.deped.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2021/11/DO_s2021_044.pdf
14. DepEd Order Number 46, series of 2014 known as the Guidelines on the Implementation of Alternative Learning System for Persons with Disabilities Program https://www.deped.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/DO_s2014_46-1.pdf
15. DepEd Order Number 21, series of 2020 known as the Policy Guidelines on the Adoption of the K to 12 Transition Curriculum Framework for Learners with Disabilities https://www.deped.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/DO_s2019_021.pdf
16. DepEd Order Number 21, series of 2020 known as the Policy Guidelines on the Adoption of the K to 12 Transition Curriculum Framework for Learners with Disabilities https://www.deped.gov.ph/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/DO_s2020_021.pdf
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METHODS AND PROCEDURE

This section described the research design, methodology, study respondents, data sources, sampling and data collection procedures, research instruments, and statistical treatment used in this study.

Methods Used

This study employed descriptive – correlational research. The descriptive method was utilized to explore the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placement, developing educational plan, assistance and reporting. The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting. It was also utilized explore the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The Correlational method was used to determine significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs.

Respondents of the Study

The respondents were the Receiving Teachers, who were generally classified as Junior High School Teachers, and parents. Total enumeration was utilized for teacher-respondents while for parent-respondent was through purposive sampling. Purposive sampling refers to a group of non-probability sampling techniques in which units are selected because they have characteristics that you need in your sample. In other words, units are selected “on purpose” in purposive sampling. Also called judgmental sampling, this sampling method relies on the researcher’s judgment when identifying and selecting the individuals, cases, or events that can provide the best information to achieve the study’s objectives. Purposive sampling is common in mixed methods research. Nikolopoulou (2022). In this study, the researcher identified the parent-respondents based on the attendance in the HRPTA meeting conducted by the class adviser. Table 1 presented the data as to respondent of the study.

Table 3 Respondents of the Study

Legend: RT – Receiving Teacher; P – Parents

Data Gathering Tools

This study used various tools to answer the problems in the study.

Survey- Questionnaire Checklist. This was the main tool used for gathering the needed data in this study. It was used to explore the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placement, developing educational plan, assistance and reporting. The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting. It was also utilized explore the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

It is composed of four parts, namely: Part I is the profile of public secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for school year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation and equipment, facilities, and services.

Part II focused on implementation practices of the public secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance and reporting.

This study used a four point Likert scale to the indicators of the implementation practices of the public secondary schools such as 4 – Strongly Agree (SA); 3-Agree (A); 2 Disagree (D) and 1 Strongly Disagree (SD).

Part III focused on the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart. Part IV focused on the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The questionnaire was prepared by the researcher herself. The first draft was shown to the adviser, special education teachers and other professionals knowledgeable with it for possible suggestions. Suggested revision as incorporated in the final copy. For the first and second dry run, the proposed questionnaire was tried in a non-respondent school of fifteen (15) teachers to attain its validity and reliability.

Document Analysis. The profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment, human resources, budget allocation, and equipment, facilities, and services was gathered through the survey-questionnaire checklist but it was triangulated through documentary analysis. The researcher asked each school a copy of their enrolment generated from Learners Information System (LIS), number of human resources based on the list provided by the human resource department of each school, copy of program support fund for SPED provided by the EPS-SPED, list of equipment and facilities provided by the school property custodian and list of services from the guidance office.

FGD or Focus Group Discussion. The FGD involved the receiving teacher, and parent-respondents from respondent schools. The FGD conducted produced integrated report of the different groups based on their answers to the specific questions which was about the school profile, implementation practices, behavior and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Before the conduct of the actual Focus Group Discussion, the researcher organized FGD Team composed of one (1) technical staff and one (1) secretary to assist in the preparation of FGD Session. Next is the conduct of orientation on the rationale, objective, method, tool and procedures in conducting the FGD. The researcher also explained to the staff the tasks to be done before, during and after the FGD.

Activities such as clarification of objectives, outputs, activities and inputs to all participants, explanation of procedures in the focus group discussion, formation of sub-groups and selection of a sub-group chair and a secretary, group discussion, preparation of visuals for presentation, questions and answers from the floor, revision of outputs and whole group discussion were also discussed by the researcher. The answers to the guide questions and the list of possible actions were the main output of the FGD.

Letter request to the participants were sent to them through the school principals and confirmation as to the attendance was received. The participants who attended the FGD was consist of eight (8) receiving teachers and five (5) parents. To validate the findings of the study, the researcher utilized the indicators presented in the survey questionnaire checklist. The researcher also encouraged the participants to give suggestions and or recommendations to address the issues based on the findings of the study.

During the conduct of the FGD, participants were asked to register, the researcher explained the reasons, the objectives and the methods and procedures of the activity. Distribution of the instrument was done. Each indicator was explained and asked participants for additional questions and emphasized which questions should be answered by the group of teachers and parents. Each group select their chairperson and a secretary to guide the discussion and recorded the answers to the questions. Discussion and the preparation were done in two (2) hours. Each group member contributed their ideas. They presented their group answers. Other participants were asked questions or gave comments and suggestions after each report. Then, they integrate and organized the various group reports into FGD report.

After the conduct of the FGD, the researcher explained to the participants that the data gathered were very important in proposing plan of actions to address the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Procedure of Investigation

A step – by step procedure was followed by the researcher to come up with a reliable result of the study.

Conceptualization of the Research Problem. Data driven conceptualization was employed by the researcher to come up with this research study. This includes both primary and secondary sources. Primary sources considered by the researcher includes school and division records or documents and academic and professional articles and reports analyzed and reviewed by the researcher. Secondary sources were journal articles academic or professional books research reports. These were reviewed and considered by the researcher in deciding to explore the inclusion of students with special needs in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte in terms of their profile, implementation practices, behaviors, issues and challenges encountered by both teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education.

Approval of the Research Title. After the research problem was established, variables were also identified, specific questions were conceptualized and the overall concept was drafted, the study was presented to the members of research panel for approval.

Securing Permit to Conduct the Study. Prior to the formal conduct of the study, the researcher sought approval of the Schools Division Superintendent to conduct the study and the Education program supervisor for SpEd, then to the designated school head of 10 secondary schools, being the locale of the study, were also informed as to the conduct of the study.

Preparation of Instrument. The researcher reviewed DepEd legal basis such as Orders and other issuances to as basis in developing the indicators of the instruments based on the given variables of the study. The adviser, special education instructors, and other competent individuals were presented the first copy in order to get their feedback and suggested modification as it appears in the final draft.

Validation of Questionnaire. To ensure validity of the research instrument, it was checked and scrutinized by the research adviser and panel members to further enhance it. It was also subjected to scrutiny by a set of evaluators, preferably teachers and school heads, who gave comments and suggestions to improve the structure of the instrument. Moreover, to test the reliability of the instrument, the researcher conducted a dry run to non-participants and non-respondents of the study composed of 10 teachers and 10 parents. They were asked to answer the survey and gave comments and suggestions afterwards. The researcher consulted her adviser and panel members to further enhance the instruments. Based on the results of the dry-run and the suggestions of the experts on the field, the final draft of the instruments was prepared and printed.

Administration of the Questionnaire. The administration of the questionnaire was followed after the permit to conduct a research study has been approved by the Schools Division Superintendent, content validations and pilot testing of the survey-questionnaire was done. Letter request to the school heads of the teacher respondents and receiving teachers was sent to formally seek their participation in the study. Then the researcher personally distributed the survey- questionnaire checklist to get the needed data as to profile of public secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023. Each respondent school provided the researcher necessary documents in order to determine the profile of each respondent schools, documents were subjected to thorough analysis by the researcher.

As to the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting; behavior of the special education teachers and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers, the researcher personally administered the instrument to the receiving teachers of each school. Moreover, for the responses of the parent-respondents, the researcher requested the class advisers of the learners with special needs as to their scheduled HRPTA meetings for the researcher to attend and presented and explained to the parents the objectives of the study.

The researcher obtained full consent from the participants prior to the study. The protection of the privacy of research participants and the level of confidentiality were ensured. Anonymity of individuals and the schools participating in the research was ensured. All communications in relation to the research was done with honesty and transparency. The researcher considered voluntary participation of the parent-respondent, they were provided sufficient information and assurances about taking part to allow individuals to understand the implications of participation and to reach a fully informed, considered and freely given decision about whether or not to do so, without the exercise of any pressure or coercion. The researcher took the accountability to guard the safety and security of the participants from any other situation that will allow them to be at disadvantaged position.

Processing of the Data Gathered. After the data gathering, the researcher tabulated and analyzed the data gathered in terms of the profile, implementations practices, behavior and teachers and parents and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Statistical Treatment of Data. With the help and assistance from statistician the researcher also determined if significant relationship exists between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs. The results served as basis in conducting the Focus Group Discussion for triangulation of the data gathered from the receiving teachers and parents-respondents.

Preparation of an Intervention Program. After the conduct of focus group discussion, the researcher finalized the proposed intervention program based on the outcome of the data gathered which was presented in the form of Toolkit for Schools implementing inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte for school year 2022-2023.

Writing of the Research Report. After thorough analysis and interpretation of the result, the researcher prepared a report as to the outcome of the study which was then checked and properly scrutinized by her adviser for revisions and improvement. After which was then presented to the members of the panel.

Submission of Completed Research. After a series of presentations and revisions to accommodate the suggestions and insights, the researcher was able to submit a complete research study.

