Abstract
D.Ed. (Educational Psychology)
Inclusive education was legislated as policy in South Africa in July 2001 with Education White Paper 6 which called for the establishment of various structures within the education system that would form a network of support for all learners as the foundation towards further advancement of inclusive education. These structures were envisaged as occurring both within schools, at an institutional level and between schools at a district level and outside agencies. The establishment of School Based Support Teams (SBST) occurs within ordinary schools where groups of experienced educators assist in managing first level support of diverse learner needs in collaboration with parents and outside professionals. This thesis presents a conceptual framework for understanding the collaborative support network of the SBST in mainstream schools. The aim of the study was to explore and describe the nature of the SBST’s collaborative network and to develop guidelines for effective SBST functioning.
Through an instrumental multiple case study design, the SBST network was explored in four mainstream, primary schools. Two public and two private schools were purposefully selected for comparison. The research was limited in that four cases in the same geographical area were studied and as the researcher, I acted as the interpretive instrument of analysis. Data was collected from individual and focus group interviews with team teachers; observations of team meetings and analysis of documents such as minutes, referral letters and policies. For each school data was analysed deductively looking at the pre-determined categories of school context, barriers manifested, the SBST functioning and collaboration. Data was also analysed inductively where themes arose from the data, such as confidentiality issues in one of the schools. For each school a case narrative was presented detailing the unique context and particular functioning of the SBST for that school.
Thereafter an instrumental cross case analysis was undertaken focusing on the collaborative networks of the SBST. Social Network Theory provided the framework for viewing the collaborative endeavours of the cases. The SBST was viewed as a dynamic social network formed with the specific purpose of supporting diverse learning needs. The teachers in the SBST constituted the internal nodes of the network and the network ties were the relationships they formed. Intra-school ties were formed between teachers within the same school and inter-organisational ties between other schools and outside agencies. For instance, collaboration with the multi-disciplinary District Based Support Teams occurred when dealing with learners experiencing severe barriers to learning. Teachers were agents who...