PERCEPTIONS OF PRINCIPALS, TEACHERS & STUDENTS REGARDING CAPACITY BUILDING INITIATIVES FOR SPECIAL CHILDREN EDUCATION OF KHYBER PAKHTUNKHWA, PAKISTAN

Abstract

The study was designed to investigate the perceptions of principals, teachers, and students regarding capacity building initiatives for Special Children Education of Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Pakistan. Those children who are facing some sort of slight impairment can easily acquire education with normal children. But, the children who are having severe and moderate impairment, need to go to different school, which are especially designed for the special children. Such schools design their own methodology and have different syllabus and methods of instruction. The objectives of the study were to identify the perceptions of students, teachers, and principals regarding capacity building initiatives that are undertaken by different special education institutions for the Special Children Education and formulate workable suggestions for the improvement of Special Children Education. In order to obtain quantitative and qualitative data in the study, mixed methodology was used which employed a survey questionnaire that contained 44 items grouped into 04 broad categories, which were collected from special children and their teacher’s from ten special children schools in Khyber Paktunkhwa. The data were collected from 302 students out of which both were male students and female students of equal number of 151. The total sample teachers were 217 which include 83 male teacher and 45 female teachers. However, the interviews were taken from 10 principals of special children schools. To analyze quantitative data, statistical procedures were run by using SPSS version 16.0. The perceptions of Teachers and students about various capacity building initiatives of students, teachers, and institutions as well as a different problem faced by special children was analyzed by using mean and standard deviation. Secondly, the data was collected through Likert scale which was further put to analyzed through t-test in which Mann Witney U test and Kruskal Wallis U test were applied. As far as qualitative data analysis is concerned, the results from the interview of principals were recorded, coding, theming and documented by making transcripts, along with taking notes by the researcher. The null hypothesis was rejected and it was found out that various services and facilities are provided free to special children in their schools, but most of the time they were neither sufficient nor up-to the mark. As reflected by th quantitative and qualitative data, the curriculum must be equipped with the national and international requirements because the present curriculum needs modification. The data reflected a broad consensus that a teacher may be a good researcher and must be able to tackle classroom problems. There is a need to link research with practice in order to facilitate learning and school life as a whole. It is recommended that all vacant posts of the teachers in the schools need to be fill up as in every special children school there is a shortage of teachers, establish teachers training institutes in the province, initiate awareness campaign on regular basis in order to develop awareness in people and remove the negative attitude towards special children.