Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research Vol. 51, No. 3, July 2007, pp.

239252

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education? An Interview Study with Students Experiencing Failure in Reading and Writing
Eva Heimdahl Mattson* and Lise Roll-Pettersson
Stockholm Institute of Education, Sweden

In this study a group of students with reading and writing difficulties relate their experiences of school to their expressed opinions concerning the possibilities of participation and influence in this setting. Twelve students at upper-level compulsory school or upper secondary school were interviewed. Mostly their reading and writing difficulties were not recognised until they had been in school for several years, often after a persistent struggle by them and their parents. The prerequisite for receiving special educational support was reported to be based on having a diagnosis of dyslexia. In order to obtain needed support, students often had to accept segregated small-group settings and their attitude to this often seemed ambivalent. One conclusion of this study is that what these students experienced as labelling did not seem to be the diagnosis or the special education itself, but rather the schools way of organising and carrying out this support.

Keywords: Diagnosis; Reading and writing difficulties; Inclusion; Segregation

Introduction This study is one part of a larger project (Fischbein, Malmgren Hansen, Westling Allodi & Roll-Pettersson, 1997; Malmgren Hansen, 2002; Roll-Pettersson, 2001; Westling Allodi, 2002) whose main aim is to describe the situation for school students who, in various ways, are and have been in need of special educational resources. Important aspects of this issue are overall school policies, local school organisation, and the teachers professional competence in relation to the students situation and prerequisites. In the present partial study we have elected to report the comments and opinions of students with reading and writing disabilities who have completed or almost completed their compulsory schooling. Thus they can look
*Corresponding author. Department of Human Development, Learning and Special Education, Stockholm Institute of Education, Box 34 103, SE-10026 Stockholm, Sweden. Email: eva. mattson@lhs.se ISSN 0031-3831 (print)/ISSN 1470-1170 (online)/07/030239-14 2007 Scandinavian Journal of Educational Research DOI: 10.1080/00313830701356109

240

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

back on their school years, which allows them to examine and draw conclusions about their experiences. The article begins with an overview of various aspects of reading and writing disabilities and of the concepts of integration and inclusion. The students experiences were collected by means of interviews, which are in part reported in the form of direct and indirect quotations. The discussion section sets the students experiences against the theoretical aspects presented in the background material.

Background Reading and Writing Difficulties Low achievers in reading and writing ability are overrepresented among those who drop out of school. Owing to their reading and writing disabilities they have difficulty in understanding what is going on at school, so that they often feel humiliated, stressed, and unappreciated. It is obvious that the school system finds it difficult to cope with such students, and particularly with the needs of students experiencing failure in reading and writing (Fischbein & Folkander, 2000). Dyslexia is a form of learning disability usually defined by difficulties in wordrecognition skills and spelling, and is caused by a deficit in the phonological awareness system with a genetic, linguistic, and biological basis specifically related to the reading task. Other forms of reading and writing difficulties may have arisen as a result of inadequate environmental conditions for language development (Hien & Lundberg, 2004). In fact it may be difficult for practitioners to tease out what factors or what types of interactions (such as environmental and biological) are behind a childs reading and writing difficulties. Since the biologically based definition of dyslexia as a disturbance in the phonological system is often the basis for financial allocations such as extra resources in school, there is a risk, according to Tnnesen (2001), of developing an unfair praxis. He maintains that resources must be allocated in accordance with the degree of the problem and not its cause. Kavale and Forness (2000) argue that all students experiencing difficulties with reading should be given support, and there is little necessity to distinguish between dyslexia and other forms of reading difficulties. Tetler (2000) continues this line of argument when she states that it is important to abandon the traditional system for allocating resources for special education activities with individual labels; instead, the whole class or group and its interaction should be considered when the need for resources is established, in order to avoid segregation and give all the students a chance to develop optimally. Research regarding reading and writing difficulties has been criticised, primarily by social scientists who postulate that biological factors have been overemphasised at the cost of overlooking social, cultural, and historical considerations. They claim that this overemphasis on biological aetiologies (i.e. having a diagnosis) obstructs a

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education?

