Inclusive Education in Bangladesh.

Inclusive Education in Bangladesh : Challenges & Recoveries.

It can start with a story. No, not exactly a story, but rather a wonderful experience shared in the classroom during professional life.

In the year 2024, I found Divya and Swapna in the first grade Bengali class. They were different from all the other normal children in the class. They could not walk properly, they did not speak clearly, they were very clumsy, their hands were always wrinkled, their vision was abnormal, and their memory was weak. In other words, they were often disabled. Comparatively, Swapna was over the top. Divya was somewhat intelligent. So she learned to spell by mastering the alphabet I taught her. Swapna could not do that at all. But I ran into a problem, none of them could write due to physical problems. They could not hold a pencil with their hands firmly. But they were very interested in coming to school. Divya came from a relatively well-off family. On the other hand, Swapna came from a poor family. Her guardian brought Divya in a wheelchair every day. She took good care of her. But Swapna's family could not provide such facilities. They did not play with anyone. But in class, I would tell his classmates to have fun with them. I would tell them to be friends. So everyone would cooperate with them. That's how their school life goes.If i had the special training of teaching on special child,i would teach them properly.I have some lacking such about these type teaching.

Since there is no separate education system for them in the area and there has been talk of implementing inclusive education at the primary level, we are obliged to provide them with this facility.

Before mentioning the obstacles or challenges that they face during teaching in implementing inclusive education and the steps that can be taken to overcome them, I would like to remind you a little, what is inclusive education? And who is included in it? It can be mentioned in advance that it is not possible to teach severely disabled children under this "inclusive education" system. There is a separate education system or method for them. Children with mild disabilities or disabilities or special needs can receive education with all normal children in primary school under the inclusive education system. However, some obstacles remain.

#Inclusive Education: Inclusive education is a process where people of all socio-economic status, regardless of race, religion, or color, including normal children, physically disabled or special children, are brought under the same education system to create opportunities to develop the child's potential.

In implementing integrated education, we work with roughly two types of children.

1. Considering socio-economic (rich-poor) status, all normal children including doctors, engineers, lawyers, teachers, employees, businessmen, farmers, fishermen, weavers, blacksmiths, carpenters, barbers, washermen, doms, cobblers, children of brothels, and small ethnic groups.

2. Physical disabilities or special children such as: blindness, hearing impairment, limb immobility, intellectual disability, visual impairment, speech problems and others. Although the severity of these cases is a fact.

#Obstacles to implementing integrated education while keeping the curriculum uniform:

1. Lack of teacher awareness: Teachers are not aware or aware of children with special needs, so they cannot identify them correctly. This may happen due to lack of training.

2. Lack of suitable environment in the classroom: Lack of physical infrastructure facilities and classroom environment in the school.

3. Lack of special training system: Lack of special training system for teachers for special children. For example: lack of knowledge of Braille system, sign language training, and use of various assistive devices.

4. Lack of materials: Lack of suitable materials for implementing integrated education. Inadequacy of specialized technical equipment.

5. Curriculum and assessment: The curriculum and assessment methods should be similar to those of normal children. There should be no flexibility in assessment, which is not easy for them.

6. Negative attitude towards them in society:

Due to the negative attitude towards such children in society, they are subjected to neglect and contempt, which causes problems in their mental development.

7. Financial inadequacy: Creating materials, teacher training, infrastructure, etc. to implement integrated education is expensive, but there is no funding allocation.

8. Lack of legal policies: There are no proper laws or policies for implementing integrated education. As a result, special children are neglected and burdened in society.

9. Negative attitude of classmates and teachers:

The teacher plays a special role in teaching. But many times his mentality is negative towards them. Also, the behavior of his classmates is not cooperative. As a result, school becomes a place of fear for them. They leave school and drop out.

As teachers, we have a huge role to play in overcoming the aforementioned challenges or obstacles.

1. The teacher should have a positive attitude.

2. To create a classroom environment, the teacher will arrange seating according to the type of child. He will ensure that there is adequate light and air circulation in the classroom and will create a conducive environment considering the problems of the child with problems.

3. Try to keep everyone involved in the lesson. Take a little more care of the special child. Give him equal importance like everyone else and teach him to make his classmates his friends.

4. The teacher will try to overcome the helplessness of the child with special needs and give him courage. He will try to make him realize that he is also an important person in that class.

5. Discussion with parents: The teacher will discuss with the parents of the special child what needs to be done for the child's development.

The teacher will always assure them that their child is also valuable. They will ask them to take care of him.

6. Be sincere in teaching using teaching aids and techniques.

7. Be more flexible in the assessment of the child than other normal children and make the assessment method flexible as well. Keep in mind that the assessment method is suitable for that child.

8. Along with all children, special children should also be ensured the right to education. Ensure that they are not deprived for any reason.

#Government steps to implement integrated education:

In this case, government grants can be expected to provide teacher training, educational materials, and infrastructural facilities. It is very important to provide special training to teachers. For example, Braille method for visually impaired children, sign language method for speech impaired children. Materials and

The school can provide teaching facilities to deaf children using special devices. Currently, a slouch has been provided for special children as an infrastructure facility in new establishments. In addition, wheelchairs, hair machines, glasses, scissors and medicines are being distributed to disabled children and special children.

Although there is no specific training system, a small-scale training program on the implementation of integrated education (SEND) at the school level has been conducted, which is working very effectively at the field level. It is hoped that new directions will be revealed in the stream of further development.

Rani Ratnam Government

Assistant teacher,

West Gutudiya Government Primary School,

Dumuria, Khulna.

Bangladesh.