Kathryn Underwood

Understanding Inclusive Early Childhood Education: A Capability Approach

This article explores the application of current discourse in inclusive education, particularly the capability approach and its utility in early childhood education. The article highlights the tensions between a rights-based discourse that informs inclusive education practice and the right for children to have early intervention. Structural approaches to supporting children with disabilities are examined. These structural approaches are evaluated using the framework developed using the capability approach. The article aims to ease some of the tensions that arise from differing philosophical approaches to education for young children, and to provide a framework for addressing the developmental and social needs of young children with disabilities.

Toward a social relational model of Deaf childhood

This paper advances a social relational model of Deaf childhood as a guiding framework for working with Deaf children in a present-day universal neonatal hearing screening and early intervention context. The authors discuss how Deaf children are contextualized in a medical model discourse, in a social model of Deaf childhood, and in a Deaf culture discourse. A social relational model is then discussed in with reference to a capability approach and to findings from the first author’s study of parents and young children participating in an American Sign Language shared reading program in Ontario, Canada.

Deaf time in the twenty-first century: considering rights frameworks and the social relational model of Deaf childhood

Abstract This paper considers Deaf time, or imagined futures of Deaf communities, as we question the efficacy of a rights framework to support the social relational model of Deaf childhood, which positions Deaf children within Deaf cultural discourses. We probe a disability rights discourse where the inclusion movement promotes the right of all children to high quality education and full participation in society. However, there is a gap between rhetoric and practice in early childhood education, which has often been a site of disablement for Deaf children and their families. In addition, legal recognition of the right to sign language in several contexts has not prevented a decline in numbers of Deaf children learning sign language. In planning for future Deaf communities, we examine Deaf cultural childhoods through the development of a parent ASL curriculum that is aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR). The curriculum is contextualized in relation to disability rights, sign language rights, and the rights of children outlined in the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child and Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.

A case study of exclusion on the basis of behaviour (and experiences of migration and racialisation)

Dwayne is a Grade 6 student who came to Canada from Jamaica at the age of seven. Upon arrival in a new school Dwayne had to adapt to a new culture. In addition, Dwayne was identified as having severe behavioural problems and learning difficulties, and it was recommended within the first month of school that the boy be medicated in order for him to cope. His mother refused. Through interviewing Dwaynes mother and his teacher, a case study details Dwaynes experiences of schooling in as a result of segregation and in a non-segregated classroom setting. The story of Dwayne illustrates how experiences of disablement are interrelated with experiences of migration and racialisation. The article makes a case for understanding inclusive education practice as well as the construction of disability as central to understanding systemic exclusion through special education.

The Social Relational Model of Deaf Childhood in Action

Early childhood education and care discourse on inclusion and ‘supports’ presents parents of young deaf children with false options regarding language learning that are not in the best interests of deaf children. The authors argue that the social relational model of deaf childhood can account for differences in children and their communities. The first author’s research, presented here, describes the process of developing an intensive American Sign Language (ASL) curriculum for parents of young deaf children. This curriculum is aligned with the Common European Framework of Reference for Languages (CEFR; Snoddon 2015). The research shows how the social relational model can be put into action for the parents of different deaf children.

Intersectional inclusion for deaf learners: moving beyond General Comment no. 4 on Article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities

ABSTRACT This paper discusses the meaning of inclusive education for deaf learners in a way that acknowledges the diversity of learner identities, and outlines problems with normative definitions of inclusive education as advanced by recent interpretations of Article 24 of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). This discussion calls on us to reconsider how the concepts of inclusion and segregation are understood in education for all learners with intersectional identities. We outline the legislative history of the CRPD and Article 24, show the active involvement of deaf advocacy organisations, and highlight contradictions with this history in the CRPD Committee’s recent General Comment No. 4 on Article 24. We provide examples of innovative models of inclusive education for deaf learners that provide an education in sign language and discuss the implications of these arguments for inclusive education as a whole.

The innovation of Ontario full-day kindergarten educator teams: have they reproduced the split systems of care and education?

ABSTRACT This study investigated the implementation of a full-day kindergarten programme in Ontario, Canada. Key to the implementation of this programme has been a new kind of educator team consisting of a certified teacher and a registered early childhood educator and a complementary partnership in which each team member contributes equally. Our research examined team members’ perceptions and practices related to their roles and responsibilities. Findings suggest that the care work for which early childhood educators are disproportionally responsible is accorded less value and status than the work of educating children. Implications of these findings are discussed in relation to the care/education split, the social reproduction of care work and social inequities.

Understanding Young Children’s Capabilities: Approaches to Interviews with Young Children Experiencing Disability

This study examines the efficacy of engaging young children with disabilities in interviews to elicit their perspectives on their own capabilities. Using the theoretical framework of the capability approach, the authors investigated the efficacy of different interview techniques to engage young children with disabilities in research about their capabilities. The study explores young disabled children’s perspectives of their capabilities (those skills and activities that they value), while examining the effectiveness of interviewing children who have delays in development, linguistic, behavioural and social characteristics. Through analysis of four children’s descriptions and demonstrations of their capabilities, both the responses and the interview techniques are analysed. Including young children in research is a relatively recent approach, but this study suggests that young children with disabilities are able to communicate their capabilities and that participatory methods are effective in eliciting their views. As such, eliciting the unique perspectives of young children with disabilities about their capability will enhance our understanding for the purpose of designing early childhood programmes and adequately responding to all children’s needs.

Early Intervention Practice and Research in Ontario, Canada: Listening to the Field

In the province of Ontario, Canada, early intervention services are in need of networking opportunities in order to further a research agenda and support early childhood educators in the field. The authors describe the political circumstances facing new graduates of early childhood education (ECE) training programs and the discrepancy between the ECE curriculum they are exposed to and the realities of the field they enter. Efforts to create a new network of early intervention professionals in order to address some of the challenges facing early intervention in the province are described.