Statistical Tool

The data consolidated and tabulated by the researcher were subjected to statistical calculations in order to present the findings with the corresponding analysis and interpretation to answer the specific research questions in chapter one of this study. Descriptive and inferential statistics were applied to facilitate the interpretation of the data gathered by the researcher.

Frequency Count and Percentage Technique were utilized for the profile of the secondary schools and on the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Weighted Mean and Ranking were utilized for the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan assistance, and reporting and on the behavior teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart.

With the help and assistance from statistician the researcher determined if significant relationship exists between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs.

Pearson’s Moment Correlation using Covariance was used to test the hypothesis on significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of public secondary schools for learners with special needs. (Sevilla, 2002)

NOTES

1. Fraenkel, J. R. and N.E. Wallen (2010) How to Design and Evaluate Research in Education, New York: McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc., 2010, p. 14.
2. Nikolopoulou, K. (2022, December 1). What Is Purposive Sampling? | Definition & Examples. Scribbr. https://www.scribbr.com/methodology/purposive-sampling/#:~:text=Purposive%20sampling%20refers%20to%20a,on%20purpose%E2%80%9D%20in%20purposive%20sampling.
3. Zulueta, F. M Methods of Research and Applied Statistics (Mandaluyong City: National Bookstore, 2004).
4. Sevilla, C.G. (2002) Research methods. Quezon City, Philippines: Rex Bookstore.

ANALYSIS AND INTERPRETATION

This chapter presents the results and discussion of the findings, analysis and interpretation of data gathered based on the sub problems of the study.

Specifically, this study was conducted to explore the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte which specifically determined the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 ;the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs; if there is a significant relationship exists between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs; the behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart and the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Profile of Secondary Schools Implementing Inclusive Education

The profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 was revealed in terms of enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation; and equipment, facilities, and services provided.

Enrolment of Children. This indicator measures the general level of participation in, and the capacity of each level of the education system: Kindergarten, Elementary (Grades 1-6), Junior High School (Grades 7-10) and Senior High School (Grades 11-12). It is the total enrolment for a particular education level, regardless of age, expressed as a percentage of the eligible official school-age population of that particular education level in a given school-year. In this study, it refers to the enrolment based on Learners Information System (LIS) of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023.

The profile of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 along enrolment of children is presented in Table 2.

Table 2 Enrolment of Learner with Special Educational Needs for 2022 -20223

As revealed in the table, School G has the highest number of enrollees with 72 or 20.6% as compared to School B with only 58 or 16.6% enrollees out of 349 learners, next is School H with 53 or 15.2% out of 349 learners. The school with the lowest enrolment is School I with only six learners or only 1.7% out of 349 learners with special needs as reflected in the Learners Information System. Based on the table, the Division of Camarines Norte has only 10 secondary schools implementing inclusive education.

The results implies that the enrolment in secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 varies and with a very limited enrolment or number of learners. This can be attributed to school-based, socio-cultural and socio-economic factors as having influence on the enrolment of children with special education needs in school.

As affirmed in the study of Mulenga (2019), school-based factors includes the availability of qualified special education teachers, safety of children in school, a well-tailored curriculum, distance to school and lack of sensitization. Likewise, the findings can also be attributed to socio-cultural factors such as negative attitudes towards disabilities, lack of acceptance of children’s disabilities, discrimination of individuals with disabilities; overprotection of children with disabilities and lack of clear information on special education needs. Moreover, socio-economic factors such as parental level of education, parental income status, poverty and family size were also identified as factors affecting the enrolment of special education.

In the Division of Camarines Norte there were 92,642 enrolled learners from Kindergarten to Senio High School levels. There were 70 secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte catering Junior High School and Senior High School with only 349 recorded or classified as learners with special needs. In the case of one secondary school, School D has an enrolment of 3,929 learners officially enrolled in Learners Information System, however, the number of identified learners as learner with special need was only eight. This can be attributed to the lack of human resources specialized in identification and screening of learners with special needs, this applies to the learners needing medical expertise.

However, there were learners that can be identified as learners with special needs by just analyzing the results of their diagnostic test or reading proficiency test using the PHIL-IRI Assessment Tool so that their regular teachers will classify them as to frustration level, instructional and independent. If learners were classified as in frustration level, automatically, these learners can be included in the list of learners with special needs given their learning disabilities. With the data on enrolment as revealed in Table 2, this means that secondary schools were not able to utilize the assessment data of the learners as basis for an intervention programs to those learners with learning disabilities.

The findings also reveals that majority of the secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte were not able to attain the mandate of DepEd that all schools should implement inclusive education. This implied that not all secondary schools are accessible to learners with special needs which can be attributed against the management of schools.

School principals play a crucial role in preparing schools to address learners with special needs. School leaders can enhance cooperation and the sharing of skills and practices among teachers to promote inclusive education. Principal leadership also appears to be particularly important to stimulate teachers to develop new teaching practices and attend continuous professional development. (OECD, 2018). The head of the school should have the ability to provide visionary and inspirational leadership. Effective leadership will always results increase of enrolment. In addition, the school’s leadership must intentionally focus on leading the enrollment effort. This was affirmed in the study of Malaluan (2021) that there is a need to improve and or enhance current leadership strategy to attain the mandate of public schools focusing on accessibility of the schools to all school-age learners.

Given these, the DepEd officials may craft a clear policy directing schools in planning a management intervention in order to attain the national performance standard. Moreover, it is imperative that the school and the community work together to ensure that factors that lead to high enrolment of children with special education needs in school be enhanced. On the other hand, factors that lead to low enrolment should be addressed to ensure that they do not negatively affect enrolment. Teachers be given capacity building program to enhance their competency in catering diverse learners specifically those learners with special needs.

Human Resources. It refers to the receiving teachers out of the teaching staff of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for SY 2022-2023. The profile of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte along human resources with special obligation is presented in Table 3.

Table 3 Human Resource in School with Special Obligation

Legend

TP – Teaching Personnel

RT – receiving Teacher

As revealed in Table 3, School G has 16 or 8.89% Receiving Teachers out of 121 teaching personnel while School D has 16 or 16.16 % Receiving Teachers out of 99 Teaching Personnel and School A with 16 or 31.37% Receiving Teachers

out of 51 Teaching staff. Moreover, the school with the lowest number of receiving teacher was School J with only 2 receiving teachers out of 98 teaching staff.

The findings suggests that secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte has sufficient number of teaching staff that can be designated as receiving teachers to cater learners with special needs. These Receiving Teachers’ serves as the class advisers of the learners with special needs who were distributed to them according to their grade levels.

These findings implied that the schools has enough number of teaching staff, though, they are not Special Education Teachers based on their plantilla position, still they are capable of receiving learners with special needs. As stated by Byrd et al. (2020) in their study that in today’s education climate, the responsibility for teaching students with special needs no longer lies exclusively with special education (SPED) teachers. This change means that the educational philosophy has moved towards inclusion, where teachers at all levels and content areas are required to interact and work with students with special needs on a regular basis (Saloviita, 2018).

Including students with special needs in the general education classroom requires that teachers adapt their approaches to teaching to meet all students’ needs. However, general education teachers are not always fully aware how best to serve special population. The study of Byrd, et al. (2020) examined what skills and knowledge special education educators feel that general education teachers and teacher candidates need in order to work with students with special needs in the inclusive environment. According to them, teacher education and professional development programs can benefit by providing a continuum of learning opportunities in three important areas. General educators should: first, make and carry out informed decisions, based on proper assessments data; second, develop appropriate understanding and compassion for students with special needs and their situations and third, learn to foster effective communication in and out of the classroom with all parties involved in educating this specific group of students.

Budget Allocation. In this study, it refers to the Program Support fund given to the schools implementing inclusive education in the regular classrooms. Based on the data presented in Table 4, School A and School J has a budget of Php 120,000.00 and is ranked first. It was followed by School H with Php 90,000.00 budget while School G has a budget of Php 85,000.00. Ranked fifth is School E with a budget allocation of Php 80,000.00. The secondary schools with the lowest budget intended for the implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs were School C and School I with only Php 10,000.00.

This led to the conclusion that the budget allocation or the programs support funds intended for the implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs varies from one school to another. The allocation of Program Support Fund to secondary schools with identified learners with special needs is dependent on the number of learners officially enrolled in the Learners Information System or LIS.

In the case of School G, it has 72 enrollees as learners with special needs, however, its budget was only Php 85,000.00 compared to School A and School J with an enrolment of 37 and 41 learners with special needs with a budget of Php 120,000.00, very high compared to School G with lesser number of enrollees.

Table 4 Budget Allocation for Schools with Inclusive Education

This simply means that some of the learners in School G were classified as late enrollees and not included or not officially counted in the number of learners submitted directly to EBEIS. On the one hand, School A and School J has higher amount of budget which can be attributed to the early enrolment data submitted online directly to the national office EBEIS portal.

The Enhance Basic Education Information System (EBEIS) is an online database of basic education information, including the number of enrollees by year level, the number of schools, and the number of teachers. The information or school data submitted to this portal were the basis or support information requirements for planning, quality assurance, monitoring & evaluation and other decision making activities at all levels of the education system.