241

deeper understanding of learning difficulties in relation to, for example, class, gender, and ethnicity (Zetterqvist Nelson, 2003). The debate on these questions can be broadly characterised as on the one hand an individually oriented, diagnostic approach that prescribes early phonological training for children in the risk zone, and on the other hand an antidiagnostic approach, developing teaching methods that focus on general lines within the framework of the regular school setting. The advocates of diagnoses for educational purposes point to the positive aspects that children are given an explanation of their difficulties and thereby do not feel that they are stupid or lazy. The opponents, on the other hand, emphasise the risk of labelling the student, leading to a self-fulfilling prophecy (Zetterqvist Nelson, 2003). This kind of polarised debate is characterised by Skidmore (1996) as a reductionistic way to explain an irreducibly complex phenomenon in terms of a single, unidirectional model of causation (p. 34). Myrberg (2003) perceives reading and writing difficulties as interactive process between environmental and biological conditions:
Very good environmental conditions (teaching methods, the home environment) can reduce the risk of developing reading and writing difficulties despite biological conditions. On the other hand, unfavourable conditions at school and in the home can increase the risk of reading and writing difficulties despite comparatively favourable biological conditions. (Myrberg, 2003, p. 6, our translation)

Taube (1997) describes the ability to learn to read and write as a kind of linguistic musicality with broad human variations. Similarly, other researchers speak of it as a continuum along which different individuals have made varying progress. Seen in this light, reading and writing difficulties, even in those cases that have a biological basis, become a question of degree and not of type (Domincovic, 1996). This approach creates problems of definition. Who can be considered to have reading and writing difficulties? Hien and Lundberg (2004) also recognise that the distinctions are fluid and dependent partly on the reading and writing skills that a particular society requires. In part this lack of clarity also arises because people with reading and writing difficulties have varying abilities to utilise other means and resources to compensate for their problems. Thus it is not possible to differentiate between people with and without reading difficulties solely by considering their reading and writing performance (Domincovic, 1996; Myrberg, 2003). Rutter (2000), however, claims that such a quality, which he calls resilience (the ability to handle problematic situations), is not a fixed individual characteristic. It is both environmental and constitutional and varies over time according to the circumstances. Thus students possibilities to compensate, for example, their reading and writing difficulties are not merely a question of their personal resources but involve to a high degree personal qualities in interaction with environmental factors, making the situation a pedagogical question as well.

242

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

We are born with a desire to learn, but this desire can be inhibited if it conflicts with the need to evaluate oneself positively (Taube, 1997). In contrast to speech, reading and writing skills do not develop spontaneously but require guidance or teaching. With or without some form of linguistic weakness, a poor start in reading and writing may result in children refraining from it. That they do so is to avoid seeing themselves as stupid and failures. The road away from negative self-image is a long one; once negative self-perceptions are established they are extremely difficult to reverse (Taube, 1997). According to Myrberg (2003) a skilful teacher is characterised by having a thorough knowledge of childrens language development and of reading and writing processes. Myrberg is, however, concerned about developments in Sweden, where much of the special competence has been lost as a result of budget cuts in the municipalities in the 1990s and where new teachers are given far less training to deal with reading and writing difficulties, compared with previous generations:
Teachers who understand the ways in which children develop language will easily identify the signs of threatening problems concerning learning to read. Those teachers who lack such knowledge will use the wait-and-see attitude as an argument for not taking pro-active steps. (Myrberg, 2003, p. 53, our translation)

Segregation, Integration, and Inclusion During the late 19th century and the first half of the 20th century there was an extensive classification and institutional segregation of children and young people with social problems and different kinds of disabilities. Tssebro (2004) points out some motives for this trend. One of them was to make conditions of life better for these exposed groups. Another was an optimistic educational motive, which later was replaced by a eugenic motive. Still another, and not the least important, was to segregate the most troublesome and demanding students to prevent the upper class from establishing schools alongside the state elementary schools. During the 1960s and 1970s, integration reforms developed in Sweden both in the schools and in society at large as a reaction to discrimination, labelling, and segregation. Institutions were closed down and all students, even those with severe disabilities, got the legal right to go to a compulsory school close to their home (Heimdahl Mattson, 1998). Both in Sweden and in other European countries as well as America, there has been a trend towards increasing student variation in school. Possible reasons for this trend might be changed family patterns, migration, and the fact that the lives of many premature babies nowadays are saved, which sometimes gives rise to disabilities (Fischbein, 2001). As Westling Allodi (2002) states, schools find it difficult to adapt to this variation without segregating students. In addition, the national goals for the key subjects of Swedish, English, and maths are given priority, with recurrent national examinations, and this governs Swedish schools in a powerful

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education?

