This paper examines how remedial teachers and subject teachers in two secondary schools talk about pupils with special education needs (SEN) both in general, and more specifically about boys and girls who need special education. The study is based on 6 interviews with teachers in two secondary schools in the Stockholm area. In the analysis of the interviews, two different theories have been used. Firstly, the teachers´ speech has been analyzed based on three perspectives; a compensatory-, a critical- and a dilemma perspective (see Nilholm, 2007). Secondly, discourse analysis has been used to examine how the teachers in the study talk about boys and girls in the special education. The two categories "boys" and "girls" have been analyzed regarding which qualities and actions they are associated with. The result shows that there are two different discourses about pupils with SEN that are used by teachers today, a medical-psychological discourse which fits into the compensatory perspective, and a socio-political that goes along the critical perspective, and focuses on environmental reasons for problems that occur in school, rather than laboring the individual as the problem. Also the dilemma perspective is found explicitly in one informant´s speech. All teachers but one can immediately name differences between boys and girls with SEN. The differences that are mentioned are for example that boys mature slower, need more practical support in remembering to sit still and bringing the correct material to class, and more often than girls, boys show their difficulties by being noisy in the classroom. Girls are described as the opposite. They mature more quickly, are able to focus in school, are more motivated and able to sit still and work effectively. One teacher feels uncomfortable in speaking about gender differences in behavior, and most teachers think that these differences are cultural and social, not biological. Even so, all teachers seem to have thought about gender differences and can name many. Generally the teachers seem quite aware of the order of the discourse that is what is okay to say about gender differences and pupils with SEN and what is not.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:UPSALLA1/oai:DiVA.org:sh-18072 |
| Date | January 2012 |
| Creators | Tuomaala, Seidi |
| Publisher | Södertörns högskola, Lärarutbildningen |
| Source Sets | DiVA Archive at Upsalla University |
| Language | Swedish |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Student thesis, info:eu-repo/semantics/bachelorThesis, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
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