Pursuant to DepEd order 42 s, 2021 entitled “Guidelines on the utilization of support funds for special education, schools are allocated with program support fund based on the school enrolment of Learners with Disability/Difficulty. This fund aims to provide access to quality and equitable basic education for learners with disabilities (LWDs) require that schools be equipped with additional resources to address their unique educational needs. The support funds aims to enhance the operation of the Program and augment the regular Maintenance and other Operating Expenses (MOOE) of all recognized SPED Centers for elementary and secondary schools with classes for learners with special needs. Specifically, it aims to enhance access to and upgrade the quality of SPED programs and services as well as to raise the efficiency of its operations.

As stated in DepEd Order No. 38. s. 2015, for years of providing support funds to SPED Centers, significant improvement has been observed. However, much remains to be done to provide quality education to learners with special needs who tend to be unseen, unheard, and uncounted. Hence, the continuation of support funds was implemented. The program support fund is allocated for the modification and adaptation of physical environment, curriculum, timetables, and evaluation procedures, supply of special teaching aids, materials and equipment; access to assistance by peers (buddy system), parents and volunteers and; access to support personnel in health services and guidance and counselling. Secondary schools with programs for students with special needs are given financial assistance based on the number of enrollees served.

The ultimate goal of inclusive education is the inclusion of children with special needs into the regular school system and eventually in the community. With these, the researcher recommends that the school should integrate potential financial aid and resource generation activities to SPED program development planning and effectively and efficiently utilize Program Support Fund through collaborative efforts of school partners and stakeholders.

Equipment, facilities, and services          

The Special Education (SPED) program of the Department of Education (DepEd) aims to meet the special needs of exceptional/differently-abled students in connection with their education and training, Special education is carried out by SPED teachers who are specially trained to teach children with exceptional needs. SPED classes require special facilities. Table 5 presents the available equipment, facilities and services of the secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte implementing inclusive education.

As revealed in Table 5, the equipment available for speech and hearing impairment includes manual alphabet, chart slides on sign language, mirror for speech correction and speech correction exercises. School A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H have manual alphabet while School A,E,H,G have chart slides on sign language and mirror for speech correction.

Table 5 Equipment, facilities, and services

For visual impairment, only three schools, Schools A, G, H have Snellen charts required for eye check-ups and only one school with model on eye mechanism. Available equipment to 10 secondary schools catering learners with learning disability includes tests used for assessment and charts/slides on basic areas of learning disability- perceptual, reading, writing, arithmetic, listening and comprehension; one school with charts/slides on mistakes done by children and only two schools, School A and School C have toys games, any other material used for correction of these problems.

As to services provided by the schools to learners with special needs, eight school, Schools A,C,D,E,G,H,I have identification and referral process and assessment services; all schools, Schools A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J adapted the K to 12 Curriculum for LWDs and only six schools developed Individualized Educational Plan (IEP); five schools, Schools A,C,G,H,I have specific instructional interventions and seven schools, Schools A,B,C,E,F,G,I have tutorial or remedial sessions for LWDs who display difficulty in achieving the expected instructional goal/ s and for learners who are at risk of failing and assessment services area for LWDs educational placement and referral and ten schools adapted learning resources and ICT. This implied that secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte has limited equipment, facilities and services provided to learners with special needs.

The quality of school facilities and equipment affects students in two ways. Firstly, a lack of facilities limits the ability of a student to achieve various learning and extra curricula activities. Secondly, a lack of facilities has a negative impact on a teachers’ job satisfaction, which undermines their motivation to teach. Andrews (2019) the quality of school facilities and equipment limits the ability of a student to achieve various learning and extra curricula activities and has a negative impact on a teachers’ job satisfaction, which undermines their motivation to teach. In other words, if the schools implementing inclusive education catering learners with special needs have limited equipment, facilities and services it can definitely affects how the learners develop holistically. As affirmed in the study of Octavia (2019) School facilities become one of the factors in supporting student learning achievement and teacher performance, thus, learning achievements can be improved through improved school facilities and equipment which in turn improve school quality.

Moreover, DepEd Order No. 42, s. 2021 entitled Guidelines on the Utilization of Support Funds for the Special Education (SPED) Program mandates the schools to procure early intervention materials, manipulative materials and resources for the gifted and talented and other disabilities, psychological and other assessments tests and materials; payment for services of psychologists and psychometricians in the screening and identification of children with special needs; supplies for the transition programs; maintenance and minor repairs of existing devices/facilities.

Implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs

Identification and Placements. as defined in this research study as the process which ascertains the child’s skills and level of functioning, not limited to assessment and screening which will qualify the child for special education services as practice by SPED teachers and coordinator of this study in selected secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs is presented in Table 6.

Table 6 Implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along Identification and Placements

Legend:

As revealed in Table 6, the indicator screening is recommended in case a child is observed to have disabilities or developmental delays, got a mean score of 3.67 interpreted as strongly agree, and is ranked first. Rank second is the indicator the inclusion of learners with disabilities in the general education classroom varies depending on their unique needs and other requirements, got a mean score of 3.50 interpreted as agree. Third rank is the indicator a group of qualified professionals and the parents look at the child’s evaluation results. Together, they decide if the child is a child with a disability, got a mean score of 3.47 interpreted as agree.

These findings suggests that receiving teachers strongly agree that screening is recommended in case a child is observed to have disabilities or developmental delays. As mandated by DepEd Order Number 23, series of 2022 known as Child Find Policy for Learning with Disabilities toward Inclusive Education articulates the processes in ensuring that learners with disabilities are identified, located, and evaluated to facilitate their inclusion in the general basic educational school system, provides means for the schools to monitor implementation of the child find process, promotes cooperative advocacy for children with disability and developmental delays among stakeholders in the communities.

Regular classrooms contains a very diverse group of learners. This means that some learners will need additional services in the classroom. The first step to determine if a student should be assessed for special education services is screening, which may consist of group testing or classroom observation. Screening of the learners at the beginning of the school year can lead to timely recognition of learning difficulties and characteristics that might signal a risk for disorder of learning and/or attention. Early learning experiences and interventions can have a greater impact on students when they are young. Early screening can result in children receiving extra help sooner and prevent them from falling behind.

As explained by National Center for Learning Disabilities screening may prevent children from being inappropriately identified as having a learning disability or incorrectly being classified as needing special education services and supports. Children whose needs are identified and addressed early might make sufficient progress to mitigate the need for special education services. Unfortunately, there is still a stigma related with being identified as having a learning disability, which can lead to higher rates of bullying, depression, anxiety, and substance abuse.

Receiving teachers also agree that inclusion of learners with disabilities in the general education classroom varies depending on their unique needs and other requirements and the identification whether a child has disability is the decisions of a group of qualified professionals and the parents based on the child’s evaluation results. The inclusion of students with special needs in the general education classroom has been a major topic of discussion for many years. Inclusion education means that all students are part of the school community, regardless of their strengths and weaknesses. These students deserve to have full access to all resources and social interactions that are present in the general education classroom. The ultimate goal of many schools is to create a classroom that has the least restrictive environment to meet the needs of all students, including those with special needs.

However, according to Walsh (2018) many teachers were not taught how to teach students with special needs. Despite this lack of education, students with special needs are still placed in the general education classrooms. Teachers do want students with special needs in their classroom; however they do not feel prepared to fully address the educational needs of these students. Walsh recommended that teachers should be given the opportunity to learn more about how to create successful inclusion classrooms.

Moreover, the indicators placement is determined using the result of any medical record or medical assessment results together with the doctor’s recommendation, got a mean score of 2.43 interpreted as disagree and is ranked eighth. Next is the indicator the school shall provide an appropriate educational placement to better serve the LWDs, got a mean score of 2.29 interpreted as disagree. Ranked tenth is the indicator the learners with atypical needs shall be assessed and evaluated by an appropriate specialist using a variety of available assessment tools and strategies, got a mean score of 1.84 interpreted as disagree.

The findings suggest that the receiving teachers disagree that schools used the results of any medical record or assessment results together with the doctor’s recommendation in terms of identification and placement of learners with special education. This findings was substantiated by one of the receiving teachers during the conduct of Focus Group Discussion that according to her “schools accepted enrolment of learners even without medical assessment results, they just presented or submit their School Form 9 (school card) only”. Another Receiving Teacher said that “ang mga learners na nakalista sa amin and classified as learners with special needs ay wala naman talaga actually ng mga medical records na ipinapakita, ang ginagawa namin ay yung assessment tool na ginagamit namin pagpabasa na lang para ma identify namin kung may learning difficulty sila”. (Those learners in our school classified as learners with special needs, actually, they do not have medical records submitted, what we did was we utilized assessment tool for reading for us to identify if they have learning difficulty).

Another Receiving Teacher explained the reasons why schools disagree that they used the results of any medical record or assessment together with the doctor’s recommendation in terms of identification and placement of learners with special education, simply because most of the learners were undiagnosed thus parents do not have any medical records or assessment coming from medical doctor.

During the conduct of Focus Group Discussion, one of the parents explained that “gusto man din nga po naming mga parents na madala sa espesyalista ang mga anak natin para ma check kung ano baga talaga ang disability nila kaso po limited man lang din ang resources namin plus wala man po dito sa Daet ng espesyalista talaga tsaka po ang mga anak namin wala namang physical disability at ang common na nakikita at napapansin namin sa kanila ay yong wala lang pakialam sa pag-aaral puro cellphone tsaka hindi marunong magbasa o mag intindi ng binasa, hindi naman namin mabigyan talaga ng buong oras kasi busy din naman kami sa pagtrabaho sa labas ng bahay po”. (We parents also want our children to be taken to a specialist to check their specific disability but we were not able to do it since our resources are limited, plus there is no specialist here in Daet. Actually, our children have no physical disability and the common thing we observe and notice is that they just don’t care about studying, they just use their cellphones most of the time as a result they have difficulty in reading and in comprehension, we cannot really give them full time and attention because we are also busy with our work outside the home). This simply means that parents are not fully capable of sending their children for a medical identification of the disability of their children.