243

way. On the local level this has led to ability grouping and segregated groups within schools. Several Swedish municipalities also have a co-ordinated organisation consisting of small groups for students with, for example, social problems and learning disabilities. This means that an increasing number of students have to leave their classmates and home school to get their teaching in another school or setting. This could be interpreted as a form of exclusion, both within the school and outside it (Heimdahl Mattson, 2003). These obstructions inherent in the normal environment can be seen as causing the present tendency towards using the concept of inclusion instead of the concept of integration (Holm, Holst, Olsen, & Perlt, 1997). According to the inclusion concept, school should be changed in such a way that it can benefit from the broad variation of students. This concept makes the assumption that heterogeneity instead of homogeneity is the norm within the school. Differences should be seen as a resource, not as a problem that needs to be solved with curricular tracking and special classes (Braadland, 1997; Heimdahl Mattson, 1998; Oliver, 1996; Tetler, 2000; Tssebro, 1997). Skrtic, Sailor and Gee (1996) claim that difficulties in accomplishing inclusive education have been caused by schools refusal to question what they call professional bureaucracies. These are described as nonadaptable, inflexible organisations with specialists in different areas who may share common facilities and resources but nonetheless work quite independently, each with his or her students: schools where homogeneity is the norm. Skrtic et al. (1996) contrast professional bureaucracies with adhocracies or inclusive schools, which they define as problem-solving organisations in which professionals collaborate both with one another and with students and parents. In such an organisation attempts are also made to respond to heterogeneity and challenge issues with flexible and individually adapted solutions. Inclusive education is thus described as an attempt to replace the traditional professional bureaucratic structure of schools with the adhocratic form (p. 146). The fact that it is believed that this is a way of solving special education teaching problems without extra resources will probably, according to Skidmore (1996), make practitioners and researchers more and more interested in the inclusion concept. Roach (1995), however, warns against the belief in inclusive education to promote economic cutbacks, since inclusive teaching requires at least as much special educational competence as segregated teaching. On the other hand, as she points out, you probably get more for the money this teaching would have cost. But why do some schools function as professional bureaucracies characterised by a lack of co-operation, with static and often segregating solutions, and why do others develop into inclusive schools? One assumption is that schools with heterogeneous student bodies are forced to solve problems in a more flexible and less traditionbound way, while schools with less variety among their students, so-called stable schools, can more easily develop and retain professional bureaucracies (Heimdahl Mattson, 2002).

244 Aims

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

An aim of this work was to study a group of students with dyslexia or other forms of reading and writing difficulties and their experiences of school in regard to goals, organisation, and teaching methods. Another aim was to relate the above to their expressed opinion concerning possibilities of participation and influence. The specific research questions were: 1. What possibilities did the students perceive they had of taking part in and influencing the teaching process? 2. What were their experiences of teachers attitudes and competence, especially in connection with the development of their reading and writing ability? 3. How did the students perceive the schools aim, organisation, and ways of working, especially based, for example, on their experience of segregation, participation, and inclusion? Method Procedures and Participants The parents of the participating students had during the 1996/97 school year taken part in a multifaceted project at the Stockholm Institute of Education (Fischbein et al., 1997; Roll-Pettersson, 2003). That study consisted of 100 parents of children with special educational needs. In the spring of 2002 the families were contacted again by telephone in order to recruit their participation in a follow-up survey study. Following the initial telephone contact, parents who had agreed to participate were mailed a survey package and requested to give a description of their childs special education needs and diagnosis, if applicable (Roll-Pettersson, 2003). Interview selection in the present study was limited to the children in the project who were at least 15 years of age and described by their parents as having difficulties in reading and writing, with or without a diagnosis of dyslexia. Students whose parents had rated them as having combined difficulties such as problems with reading and writing and Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) or Attention Deficit Disorder (ADD) were accepted, but children who were described as having mental retardation were not included. The students were contacted by one of the authors, who described the purpose of the study and promised confidentiality. In total, 12 students agreed to be interviewed. All of them, 3 girls and 9 boys, were at the time of the study at upper-level compulsory school or upper secondary school. A phenomenological perspective has influenced the methodological approach. What people say and do is a result of how they define their world, and it is this process of definition and understanding that the qualitative researcher documents, describes and analyzes (Bogdan & Lutfiyya, 1996).

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education?

