This Master's thesis, Raising Awareness of Special Needs through Youth Literature in
Preschool explores the use of picture books with theme of special needs in preschool period.
Children with special needs in inclusive environments are included in regular preschool
programmes, but they can have trouble with social contacts with their peers. Encouraging peers
to embrace differences and building empathy can be helpful. We can use children’s literature
that addresses special needs as an excellent tool for discussion about special needs, aids, they
use and problems, that they may have.
The theoretical sections outline the concept of inclusion and children’s literature. We get to
know the elements of picture books and the descriptions of special needs groups.
In the empirical section we present the programme we performed for preschool children, that
included reading of five picture books, related to special needs (Ojoj, Boris, C. Weston, T.
Warnes; Luka je med nami, L. Ely, P. Dunbar; Izabela – pravljica o princeski, ki je jecljala, B.
Akerman; Veveriček posebne sorte, S. Makarovič; Imam downov sindrom, H. Kraljič). For
every picture book we designed pre and post reading activities, with which we wanted to deepen
the reading experience. Before and after the programme children filled out the adaption of
questionnaire Acceptance Scale for Kindergarten (ASK), adapted after Acceptance Scale to
Measure Attitudes of Kindergarten – Age Children, (Favazya in Odom, 1996), with which we
tested the attitude of children towards special needs. We also observe the use of vocabulary
about special needs.
The research included 30 children aged 4 to 6, but the results showed no statistical important
difference between answers on first and second questionnaire. Nevertheless, preschool teachers
reported positive changes in attitudes of peers towards special needs. As a part of Master's thesis
we prepared a manual for preschool and primary school teachers, that presents all five picture
books and activities, that can be performed before and after the reading.
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