| dc.description.abstract | The teachers, serving in the special classrooms have to play a major role in further extending
their services focusing on the special needs of children’s achievement in education. “The term
disability is encompassed by the current research on children with learning disabilities such as
Down syndrome, cerebral palsy, and autism.” This study aims to explore the teachers’ role and
serving gaps to enhance the education achievement of special needs children in Sri Lanka. The
study mainly intends to understand the teachers’ current knowledge and skills to serve the special
needs of children that were measured considering the UNICEF guidelines of adaptation to proper
curriculum & confidence for the special skills to serve these children. The current study further
extends to investigate how the teachers are involved in controlling the children’s situational
behaviors, utilizing their capabilities. Mainly, data were collected by a structured questionnaire
from the teachers served in the special needs children’s classrooms of the government school in
Gampaha District, Sri Lanka, additionally the research was intended to understand the children’s
situational behaviors and teachers’ treatment style on these behaviors (words and actions)
observing each classroom separately during the three months (July, August and September
2023). Critically analyzed collected data using the SPSS software and qualitative research
technique, the major finding was the barriers include many interrelated factors, majority of
teachers (90%) are positioned by lack of knowledge and skills to cover the proper curriculum
and to control the children’s situational behaviors. 96% of teachers indicated that the difficulty of
time limitation to attend the individual children’s education enhancement and difficulties of
limited accessibility to infrastructure in special needs children’s classrooms in government
schools in Sri Lanka were highlighted by 99% of respondents. Against this backdrop, children
with special needs continue to face several barriers to access, participation, and achievement in
education in Sri Lanka. Therefore, current research recommended enhancing the teachers’
knowledge & skills via continuous professional training and extending the infrastructure
facilities in special needs children’s education. The study thus recommended establishing a
proper mechanism of involvement of other teachers to enhance the therapy activities of reading,
music, Arts, dancing, sports, drama and IT to improve special needs children’s achievement in
education. | en_US |