245

In accordance with the purpose of the study, an interview guide consisting of basic predetermined open-ended questions in the format of an in-depth, conversationstyle interview was used. The questions were semistructured, which is part of an informal interviewing technique that can also be described as a mixture of conversation and embedded questions (Erlandsson, Harris, Skipper and Allen, 1993). These questions dealt with matters such as what the students wanted to get from their schooling, how the special educational resources had been organised, and how well they thought it had worked. The students were also asked to describe whether and in what ways they had been able to influence the teaching methods and contents of the lessons. Some of the questions also concerned the students experiences of the teachers teaching approach and what they thought made a good and a bad classroom climate. In order to create an informal situation each participant chose both the meeting place and time for the planned interviews. This was, for example, in the interviewers office, at their homes or in a library close to the students school. Each interview lasted between 25 minutes and 2 hours. All interviews were recorded and transcribed. A constant comparative analysis of data between participants was conducted to find categories based on common dimensions and themes (Patton, 2002). Results Three major categories emerged from the analysis of the interviews:

N N N

Prerequisites for support and participation Teacher competence and approach to the students Segregated groups or inclusive education.

The students interviewed had in many ways very different life situations. Yet there were similarities between their stories that may contribute to enhancing the understanding of students experiencing difficulties in reading and writing, especially in regard to the school system. Prerequisites for Support and Participation What almost all the students interviewed had in common was that their reading and writing difficulties were not recognised until they had been in school for several years, in some cases not until the fourth or fifth grade, and according to the students often after a long struggle by them and their parents:
Mum noticed that something was wrong. I just felt that I was stupid and didnt fit into the class. Mum spoke to my teacher. She was very understanding but said: Dont worry. Itll work out! But it never did. So Mum got at them again. It was in the second or third class Now I want you to make a report on B. It was arranged by the school nurse I

246

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

went somewhere, had an examination and then I got the answer: dyslexia. (Lisa, 17 years old) Both Mum and I have really tried to deal with these problems; we have had a hard time with them [the teachers]. A lot of people would have given up. (Karin, 18 years old)

One condition for receiving special educational resources is usually that a student has to present a certificate of dyslexia:
There was quite a lot of hassle about this. The headmistress didnt think I should go to the special teacher. She didnt think it was necessary and our teacher didnt think so either. Later [when the report was completed] there was some sort of proof that I really did need help. (Fanny, 15 years old) When you dont have a certificate that you have these difficulties, you dont get any help. I noticed that. Now that Ive got a certificate and done my tests, the teachers deal with the problem in quite a different way. (Karin, 18 years old)

One of the students had not received any real support for his reading and writing difficulties until the fourth grade. During the first three years he felt that the teachers only thought he was stupid and impossible: They grumbled at me. They told me I was totally useless and couldnt do anything. According to the student, this led to his being bullied and mocked by the other students. He tried to get teachers and the school principal to help him but he felt that he did not get any support. At last the situation became so difficult that he tried to commit suicide. Teacher Competence and Approach to the Students No reading and writing tests were carried out until the fourth grade, when the student described above got a certificate that he had dyslexia. Then he got access to various teachers who were supposed to give him special education, which he reported as having given him both negative and positive experiences. For example, one teacher in the sixth grade wanted him to play with clay: This suited a couple of the guys who were there but it wasnt really what I wanted. He also described another teacher as one who was committed, who did not give up, and who helped him to find strategies for managing his other schoolwork despite his dyslexia:
When I got to the seventh grade I met Boel. That was probably what got me to where I am now Boel was involved, she found solutions We went through things on the blackboard. A lot of writing on the blackboard and a lot of talking. I cant get hold of things by reading and writing. Boel understood that. (Conny, 17 years old)

The way in which the students reacted to the special education activities was to a high degree dependent on the help they considered they were given. This in turn was a matter of the teachers knowledge, teaching strategies, and the way the students were treated. A 15-year-old girl, Fanny, gave these examples:

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education?

247

to start with, I and a few others were sent to a special teacher who had terribly boring exercises which we didnt think were any fun at all, and he was mean all the time. It was lots of fun. We recorded it I read for her for perhaps 1015 minutes and then we listened to it. This was only in the lower grades. I think everything was much better afterwards. I didnt read all that much, but I didnt think books were horrible or hard work.

