engleski

Competence and self-worth of teachers in connection with the behaviour and acceptance of pupils with special needs

In previous research (Žic, 2002) it has been shown that pupils with special needs, whose teachers were participating in education for work with pupils with special needs, have assessed themselves more positively regarding their behaviour in school and with peers, then those pupils whose teachers were not. It has also been found that teachers who have lower level of competence for their job, express less positive attitudes toward integration (Igrić & al., 2001). That is why we found interesting to investigate the connection between some of teachers` characteristics with the position of pupils with special needs in school. The aim the research is to define the relationship between teachers` self-evaluation of the competence for the position of the teacher and behaviour and acceptance of pupils with special needs in mainstream school. The behaviour in school has been evaluated by pupils themselves and by their teachers as well. The acceptance in classroom has been evaluated by sociometry. For the needs of the research a sample of 6th grade pupils with special needs has been constructed (N=100) as well as the sample of their teachers (N = 70). BRP II battery (Brown & Hamm ill, 1990) has been applied for the pupils` self-evaluation. Teachers` self-respect was assessed by Rosenberg’ s Scale RSS ( Bezinović, 1988), and for the needs of this research applied was a modified Scale for the Teacher’ s Assessment of the Competence for the Position of Teacher (Sekušak-Galešev, 2002). Positive correlation has been established between teachers` assessment of children’ s behaviour in school and their acceptance by peers in classroom concerning three variables (learning together with, sitting with and associating with). Teachers` self-evaluation of their competence for the position of teacher and self-respect were not statistically significantly correlated with the assessment of children’ s` behaviour and acceptance in classroom.

teachers; pupils with special needs; self-respect; competence; sociometry

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