Based on this, the schools do not require the parents for a medical diagnosis of their children, they just require them to submit learner’s report card with final grades in all the subject areas. This simply means that as to identification and placement of learners with special needs, the schools does not practice the use of any medical record or doctor’s recommendation as basis for identification and placement of learners with special needs. Relatively, another Receiving Teacher from one of the secondary schools stated that assessing and evaluating the learners with atypical needs by an appropriate specialist using a variety of available assessment tools and strategies were not practiced by almost all secondary schools implementing inclusive education since the school has no medical specialist and the assessment tool and strategies they utilized were focus only on literacy and numeracy skills of the learners, thus, learners were left undiagnosed and the schools implements interventions focusing on literacy and numeracy only.

In the study of Schechter (2018), the most common specific learning disabilities such as dyslexia and other language disorders), attention deficit disorder; mental illness, psychological, or psychiatric conditions; and health impairment or conditions. However, many of these learners never received special education services of any kind. These students tend to have relatively mild levels of disability, which explains why they slipped through the cracks during high school: While their peers with more serious disabilities were able to secure accommodations, tutoring, counseling, and other services, their own challenges never seemed quite serious enough, in the eyes of teachers and school staff, to warrant diagnostic tests or the creation of an individual education program (IEP). And because their disabilities were mild, they were able to struggle through high school and earn a diploma even without receiving such services.

To say that their disabilities are relatively mild, however, is not to suggest that they don’t need or deserve support. On the contrary, these students face academic, social, and/or psychological challenges that their schools deems significant, and which, if not addressed, could make it very difficult for them to succeed in the school. This burgeoning population of students with mild disabilities poses an urgent challenge for secondary education. With these, schools should take steps to upgrade their student support services, writing centers, tutoring programs, counseling services, and more.

The implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements got an average weighted mean of 2.93 interpreted as “agree”. This findings reveals that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte implemented practices such as child-find or child mapping in collaboration with the LGU/barangay officials during the early registration; they also conducted screening if a child is observed to have disabilities or developmental delays.

The schools also agree that learners with a typical needs be assessed and evaluated by an appropriate specialist using a variety of available assessment tools and strategies and; their assessment and evaluation results be discussed with the learners with disabilities and their families as basis for placement in the learning environment and for eligibility to be part of appropriate programs and services. Another practice that the schools agree was the inclusion of learners with disabilities in the general education classroom depending on their unique needs and other requirements.

The process of identifying students with disabilities is important because it determines who among the general student population is entitled to unique and specific legal and educational rights as well as access to extra resources and services. These rights involve extensive due process protections, designed to ensure fundamental fairness in all aspects of the identification and placement of students with disabilities and to prevent misclassification.

Developing the Individualized Educational Plan.

Individual Educational Plan (IEP) is a systematic, purposive and developmental educational programming document of curricular and instructional priorities and contents designed to meet the learner’s special needs and aimed at ensuring mastery of learning for target skills and behaviors.

Table 7 presents the implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs along developing the individual educational plan. toward the realization of the agreed goals/performance and parents provide feedback, comments and concerns during parents meeting and or during encounters to be integrated in the educational plan.

As revealed in Table 7, the indicator “ensure that educational plan is carefully planned, constantly monitored and reviewed periodically to ensure the learners progress toward the realization of the agreed goals/performance”, got a mean score of 3.62 interpreted as strongly agree and is ranked first.

Next is the indicator considers the elements of Written Plan: child progress, annual goals and activities, with a mean score of 3.59 interpreted as strongly agree. The indicator the IEP must list the special education and related services to be provided to the child or on behalf of the child, got a mean score of 3.58 interpreted as strongly agree, and is ranked third.

These findings revealed that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte strongly agree that they implemented practices along developing individual educational plan such as ensuring that educational plan is carefully planned, constantly monitored and reviewed periodically to ensure the learners progress toward the realization of the agreed goals/performance. Schools also consider the elements of Written Plan: child progress, annual goals and activities and the IEP must list the special education and related services to be provided to the child or on behalf of the child.

Table 7 Implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along Developing the Educational Plan

Legend:

On the other hand, the indicator the IEP is developed by a team of individuals from various educational disciplines, the child with a disability, family members, and/or designated advocates, got a mean score of 2.43 interpreted as disagree and is ranked eight. Next is the indicator ensure that a child with an identified disability who is attending an educational institution receives specialized instruction and related services, got a mean score of 2.30 interpreted as disagree. Last in rank is the indicator parents provide feedback, comments and concerns during parents meeting and or during encounters to be integrated in the educational plan”, got a mean score of 2.22 interpreted as disagree.

These findings suggests that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte disagree that they implemented practices such as the IEP is developed by a team of individuals from various educational disciplines, the child with a disability, family members, and/or designated advocates; ensuring that a child with an identified disability who is attending an educational institution receives specialized instruction and related services and parents provide feedback, comments and concerns during parents meeting and or during encounters to be integrated in the educational plan.

These findings were substantiated by the Receiving Teachers during the conduct of Focus Group Discussion. One of the Receiving Teachers said that “ang IEP ay ginagawa lang ng mga subject teachers specifically English Teacher kasi kalimitan ang mga learners ay may learning difficulty lang sila like difficulty in applying knowledge kaya more on reading interventions kami and hindi na namin naisasama sa planning o pag develop ang magulang kasi kapag pinatatawag sila for a meeting ay di naman nakakaattend”, (The IEP is usually prepared by the subject teachers specifically English teachers because usually learners only have learning difficulty like difficulty in applying knowledge that is why the interventions provided were more on reading interventions and programs and parents were actually not involved in the preparation of IEP since they did not attend the meeting called for the said purpose).

Another Receiving Teacher explained that “ang mga eskwelahan ay talagang dapat bigyan ng tamang interventions ang mga mag-aaral kaya lang ang problema ay ang mga magulang ng mga mag-aaral na ito dahil kapag pinatatawag sila ng paaralan para pag-usapan ang tungkol sa kanilang mga anak ay hindi naman nakakapunta kahit padalhan ng sulat ng adviser kaya ang nangyayari si teacher lang ang gumagawa ng educational plan”, (Schools should provide appropriate interventions to those learners but the problem is the parents of these learners even though they were called by the schools to discuss the conditions of their children they did not come to school even the advisers sent a letter to them that is why only the teacher prepared the IEP).

Additionally, one of the parents stated that “may mga magulang kasi na hindi nila matanggap na kailangan ng kanilang anak na ma assess at mabigyan ng tamang tulong ng mga teachers. Ang nangyayari kahit anong patawag na meeting para pag-usapan ang tungkol sa kanilang anak karamihan ng mga magulang hindi nakaka attend ng meeting ang resulta si teacher na lang ang nagawa ng plan”. (There are parents who cannot accept that their child needs to be assessed for the teachers to give them interventions or special education program services based on their difficulty. What usually happens is that most of the parents are unable to attend the meeting called for the purpose, the result is that only the teacher prepares the educational plan).

In developing Individualized Education Plan (IEP) some obstacles also came from parents who are unaware of their children’s needs and cannot contribute to their studies, this was affirmed in the study of Asri et al. (2022). The implementation practices of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte along developing an individual educational plan got an average weighted mean of 3.17 interpreted as agree. This suggest that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte agree that they practiced developing IEP in collaboration with various educational disciplines, the child with a disability, family members, and/or designated advocates; planning is based on learner’s current level of functioning, ensuring that educational plan is carefully planned, constantly monitored and reviewed and parents provide feedback, comments and concerns during parents meeting and or during encounters to be integrated in the educational plan.

They also agree that they considers performance assessment to ensure active participation of the child or learner; considers the provisions of differentiated learning activities suited to learning ability of the child; considers the elements of Written Plan: child progress, annual goals and activities; ensuring that a child with an identified disability who is attending an educational institution receives specialized instruction and related services; IEP must include certain information about the child and the educational program designed to meet his or her unique needs and; the IEP must list the special education and related services to be provided to the child or on behalf of the child.

Developing the Individual Educational Plan (IEP) for learners with special needs are significant to ensure that varied and appropriate interventions, programs and services be provided to learners with special needs.

This was affirmed in the study of Ismail et al. (2020) that Individualized Education Program (IEP) is urgently needed for each of the barriers faced by students with special needs since it will greatly help the success of the programs and or services being implemented to them. Moreover, Ismael et al. stated that students with special needs need IEP to ensure that learners with special needs can adapt in the classroom together with regular students, and the implementation of the IEP has a positive impact on the learning process of students with special needs so that they can achieve optimal development and provide the same opportunities as students in general in class.

Assistance. In inclusive education, schools provide assistance to parents of special education learners which may be beyond the teaching and learning.

Table 8 present the data along the implementation practices of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte in terms of assistance.