Another student also described the teacher in the small group as positive and inspiring. Every time the student had worked hard for a while, he got some sort of reward: Then you got easier things to do, something you could really manage. A good teacher was described by the students as a teacher who:
asks the students what they want to do. dares to look at school and work in a different way from the usual one. does things in a slightly different way. doesnt avoid problems. is interested in the work. has a positive attitude and doesnt turn you away.

To sum up, it may be said that a good teacher from these students point of view is a teacher who wants to co-operate and try new and unconventional solutions. She or he does not ignore the problem, but is interested, positive, fair, and goal-oriented. A good teacher does not give up on a student. The teachers competence was also connected with the classroom climate. A good teacher was one who made all the students feel they were equally important:
Its all too easy for some students to be treated as a bit more important than others. It never feels good when its like that because the ones who feel they arent that important probably dont think they have as much to say. A good teacher is one whoif someone laughs [at you]says What are you laughing about? What was so terribly funny? So he gets the person who laughed to feel ashamed. (Lisa, 17 years old)

One of the students talked about his present class at the upper secondary school where they had a lot of fun together, where there were no cliques and nobody felt frozen out. He thought that was due to the teachers: It was their motto, like, to try to get us together. Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education? All the students who were interviewed had received their special education individually or in a small group. For most of them it was a few hours a week, while others had spent practically all the time in a small group. Attitudes to this segregated form of teaching often seemed ambivalent:
It was nice to be in a small class, to know who you were You found out what your problems were The teachers knew their job they were more fair. (Albin, 17 years old)

248

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

The same student thought it was important for the school to draw up a long-term plan right from the start for students with learning difficulties, but in this connection he expressed a different opinion:
Then the students dont have to leave the class. Thats much better. When youve been in a small group, youve felt outside the bigger classes and shut out from the big group.

Another student thought it felt good to go to the small group because then he dared to say things and read aloud without humming and hawing. But later in the interview he said:
Its a bit awkward having to leave the class in the seventh grade when you didnt know so many people having to go down. (Niklas, 14 years old)

When asked if he had spoken to anyone about this, he replied: I said nothing, I didnt dare to say anything, I think. However, segregation may be seen as the price to be paid for having access to skilled teachers:
Well, it was OK, I suppose, from a learning point of view, when I look back on it When youre that age you dont want to be singled out in any way. (Johan, 17 years old)

Several students mentioned the composition of the small group as problematic:

The disadvantage was that it felt as though the troublemakers would be moved down there. You felt like one of them, though it wasnt really like that. (Karin, 18 years old) Many students in that class didnt have reading and writing difficulties, but the trouble is that they always solve the problems with the troublemakers at school by putting them there [in the small group], the ones with social problems. (Conny, 17 years old)

One of the students in the study had, in his opinion, definite reading and writing difficulties. He got high marks in science subjects but had difficulty in getting a pass mark in Swedish and English. He spent a good deal of his time in the senior level of the compulsory school in a small group:
The class was a bit above my level and the special class was far too low for me, so I didnt fit in anywhere so I could develop I couldnt really talk with the other people in the special group. (Michael, 17 years old)

Another student said the same thing in somewhat different words:

You felt a bit depressed, you couldnt quite accept it. You just went there because thats where you went: Im going to the special teacher. It felt a bit, you know, awkward. (Kim, 16 years old)

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education? Summary of Results

