Seeking to promote the importance of creating inclusive early care and education settings, this competency area addresses the knowledge and skills that early childhood educators are expected to have to foster the learning and development of young children with disabilities or other special needs. It includes policies and requirements for inclusive practice, program philosophies that promote full participation by all children, collaboration with families and other service providers, and personalization of practices to meet children’s individual and family needs (CDE 2009b). Because children learn and develop in different ways, it is the responsibility of early childhood educators to provide diverse learning opportunities to meet the needs of all children. This competency area reinforces and extends the performance areas of the Observation, Screening, Assessment, and Documentation competency area.
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Framing questions identify some of the major themes in this competency. They provide you with a starting point. As you explore this competency, add your own framing questions for issues you want to further examine.
Keep these dispositions in mind as you explore the Framing Questions. If you mindfully adopt these dispositions, you will realize the Desired Outcomes for Practitioners and for Children.
The CompSAT Keys to Reflection and Inquiry offer you a protocol to use in whatever setting you work as an early childhood educator. Learn how you can integrate the six Keys into your work. Select one of the Keys below to practice reflecting with questions related to the competency area of Special Needs and Inclusion.
Choose from one of the Keys below to view additional information related to this Competency!
Journaling is a great way to record your experiences, keep track of your questions, and make sense of your choices and their outcomes. Journaling lends itself nicely to portfolio work. It's largely a narrative format, but can be enhanced by the addition of photos, sketches, and doodles. Journaling can be done on the computer, or can it can be done using plain, blank notebooks, a pen, and colored pencils.
© Copyright 2011-2013 California Department of Education. All rights reserved. Electronic edition 2011, and 2013. Print edition 2012 ISBN:978-0-8011-1719-0. The ECE CompSAT project was produced by Fresno State University for the California Department of Education in 2013.