Table 8 Implementation Practices of the Secondary Schools for Learners with Special Needs along Assistance

Legend:

As revealed in Table 8, the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along Assistance got an average weighted mean of 2.81 interpreted as agree. Specifically, the indicator “ensure support to learners with disabilities for an equal opportunity to access quality basic education”, got a mean score of 3.52 interpreted as strongly agree, and is ranked first.

The indicator providing assistance in terms of guiding the parents in the implementation of the agreed goals and performance based on educational plan,got a mean score of 3.51 interpreted as strongly agree, and is second in rank. The indicator ensure constant communication to parents for regular assessment of progress, got a mean score of 3.49 interpreted as agree and is ranked third.

These findings show that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte strongly agree that they implemented practices such as ensuring support to learners with disabilities for an equal opportunity to access quality basic education; providing assistance in terms of guiding the parents in the implementation of the agreed goals and performance based on educational plan and ensuring constant communication to parents for regular assessment of progress.

Ensuring support to learners with disabilities for an equal opportunity to access quality basic education is mandated by Republic Act 10533 section 8 the inclusiveness of enhanced basic education. Specifically, it mandates the implementation of programs designed to address the physical, intellectual, psychosocial, and cultural needs of learners, which shall include, but shall not be limited to programs for the gifted and talented which refer to comprehensive programs for the gifted and talented learners in all levels of basic education; programs for Learners with Disabilities which refer to the comprehensive programs designed for learners with disabilities which may be home-, school-, center- or community-based.

Another law is the Republic Act 9155 known as the Governance of Basic Education Act of 2001 which mandates the State to protect and promote the right of all citizens to quality basic education and to make such education accessible to all by providing all Filipino children a free and compulsory education in the elementary level and free education in the high school level. It shall be the goal of basic education to provide them with the skills, knowledge and values they need to become caring, self- reliant, productive and patriotic citizens of this country.

Anchored on these Acts are the DepEd Orders specifying the mandates of the department as to inclusion and special education. DepEd Order Number 72, series of 2009 known as Inclusive Education as Strategy for Increasing Participation Rate of Children. DepEd Order 44, s. 2021 known as the “Policy Guidelines on the Provision of Educational Programs and Services for Learners with Disabilities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program”. This policy shall provide an overall direction for the Special Education (SPED) Program to ensure the provision of educational services to learners with disabilities in both public and private basic education institutions. This policy covers the provision of the educational services, assessment, curriculum, teachers, learning delivery, learning environment and resources, and roles and responsibilities of the different levels of governance. The department shall ensure that learners with disabilities are equally provided with opportunities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program.

On the other hand, there were five indicators that the secondary schools were not able to implement such practices such as “parents were given assistance in terms of providing educational interventions, programs and services”, with a mean score of 2.43 interpreted as “disagree” and ranked sixth. The indicator “provision of monetary and nonmonetary assistance for learners with disabilities be able to complete their basic education, such as transportation or meal allowance, extra time for remedial instruction or tutoring, among others”, got a mean score of 2.37 interpreted as “disagree”.

These findings implied that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte were not able to provide parents assistance in terms of providing educational interventions, programs and services and monetary and nonmonetary assistance for learners with disabilities to complete their basic education, such as transportation or meal allowance, extra time for remedial instruction or tutoring, among others. This findings may be attributed to the limited resources of the schools and involvement or engagement of parents in school programs and activities.

Parents are the most significant member of the education process of children with special needs. The importance of parents in the education process is in the legal foundation of special education services. Although laws require parents to participate in the education process, it is stated in most studies that parents do not actively participate in this process. In the study of Ilik et al. (2019) they cited that teachers do not receive support from parents while preparing IEP and teachers find parents uninterested. They also found out that teachers working in special education schools must keep in touch with parents of students with special needs and thus, they must develop their cooperation skills.

Providing assistance in terms of guiding the parents in the preparation and implementation of the IEP is very crucial in the attainment of the agreed goals and performances. In the study of Ilik (2019) it was found that most of the parents do not know anything about IEP. It was also found that parents are not involved in the IEP process and they are not invited by the school/institution and the teachers also have some problems about getting the parents to involve in the IEP process.

Moreover, ensuring constant communication to parents for regular assessment of progress is important to ensure involvement and engagement of the parents. As affirmed in the study of Yuen as cited by Asri (2020) that the success of inclusive education is determined by the availability of special education teachers, parents’ participation, social interaction, and supports from the environment.

Likewise, the indicator “ensure that the school equipment and facilities cater the needs of children with special needs”, got a mean score of 2.31 interpreted as “disagree” and is ranked eight. The indicator “children with disabilities are provided an assistance if they are involved in an accidents and injuries as a result of their disabilities”, with a mean score of 1.85 interpreted as “disagree”, and is ranked ninth. The indicator “providing assistance to avail the necessary services appropriate to the needs of learners with disabilities such as but not limited to sign language interpreting, speech-language therapy, and physical therapy, assessment, occupational and behavioral therapy, and others”, got a mean score of 1.78 interpreted as “disagree”.

These findings implied that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte does not ensure that they provided sufficient school equipment and facilities catering the needs of children with special needs; children with disabilities are not provided an assistance if they are involved in an accidents and injuries as a result of their disabilities due to lack of funds and school resources and in providing assistance to avail the necessary services appropriate to the needs of learners with disabilities such as but not limited to sign language interpreting, speech-language therapy, and physical therapy, assessment, occupational and behavioral therapy, and others.

These may be attributed to lack or limited program support fund to finance the needed intervention, program and services for learners with special needs. As cited by United Nations Educational Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO, 2021) Sub-Education Policy Review Report on Inclusive Education that challenges like weak enforcement, lack of political commitment, inadequate financing, and fragmentation of service delivery hindered implementation of inclusive education.

Another reasons, as substantiated by one of the Receiving Teachers is the competency of human resources in the schools in terms of providing appropriate necessary services to learners with special needs given their limited trainings or capability enhancement in dealing with learners with special needs. This was affirmed in the study of Byrd et al (2022) that teacher education and professional development programs can benefit them by providing a continuum of learning opportunities in making and carry out informed decisions, based on proper assessments data; develop appropriate understanding and compassion for students with special needs and their situations and learn to foster effective communication in and out of the classroom with all parties involved in educating this specific group of students.

Teachers have a key role in the attainment of successful and sustainable inclusive education by providing quality education to students with special needs in an adaptable learning environment (UNESCO, 2017), an environment where learners with special needs can interact with normal students so they can express their emotions, minds, and actions. It implies how important the trainings or capability enhancement in dealing with learners with special needs and in the actual teaching-learning process for it maintains positive engagement between learners with special needs and the teacher in the classroom.

School principals play a crucial role in preparing schools to address learners with special needs. School leaders should enhance cooperation and the sharing of skills and practices among teachers to promote inclusive education (OECD, 2018).

Reporting. Table 9 presented the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along reporting.

Table 9 Implementation practices of the Secondary Schools for Learners with Special Needs along Reporting

Legend:

As revealed in Table 9, the indicators “confidentiality of the reports submitted is ensured”, got a mean score of 3.75 interpreted as “strongly agree”, and is ranked first. This means that confidentiality of the information and data of the individual learner is of utmost concern not only to protect learners but most of all is their right to privacy. Second in rank is the indicator “education planning reports whether it be an initial report or a progress report need to be documented”, got a mean score of 3.44 interpreted as “agree”. Next is the indicator “submits results of evaluation as to the effectiveness of the student’s special education services”, and regular reports to parents to provide a mechanism in monitor the student’s progress toward the annual goals, got a mean scores of 3.43 interpreted as agree respectively.

This findings implies that information or data about learners with special needs were properly documented by the schools and communicated to parents and confidentiality of these were ensured. The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along reporting got an average weighted mean of 3.41 interpreted as “agree”.

This findings suggest that the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte agree that they implemented practices along reporting. Receiving teachers in the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte agree that they implemented practices such as copies of the report of findings about the child and the corresponding educational plan furnished the teachers such as SPED teacher, general education teacher or receiving teacher; education planning reports whether it be an initial report or a progress report were documented and; reports are ideally kept on file and copies were given to those in attendance during the planning session, including the parent.

They also agree that they implement practices such as providing regular reports to parents as a mechanism in monitoring the student’s progress toward the annual goals; if progress is such that the student is not expected to reach his/ her annual goals; planning team reviewed and revised the student’s IEP to ensure that the student is provided with the appropriate supports and services; submits results of evaluation as to the effectiveness of the student’s special education services; confidentiality of the reports submitted was ensured; protocols in submitting and providing reports were properly observed; managed learner’s data and information using technology, including ICT, to ensure efficient and effective records and report management and; capacitated school personnel specifically SPED teachers in managing learners records and information.

The summary as to the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placement, developing individual education plan, assistance and reporting is presented in Table 10.

As revealed in the table, the implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements got an average weighted mean of 2.93 interpreted as “agree”. Along developing the Educational Plan got an average weighted mean of 3.17 interpreted as “agree”. Along assistance got an average weighted mean of 2.81 interpreted as “agree”. Along reporting, got an average weighted mean of 3.41 interpreted as “agree”. The implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs have a grand mean of 3.08 interpreted as agree.

Table 10 Summary of the Implementation practices of the Secondary Schools for Learners with Special Needs

Legend:

This implied that the public secondary schools implementing inclusive education implemented the practices along identification and placement, developing individual education plan, assistance and reporting.

Significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs

Statistically speaking, this study failed to establish the relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs. As revealed in Table 11, at 5% significant level the computed t value is 0.516 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected and interpreted “Very Weak Relationship”. This means that enrolment profile has no significant relationship on the implementation practices for secondary schools for learners’ with special needs.

Table 11 Significant relationship between the Profile and Implementation Practices of Secondary Schools for Learners with Special Needs

Legend:

(1.00) Perfect Relationship; (0.80-0.99) Very Strong Relationship; (0.60-0.79) Strong Relationship; (0.40-0.59) Moderate Relationship ;( 0.20-0.39) Weak Relationship; (0.01-0.19) Very Weak Relationship; (0.00) No Relationship

Along human resources and its relationship on the implementation practices for learners’ with special needs, at 5% significant level the computed t value is 0.743 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected and interpreted “Weak Relationship”, meaning, human resources is not related with implementation practices for secondary schools for learners’ with special needs. Along budget allocation on the implementation practices for learners’ with special needs, at 5% significant level the computed t value is 0.024 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected and interpreted “Very Weak Relationship”. This means that budget allocation profile is not related with the implementation practices for secondary schools for learners’ with special needs.

In terms of equipment, facilities and services on the implementation practices for learners’ with special needs, at 5% significant level the computed t value is 0.158 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected and interpreted “Very Weak Relationship”, meaning, equipment, facilities and services are not related with implementation practices for secondary schools for learners’ with special needs.

These findings led to the conclusion that the profile of the schools as to enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation and equipment, facilities and services are not related with the implementation practices as to identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance and reporting.

These findings may be attributed to the smaller number of learners with special needs officially identified and placed in the regular classrooms of secondary schools as can be seen in the data along enrolment. Another possible reason for the findings of this study is that though the schools have smaller amount of budget allocation or Program Support Fund for SPED, the school has its MOOE intended for access, for quality and governance activities of the school including the program implementation to cater diverse learners including learners with special needs. The intervention given to them specifically for those learners with learning difficulty as actually funded from the school MOOE. The program support fund for the implementation of special education was actually incorporated in the school MOOE. Another reason is that, the number or teaching staff in the schools with learners with special needs was actually sufficient to handle these learners. Moreover, the schools though they have limited facilities and equipment and services, they ensured that the implemented school programs and activities intended for diverse learners based on the approved AIP and SIP caters the learning needs and safety of the learners.

The findings may also be attributed to the sufficient number of human resources of the schools specifically the teaching staff and or the receiving teachers who positively accepted these learners with special needs and conducted series of intervention programs to cater their learning needs. As affirmed in the study of Saloviita (2018) positive teacher attitudes are essential for success when children with special educational needs are placed into mainstream classrooms and the attitudes towards inclusion had only weak relationships with variables other than the teacher category. Teachers’ work orientation and self-efficacy had low relationships with their attitudes towards inclusion.

Given these findings, the researcher recommends that the school should sustain the implementation of school programs and activities catering all learners with special needs. Strengthen the involvement and engagement of school community in all programs of the schools.

Behavior of the Special Education Teachers and Parents

Behavior of the Special Education teachers and parents of Learners with special needs are important to the success of the Inclusive education Table 12 presented the behavior of the special education teachers of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart.

As revealed in the Table, the indicators “it can promote the working relationship among the general education and special teachers”, got a mean score of 3.14 interpreted as “agree” and is ranked first. Ranked second is the indicator “it will help me identify resources that the child need”, got a mean score of 2.91 interpreted as “agree”. Ranked third is the indicator “It will not just be another paper/ document to be complied with”, got a mean score of 2.83 interpreted as “agree”. This means that SPED teachers agree that developing and implementing IEP promotes working relationship among the general education and special teachers; help me identify resources that the child need and agree that it will not just be another paper or document to be complied with.

Moreover, the indicator “the teacher have material support for learning IEP”, got a mean score of 2.62 interpreted as “agree” and is ranked eighth. It was followed by an indicator “the teacher know their responsibilities concerning IEP”, with a mean score of 2.60 interpreted as “agree”. The indicator “the teacher know where to get support to learn about IEP”, got a mean score of 2.54 interpreted as “agree”. This results implied that SPED teachers have material support for learning IEP; they also know their responsibilities concerning IEP and they know where to get support to learn about IEP.

Table 12 Behavior of the Special Education Teachers

Legend:

The behavior of the special education teachers of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart got an average weighted mean of 2.74 interpreted as “agree”. This findings led to the conclusion that teachers have enough information about IEP; have material support for learning IEP; know where to get support to learn about IEP; know their responsibilities concerning IEP; have the knowledge to determine the educational performance of the student; know how to determine annual goals during the preparation process of IEP; know with which activities and tools the IEP be enriched; identify resources that the child need and promote the working relationship among the general education and special teachers.

Developing the Individual Educational Plan (IEP) for learners with special needs are significant to ensure that varied and appropriate interventions, programs and services be provided to learners with special needs. This was affirmed in the study of Ismail et al. (2020) that Individualized Education Program (IEP) is urgently needed for each of the barriers faced by students with special needs since it will greatly help the success of the programs and or services being implemented to them. Moreover, Ismael et al. stated that students with special needs need IEP to ensure that learners with special needs can adapt in the classroom together with regular students, and the implementation of the IEP has a positive impact on the learning process of students with special needs so that they can achieve optimal development and provide the same opportunities as students in general in class. Moreover, Ilik et al.(2019) stated that all individuals who are responsible for the education of learners with special needs must actively participate in Individualized Education Programs (IEP). Additionally, IEP is a common ground encouraging educators and parents to work together on an education plan.

Table 13 presents the behavior of the special education parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart.

Table 13 Behavior of the Special Education Parents

Legend:

Based on the Table below, the indicator “the people from the school have knowledge about my child’s disability”, got a mean score of 3.48 interpreted as “agree” and is ranked first. Ranked second is the indicator “I am given enough time to ask questions”, with a mean score of 3.38 interpreted as ‘agree”. Third in rank is the indicator “parents value a team approach to the IEP meeting characterized by communication, collaboration, and providing parents with choices”, got a mean score of 3.05 interpreted as “agree”.

This findings reveals that parents of learners with special needs agree that the schools have knowledge their child’s disability; they have enough time to ask questions and they value a team approach to the IEP meeting characterized by communication, collaboration, and providing parents with choices.

On the other hand, the indicator I help decide goals and objectives for my child, got a mean score of 2.24 interpreted as disagree, and is ranked eight. The indicator I am involved in deciding how much time my child spends with his/her peers during the school day, got a mean score of 2.17 interpreted as disagree, and is ranked ninth. Ranked tenth is the indicator I am involved in making decisions about my child’s services, with a mean score of 1.81 interpreted as disagree. This findings reveals that parents were not able to help decide goals and objectives for their child, they are not involved in deciding how much time their child will spend with their peers during school day and they were not involved in making decisions about their child’s services. These findings could infer that parents are aware of their role in the development of the learning needs of their children.

This findings affirmed in the study of Ilik et al.(2019) that most of the parents do not know anything about IEP. It was also found that parents are not involved in the IEP process and they are not invited by the school/institution. As for the opinions of teachers, it was found that they have some problems about getting the parents to involve in the IEP process.

Moreover, the study of Sullivan (2015) indicated that parents are not participating in decision-making about their child’s educational program, parents indicated they did not have enough time to read reports before decisions were made at IEP meetings and parents continue to struggle to participate meaningfully in the decision-making responsibility of the IEP team.

The behavior of the Special Education parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart got a mean score of 2.65 interpreted as “agree”. This findings shows implied that the school, parents and the community have a strong engagement and involvement in crafting IEP.

Issues and challenges

Implementation of inclusive education provided equal access to quality education for all students. However, its implementation success would not happen overnight, there are issues and challenges that needs to be address not just by the teacher but by the school and the parents. Table 14 presents the Issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

As revealed in Table 14, there were 76 or 65.52% out of 116 teachers’ encountered issues and challenges along lack of training to cater different exceptionalities and is ranked first. Second in rank is the issues and challenges pertaining to lack of access to learning resources to promote learning with 74 or 63.79% out if 116 teachers. It was followed by the issues and challenges along establishing ways of communication with 63 or 54.31% out of 116 teachers.

Table 14 Issues and Challenges Encountered by the Teachers and Parents

This findings led to the conclusion that teachers encountered issues and challenges along training to cater different exceptionalities, access to learning resources and establishing ways of communication to parents. This implies that teachers encountered various issues and challenges pertaining to implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the division of Camarines Norte.

As affirmed in the study of Kozikoğlu et al. (2021) on teachers’ attitudes and challenges they experienced concerning Individualized Education Program (IEP), the teachers think that they do not have sufficient information about the planning, implementation and assessment/evaluation processes of IEP, the school/classroom is physically inadequate, and the classes are crowded in the implementation of IEP.

Likewise, in the study of Yuwono et al (2021) indicates that teachers face challenges with the way the curriculum is designed—posing challenge to them on how to best handle it. It is also found that class room environment, resources and implementation of policies on education for LwDs and OSNs have both direct and indirect influence on the teachers’ impact in class. Parveen et al. (2018) affirmed that teachers felt that they were incapable to differentiate the learning activities for the students. Majority of the teachers felt that the biggest challenge in dealing with students with disabilities is the lack of knowledge and skills they require to understand these students’ behavioral needs.