249

What all the students in the study said they had met in school was a wait-and-see attitude to their reading and writing disabilities that was not resolved until some form of dyslexia diagnosis was obtained, usually on the initiative of their parents. When the students finally got access to special education, this was almost exclusively in a segregated form, either individually or in a small group. However, the students experience seems to have been that, if and when they got interested and competent teachers, this was within the framework of the segregated teaching, not in the ordinary class. Put the other way round, one can also say that this type of organisation, according to the students, was no guarantee of effective teaching. Several of them describe ambivalent feelings about this. They did not always feel that they fitted into the group they were placed in; in addition, they had to leave their usual classmates, which gave many of them a feeling of being left out in the cold. Conclusions Leaving ones own class and going to a small group was often seen as being labelled, though a necessary solution in order to get relevant teaching. According to the students descriptions, on the other hand, the teachers lack of competence and the composition of the group often spoiled this. Tnnesens (2001) fears of an unfair praxis in the allocation of resources seem to be a reality, according to the present study. Without a diagnosis, there are no special educational efforts. But if you get a diagnosis and receive these efforts, you have to accept a segregated environment. Just one of the students gave an example of a teacher who tried to help him with strategies for managing his other schoolwork despite his dyslexia. Resilience, the ability to handle problematic situations, seems in this study to be regarded more as a personal ability and not, as Rutter (2000) claims, a question of the individual in interaction with the current environment, which is an educational question. Almost all the students had experienced the so-called wait-and-see teaching policy, which is a sign of a lack of knowledge among teachers of how childrens language develops and of the reading and writing processes. This gives a clear and urgent warning signal for teacher training (Myrberg, 2003; Roll-Pettersson & Heimdahl Mattson, 2005). The students who were interviewed consistently described their schools as professional bureaucracies (Skrtic et al., 1996). Creating segregated small groups appears to strengthen the homogeneity of the ordinary classes. Teachers seem to hand over the problems of reading and writing difficulties to the teacher of the small group, which reinforces a culture of uncooperativeness and inflexibility. This means that the overt aim of the small group is to give the students adequate teaching help, while the covert aim is to increase the homogeneity of the ordinary class. This is reinforced by the students description of the small groups as heterogeneous and sometimes very troublesome. Thus the motive for segregation that Tssebro

250

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

(2004) describes, more than a century old, continues to be relevant; the student in need of support will get some sort of special effort in a small group, without disturbing work in the ordinary class. Otherwise there could be a risk that the parents of the other students in this class would move them to another comprehensive school or an independent or private school. At the local level this would mean a financial loss for the school affected and at the national level a threat to a school for all. The school that the students would prefer is largely that characterised as the socalled inclusive school (Skrtic et al., 1996), where the teachers are flexible and open to their problems and prepared to co-operate with the students in trying out different kinds of teaching solutions. One problem with the inclusive approach is that even good teachers have, of course, a limit to their competence and not all teachers can cope with all kinds of learning situations. As Roach (1995) points out, this requires special educational competence, within the framework of the ordinary class. If attention is not paid to this reality, inclusive teaching runs the risk of what might be called silent segregation, or a concealment of those individual qualities and needs that are not so easily tucked away under collective terms like class, gender, and ethnicity. One conclusion of this study is that the students expressed an eagerness to be diagnosed as dyslexic so as to get educational help with their reading and writing. This, however, meant that they had to attend a small group, which several of them described as involuntary exclusion. What these students experienced as labelling did not seem to be the diagnosis, but rather the schools way of organising and carrying out the educational support. Acknowledgement This study was supported by the Swedish Council for Working Life and Social Research and the Swedish Research Council. References
Bogdan, R., & Lutfiyya, Z. M. (1996). Standing on its own: Qualitative research in special education. In W. Stainback & S. Stainback (Eds.), Controversial issues confronting special education: Divergent perspectives. Boston: Allyn & Bacon. Braadland, N. (1997). En skola for allealle inkludert [One school for allincluding all; in Norwegian]. In J. Tssebro (Ed.), Den vanskelige integreringen (pp. 5883). Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget. Domincovic, K. (1996). La ssva righeter i ett helhetsperspektiv: En litteraturstudie [Reading difficulties in a holistic perspective: A review of research; in Swedish]. Stockholm: Institutionen fo r specialpedagogik, Ho gskolan fo r la rarutbildning. Erlandsson, D., Harris, L., Skipper, B., & Allen, S. (1993). Doing natural inquiry: A guide to methods. Newbury Park, CA: Sage. Fischbein, S. (2001). A holistic view on childrens growth and development. Paper presented at the International Congress on Children and Young People in a Changing World, Agrigento, Italy, June.

Segregated Groups or Inclusive Education?

251

Fischbein, S., & Folkander, M. (2000). Reading and writing ability and dropout in the Swedish upper secondary school. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 15(3), 264274. Fischbein, S., Malmgren Hansen, A., Westling Allodi, M., & Roll-Pettersson, L. (1997). Elever i specialpedagogisk verksamhet. Delrapport I. Planering och genomfo rande [Students in special education activities. Report no. 1. Planning and design; in Swedish]. Stockholm: Institutionen fo r specialpedagogik, Ho gskolan fo r la rarutbildning. Heimdahl Mattson, E. (1998). The school situation of students with motor disabilities: Interaction of individual prerequisites and environmental demands. Stockholm: HLS Fo rlag. Heimdahl Mattson, E. (2002). Inclusive strategies and bureaucratic organisations in integrated and segregated schools systems. Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research, 3(1), 3855. Heimdahl Mattson, E. (2003). Statliga specialpedagogiska sto dinsatser fo r elever med funktionshinder: Behovsinventering och analys [National special educational resources for students with disabilities; in Swedish]. Ha rno sand, Sweden: Statens Institut fo r Handikappfra gor i Skolan. Holm, P., Holst, J., Olsen, S. B., & Perlt, B. (1997). Efter normaliseringen [After normalisation; in Norwegian]. In J. Tssebro (Ed.), Den vanskelige integreringen (pp. 129157). Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget. Hien, T., & Lundberg, I. (2004). Dyslexi fra n teori till praktik [Dyslexia from theory to practice; in Swedish]. Stockholm: Natur & Kultur. Kavale, K., & Forness, S. R. (2000). What definitions of learning disability say and dont say: A critical analysis. Journal of Learning Disabilities, 33(3), 239256. Malmgren Hansen, A. (2002). Specialpedagoger: Nybyggare i skolan [Special educators: Pioneers in school; in Swedish]. Stockholm: HLS Fo rlag. Myrberg, M. (2003). Att skapa konsensus om skolans insatser fo r att motverka la s- och skrivsva righeter [Creating consensus about schoolwork to combat reading and writing difficulties; in Swedish]. Retrieved April 24, 2007 from www.sit.se/download/PDF/Dyslexi/skapa_ konsensus.pdf. Oliver, M. (1996). Understanding disability: From theory to practice. London: Palgrave. Patton, M. Q. (2002). Qualitative research and evaluation methods. Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage. Roach, V. (1995). Supporting inclusion: beyond the rhetoric. Phi Delta Kappan, 77(4), 295300. Roll-Pettersson, L. (2001). Between open systems and closed doors: The needs and persceptions of parents of children with cognitive disabilities. Stockholm: HLS Fo rlag. Roll-Pettersson, L. (2003). Perceptions of parents receiving special education support in Stockholm and adjacent areas. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 18(1), 293310. Roll-Pettersson, L., & Heimdahl Mattson, E. (2005). Mothers of children with learning difficulties/ disabilities: Effects of policy on education. Manuscript submitted for publication. Rutter, G. (2000). Resilience reconsidered: Conceptual considerations, empirical findings, and policy implications. In J. P. Shonkoff & S. J. Meisels (Eds.), Handbook of early childhood intervention (pp. 651682). Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press. Skidmore, D. (1996). Towards an integrated theoretical framework for research into special educational needs. European Journal of Special Needs Education, 11(1), 3347. Skrtic, M. T., Sailor, W., & Gee, K. (1996). Voice, collaboration, and inclusion: Democratic themes in educational and social reform initiatives. Remedial and Special Education, 17, 142157. Taube, K. (1997). La sinla rning och sja lvfo rtroende: Psykologiska teorier, empiriska underso kningar och pedagogiska konsekvenser [Learning to read and self-reliance: Psychological theories; empirical studies and educational consequences; in Swedish]. Stockholm: Prisma. Tetler, S. (2000). Den inkluderende skole: Fra vision till virkelighed [The inclusive school: From vision to reality; in Danish]. Kbenhavn, Denmark: Gyldendal Uddannelse. Tnnesen, F. E. (2001). Hva er dysleksi? [What is dyslexia?; in Norwegian]. Retrieved May 25, 2004 from http://www.his.no/common webcenter/webcenter.nsf.dok.

252

E. Heimdahl Mattson and L. Roll-Pettersson

Tssebro, J. (1997). Inledning [Introduction; in Norwegian]. In J. Tssebro (Ed.), Den vanskelige integreringen (pp. 932). Oslo, Norway: Universitetsforlaget. Tssebro, J. (2004). Introduksjon: Integrering og inkludering, historikk og politikk [Introduction: Integration and inclusion, history and politics; in Norwegian]. In J. Tssebro (Ed.), Integrering och inkludering (pp. 1141). Lund, Sweden: Studentlitteratur. Westling Allodi, M. (2002). Support and resistance: ambivalence in special education. Stockholm: HLS Fo rlag. Zetterqvist Nelson, K. (2003). Dyslexi: En diagnos pa gott och ont. Barn, fo ra ldrar och la rare bera ttar [A diagnosis of dyslexia: Pros and cons; in Swedish]. Lund, Sweden: Studentlitteratur.