As to parents of leaners with special needs, based on the Table, there were 89 or 84.76% out of 105 parent’s encountered issues and challenges along behavioral issues of their child; 86 or 81.90% out of 105 parents’ encountered issues and challenges as to lack of training to cater different exceptionalities and 84 or 80% out of 105 parents encountered issues and challenges as to awareness and acceptance of family members.

This findings led to the conclusion that parents of the learners with special needs encountered issues and challenges along behavioral issues of their child, lack of training and information on how to cater different exceptionalities and awareness and acceptance of family members. As affirmed in the study of Parveen et al. (2018) inclusive education is still fumbling with problems of policy implementation, an environment that is not conducive for practice and the success of inclusive education is hindered by other factors like parents and community’s attitude towards disability, lack of adequate involvement of all stakeholders among others.

With these, the researcher recommends that teachers should receive in-service training, physical conditions be improved, the class size be reduced, and cooperation should be provided between the family, classroom teachers and guidance counselor in order to conduct IEP in a healthier way. Curriculum modification should be done regularly. Classroom environments need regular improvement to be more disability friendly. Implementation of policies on disabilities and other special needs should be carried out intensively.

Intervention program

One of the objectives of this study is to propose an intervention program to address the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. As an offshoot of this study, the researcher proposed an intervention program in the form of Toolkit for Schools that will guide and assist the schools in the implementation of inclusive education with focus on the learners with special needs.

Table 15 presents the bases of the toolkit. The proposed Toolkit has the following goals: To conduct intensive child-finding activities, coordinate with school stakeholders for resource generation, and incorporating programs and activities to School AIP and SIP for effective implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs; to attain 100% participation in school activity to improve competency of teachers, non-teaching staff, parents and other stakeholders of the schools; to attain 100% participation in school activity to improve capability of teachers, non-teaching staff, parents and other stakeholders of the schools; to improve/enhance involvement and engagement of parents and other involved individuals in crafting or developing an individual educational plan; to provide parents the necessary programs and services for their learners with special needs; to attain 100% participation in capacity building programs and; to attain 100% participation in capacity building activity for teachers and parents.

This toolkit is based on the following findings: as to the profile of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education, the schools have limited enrolment of learners with special needs, limited equipment, facilities and services provided to learners with special needs, limited budget allocation and untrained school personnel to cater learners with special needs. As to identification and placement of the learners, lack and or absence of appropriate specialist to identify, assess and evaluate learners with special needs using a variety of available assessment tools and strategies and the schools were not able to provide appropriate identification, screening, assessment and evaluation and placement tool to better serve the learners with special needs.

As to developing an Individual Educational Plan, the schools were not able to involve parents and other individuals from various educational disciplines, the child with a disability, family members, and/or designated advocates in crafting or developing an individual educational plan. As to assistance, the schools were not able to provide parents an assistance in terms of educational interventions, programs and services, monetary and nonmonetary assistance for learners with disabilities to be able to complete their basic education. As to reporting, the school personnel were not capacitated specifically SPED teachers in managing learner’s records and information.

Common issues and challenges encountered by teachers were lack of training to cater different exceptionalities, lack of access to learning resources to promote learning, establishing ways of communication to parents and behavioral issues of the child while parents encountered behavioral issues of their child, lack of training and information on how to cater different exceptionalities as manifested by their child, awareness and acceptance of the family members and time management.

The findings of the study implied the need for a Toolkit for Schools that would provide them guidance on how to address the implementation of inclusive

Table 15 Bases for the Toolkit

education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte. The Toolkit provides the schools and the wider community various programs and activities with an end goal of improving and or enhancing the implementation of inclusive education focusing on learners with special needs of the secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Based on the goals and findings of the study, the researcher recommended the following: conduct intensive child-finding and child-mapping activities, coordinate with DepEd and other line agencies for resource generation, and incorporate programs and activities to School Annual Implementation Plan and School Improvement Plan for effective implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs; craft a clear policy or program or an activity that will address competency of teachers, non-teaching staff, parents and other stakeholders of the schools in terms of identifying screening, assessing and evaluating learners with special needs.

Moreover, it was also recommended that the school should conduct capability enhancement program for school personnel and other school stakeholders about SPED identification, screening, assessment and evaluation and placement procedures. Crafting of IEP based on the identified needs of the learners in collaboration with school, home, and other partners. Tap or coordinate with the school stakeholders and experts in the field to provide the necessary programs and services for learners with special needs. Conduct capacity building programs to school personnel specifically SPED teachers in managing learners’ records and information. Conduct capacity building activity for teachers and parents on how to cater various exceptionalities and behavior of the child, and development of learning resources and; Implement comprehensive ways of communication to ensure engagement of parents in school programs and activities.

The utilization of the toolkit may commence after this has undergone thorough evaluation of Schools Division Office. Some items may still be refined after a series of consultative conferences with school managers and division officials. After which, the schools may adopt the proposed activities/interventions in the Toolkit Plan in order to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

NOTES

1. Mulenga, D (2019). An Investigation Into Factors Influencing Enrolment Of Children With Special Education Needs At Kapoche Special School In Luangwa District Of Lusaka Province, Zambia. The International Journal of Multi-Disciplinary Research ISSN: 3471-7102, ISBN: 978-9982-70-318-5. http://www.multiresearch.net/cms/publications/CFP11692019.pdf
2. OECD (2018), Education Policy Outlook 2018: Putting Student Learning at the Centre, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264301528-en.
3. Malaluan, J. (2021). School’s profile and instructional leadership of school heads in Paracale District (Doctoral Dissertation, Bicol University, Legaspi Albay, Philippines
4. Byrd, D.and Alexander, M. (2020). Investigating special education teachers’ knowledge and skills: preparing general teacher preparation for professional development. Journal of Pedagogical Research. Volume 4, Issue 2, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.33902/JPR.2020059790
5. Saloviita, T. (2018): Attitudes of Teachers Towards Inclusive Education in Finland, Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research, DOI: 10.1080/00313831.2018.1541819r
6. DepEd Order No. 26, s. 1997- Institutionalization of Sped Programs in All Schools. https://www.deped.gov.ph/1997/03/07/do-26-s-1997-institutionalization-of-sped-programs-in-all-schools/
7. Andrews, A. (2019, October 28). How school facilities improve a child’s school experience. Industry News. https://www.fresconews.com/how-school-facilities-improve-a-childs-school-experience/
8. Octavia, E., ., I., & Sholikah, M. (2020). How Do School Facilities Affect School Quality? Case Study in Vocational High School at Pati, Indonesia. KnE Social Sciences, 4(6), 865–881. https://doi.org/10.18502/kss.v4i6.6648
9. DepEd Order No. 38, s. 2015- Guidelines on the Utilization of Support Funds for The Special Education (SPED) Program https://www.deped.gov.ph/2015/08/19/do-38-s-2015-guidelines-on-the-utilization-of-support-funds-for-the-special-education-sped-program/
10. DepEd Order Number 23, series of 2022- Child Find Policy for Learners with Disabilities Towards Inclusive Education https://www.deped.gov.ph/2022/05/25/may-25-2022-do-023-s-2022-child-find-policy-for-learners-with-disabilities-towards-inclusive-education/
11. Walsh, M. (2018), “The Inclusion of Students with Special Needs in the General Education Classroom”. Dominican University of California https://doi.org/10.33015/dominican.edu/2018.EDU.ST.01
12. Schechter, J.(2018). Supporting the needs of students with undiagnosed disabilities https://kappanonline.org/schechter-supporting-needs-students-undiagnosed-disabilities/
13. Asri, E. Bambang, H. Cahyono, and Trisnani, R. (2022). Developing Individualized Education Program (IEP) on early reading for special needs students in inclusive Primary Schools in Magetan Regency. 4th International Conference on Education and Social Science Research (ICESRE) Volume 2022. https://knepublishing.com/index.php/KnE-Social/article/view/11983/19411
14. Ismail, N.H and R. A. Majid (2020). Implementation of Individual Education Program (IEP) in curriculum of students with learning disabilities. In: International Conference on Special Education In South East Asia Region 10th Series 2020. pp. 140–145. Redwhite Press
15. Implementing Rules and Regulation of the Republic Act 10533 section 8 https://www.officialgazette.gov.ph/2013/09/04/irr-republic-act-no-10533/
16. Republic Act 9155 known as the Governance of Basic Education Act of 2001
17. DepEd Order Number 72, series of 2009 known as Inclusive Education as Strategy for Increasing Participation Rate of Children. DepEd Order 44, s. 2021 known as the “Policy Guidelines on the Provision of Educational Programs and Services for Learners with Disabilities in the K to 12 Basic Education Program”.
18. İlik, Ş. Şenay & Rukiye Konuk Er (2019),”Evaluating Parent Participation in Individualized Education Programs by Opinions of Parents and Teachers”. : https://doi.org/10.11114/jets.v7i2.3936
19. Yuen, C.T M. Inclusive education in an international school: A case study from Hong Kong. International Journal of Special Education. 2015;30(3):86-97
20. UIS-UNESCO (UNESCO Institute for Statistics). n.d. ‘Special needs education’. In: Glossary. http://uis.unesco.org/en/glossary-term/special-needs-education
21. 2017. A guide for ensuring inclusion and equity in education. Paris: UNESCO. http://unesdoc.unesco.org/images/0024/002482/248254e.pdf
22. OECD (2018), Education Policy Outlook 2018: Putting Student Learning at the Centre, OECD Publishing, Paris, https://dx.doi.org/10.1787/9789264301528-en.
23. , C. A (2015), “Examining Parents’ Perceptions of the Individualized Education Program Meeting” (2015). Doctoral Dissertations. 722. https://opencommons.uconn.edu/dissertations/722
24. Kozikoğlu et al. (2021), Teachers’ attitudes and the challenges they experience concerning individualized education program (IEP): A mixed method study
25. Yuwono, I. and J. B. Okech (2021) The Classroom Impact of Trained Special Needs Education Teachers in Selected Schools: An Evaluation Studyhttps://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feduc.2021.630806/full
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SUMMARY, FINDINGS, CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

This chapter is a discussion of the summary, findings of the study, as well as the conclusions deduced from them. Recommendations are likewise forwarded herein towards the application of the said findings.

Summary

The study was conducted to explore the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte, it answered the following sub problems: (1) the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment of children; human resources; budget allocation; and equipment, facilities, and services; (2) the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan , assistance, and reporting; (3) the significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs; (4) the behaviour of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart; (5) the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte; (6) the intervention program may be proposed to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

The study employed descriptive-correlational method. It also utilized triangulation technique. Descriptive method was utilized to explore the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placement, developing educational plan, assistance and reporting. Moreover, descriptive-correlational method was utilized to determine if significant relationship exist between the profile and implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs.

The respondents were the Receiving Teachers who were generally classified as Junior High School Teachers. Total enumeration was utilized for teacher-respondents while for parent-respondent was through purposive sampling. Survey-questionnaire checklist was the instrument utilized by this study. Focus group discussion was conducted for triangulation of data.

Problem 1:

What is the profile of secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 in terms of enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation; and equipment, facilities, and services?

Findings:

As to enrolment, School G has the highest number of enrollees with 72 or 20.6% as compared to School B with only 58 or 16.6% enrollees out of 349 learners, next is School H with 53 or 15.2% out of 349 learners. The school with the lowest enrolment is School I with only six learners or only 1.7% out of 349 learners with special needs as reflected in the Learners Information System. As to human resources with special designation as Receiving Teachers, School G has 16 or 8.89% Receiving Teachers out of 121 teaching personnel while School D has 16 or 16.16 % Receiving Teachers out of 99 Teaching Personnel and School A with 16 or 31.37% Receiving Teachers out of 51 Teaching staff. Moreover, the school with the lowest number of receiving teacher was School J with only 2 receiving teachers out of 98 teaching staff. As to budget allocation for schools with inclusive education, School A and School J has a budget of Php 120,000.00 and is ranked first. It was followed by School H with Php 90,000.00 budget while School G has a budget of Php 85,000.00. Ranked fifth is School E with a budget allocation of Php 80,000.00. The secondary schools with the lowest budget intended for the implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs were School C and School I with only Php 10,000.00. As to equipment, facilities and services, the equipment available for speech and hearing impairment includes manual alphabet, chart slides on sign language, mirror for speech correction and speech correction exercises. School A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H have manual alphabet while School A,E,H,G have chart slides on sign language and mirror for speech correction. For visual impairment, only three schools, Schools A, G, H have snellen charts required for eye check-ups and only one school with model on eye mechanism. Available equipment to 10 secondary schools catering learners with learning disability includes tests used for assessment and charts/slides on basic areas of learning disability- perceptual, reading, writing, arithmetic, listening and comprehension; one school with charts/slides on mistakes done by children and only two schools, School A and School C have toys games, any other material used for correction of these problems. As to services provided by the schools to learners with special needs, eight school, Schools A,C,D,E,G,H,I have identification and referral process and assessment services; all schools, Schools A,B,C,D,E,F,G,H,I,J adapted the K to 12 Curriculum for LWDs and only six schools developed Individualized Educational Plan (IEP); five schools, Schools A,C,G,H,I have specific instructional interventions and seven schools, Schools A,B,C,E,F,G,I have tutorial or remedial sessions for LWDs who display difficulty in achieving the expected instructional goal/ s and for learners who are at risk of failing and assessment services area for LWDs educational placement and referral and ten schools adapted learning resources and ICT.

Conclusion:

The enrolment, human resources, the budget allocation or program support fund and the equipment, facilities and services in secondary schools implementing inclusive education in the Division of Camarines Norte for School Year 2022-2023 varies.

Recommendation:

Schools should conduct intensive child-finding and child-mapping activities, coordinate with DepEd and other line agencies for resource generation, and incorporate programs and activities to School Annual Implementation Plan and School Improvement Plan for effective implementation of inclusive education catering learners with special needs. DepEd officials may craft a clear policy directing schools in planning a management intervention in order to attain the national performance standard. The school and the community worked together to ensure that factors that lead to high enrolment of children with special education needs in school were enhanced. On the other hand, factors that lead to low enrolment should be addressed to ensure that they do not negatively affect enrolment. Organize a team and committee for the SPED advocacy and campaign programs in school-based and community-based activities and preparation of IEC materials must be prioritized by the schools.

Problem 2.

What are the implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting?

Findings:

The implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements got an average weighted mean of 2.93. Along developing the Educational Plan got an average weighted mean of 3.17. Along assistance got an average weighted mean of 2.81. Along reporting, got an average weighted mean of 3.41.

Conclusion:

The implementation practices of the secondary schools for learners with special needs along identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance, and reporting were interpreted as agree.

Recommendation:

Conduct of intensive child-find or child-mapping activity in collaboration with the LGU/barangay officials during the early registration. Screening, assessment and evaluation using standard assessment tools be utilized by the schools. Conduct a capacity building regarding the SPED assessment and evaluation of learners with special needs. Organize a team, committee and other persons involved on SPED identification, screening and evaluation procedures. The department should also tap experts in the field and other line agencies for proper screening and medical assessment of medical practitioners for proper identification and placement of learners with special needs. Parents should also be given capacity building programs and activities for proper information and guidance as to identification of the specific learning needs of their children and placement in the regular classroom. To improve access to continuous professional development of teachers, DepEd should provide material on its online portals consists of specialist modules based on the classification or type of disabilities of learners with special needs including behavioural, emotional and social difficulties, and moderate learning difficulties. Parent’s involvement and engagement to school activities and programs related to or focusing on the implementation of inclusive education be improved or enhanced. Schools should intensively and comprehensively implements strict confidentiality of all the information and data of the all the learners in the school.

Problem 3:

Is there a significant relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs?

Hypothesis: There is a significant relationship between the profile of the public secondary schools and implementation practices of secondary schools in implementing inclusive education for learners with special needs in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Findings:

The study failed to establish the relationship between the profile and implementation practices of secondary schools for learners with special needs since at 5% significant level the computed t value is 0.516 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected. Along human resources, the computed t value is 0.743 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected. Along budget allocation, the computed t value is 0.024 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected. In terms of equipment, facilities and services, the computed t value is 0.158 less than the critical value of 1.860. Thus, the hypothesis is rejected.

Conclusion:

The profile of the schools as to enrolment of children, human resources, budget allocation and equipment, facilities and services are not related with the implementation practices as to identification and placements, developing individual education plan, assistance and reporting.

Recommendation:

School should sustain the implementation of school programs and activities catering all learners with special needs. Strengthen the involvement and engagement of school community in all programs of the schools.

Problem 4.

What are the behaviors of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an individualized education plan or its counterpart?

Findings:

The behavior of the special education teachers and parents of learners with special needs pertaining to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart got an average weighted mean of 2.74 and 2.65 respectively interpreted as “agree”.

Conclusion:

Teachers and parents of learners with special needs agree as to the development and implementation of an Individualized Education Plan or its counterpart.

Recommendation:

Strengthen school, parents and community engagement and involvement in crafting IEP. Conduct capacity building activities for parents and teachers.

Problem 5: What are the issues and challenges encountered by the teachers and parents in the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte?

Findings:

Findings revealed that there were 76 or 65.52% out of 116 teachers’ encountered issues and challenges along lack of training to cater different exceptionalities, lack of access to learning resources to promote learning with 74 or 63.79% out if 116 teachers and establishing ways of communication with 63 or 54.31% out of 116 teachers. As to parents of leaners with special needs, there were 89 or 84.76% out of 105 parent’s encountered issues and challenges along behavioral issues of their child; 86 or 81.90% out of 105 parents’ as to lack of training to cater different exceptionalities and 84 or 80% out of 105 parents encountered issues and challenges as to awareness and acceptance of family members.

Conclusion:

Teachers and parents encountered various issues and challenges in the implementation of inclusive education in public secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte.

Recommendation:

Teachers should receive in-service training, physical conditions be improved, the class size be reduced, and cooperation should be provided between the family, classroom teachers and guidance counselor in order to conduct IEP in a healthier way. Curriculum modification should be done regularly. Classroom environments need regular improvement to be more disability friendly. Implementation of policies on disabilities and other special needs should be carried out intensively.

Problem 6.

What intervention program may be proposed to address the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte?

Findings:

An Intervention Program in the form of Toolkit for Schools was developed by the researcher as an output of this study, the implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte may be addressed as reflected in the objectives and activities presented in the proposed intervention program.

Conclusions:

Implementation of inclusive education in secondary schools in the Division of Camarines Norte may be addressed as reflected in the objectives and activities presented in the proposed intervention program.

Recommendation:

The intervention program developed by the researcher as an output of this study should be submitted to the Department of Education Division of Camarines Norte for evaluation.

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