Book Description

Inclusion in the schools has been mandated since the passing of the Education for All Handicapped Children Act in 1975 (EAHCA ; Public Law 94-142). Within the field of music education, historical events like the Tanglewood Symposium of 1967, the Goals and Objectives (GO) Project of 1969, and the Housewright Symposium of 1999 aimed to achieve the best and most equitable music education for all students (Madsen, 2000). Yet, for decades, music teachers have felt underprepared to teach students with disabilities (Cooper, 1999; Darrow, 1999; McCord and Watts, 2010; Salvador, 2010; VanWeelden and Whipple, 2014a). Researchers have examined music teachers' perceptions of their preparation for teaching learners with disabilities (Davila, 2013; Gilbert and Asmus, 1981; Hammel, 2001a), university curricula for special education coursework (Colwell and Thompson, 2000; Culp and Salvador, 2021; Salvador, 2010), and pre-service fieldwork experiences in inclusive settings (Bartolome, 2017; Smith and Wilson, 1999; VanWeelden and Whipple, 2005a). Elementary music teachers have felt especially challenged to meet the diverse needs of their students (Allan, 2020a; Grimsby, 2020a; Hammel, 2001a). The primary purpose of this study was to examine elementary music teachers' perceptions of their preparation to teach students with disabilities. Its secondary purpose was to examine elementary music teachers' perceptions of their preparation so to reduce the three inclusion barriers - organizational, knowledge, and attitudinal - as defined by Adamek and Darrow (2018) when teaching students with disabilities. Data were collected through a researcher-created, web-based survey, which had four sections: (a) Organizational Strategies; (b) Disability, Legislative, and Interprofessional Knowledge; (c) Attitudes Towards Teaching Students with Disabilities; and (d) Open-Ended Questions. The first three sections of the survey aligned with the three inclusion barriers (Adamek and Darrow, 2018). For the first two sections of the survey, participants indicated their perceptions of their preparation for organizational strategies and inclusion knowledge. In the third section, participants rated attitude statements; and in the fourth section, participants responded to short-answer questions in their own words. Participants (N = 87) were members of NAfME who indicated "elementary" as a teaching area and were from all six NAfME regions of the United States. Quantitative data were analyzed using descriptive statistics and a Friedman test, and qualitative data were examined through a coding process. Results of this study suggested that music teachers need music content-specific preparation to teach students with disabilities and that a lack of training might be negatively affecting teachers' attitudes towards teaching students with special needs. Most participants received their training outside of college through professional development opportunities, and most of the preparation at the undergraduate level was outside of the music department. Participants' ratings of specific organizational strategies and inclusion knowledge revealed areas that might need further attention in music teacher preparation programs. Ratings of attitude statements showed music teachers' desire and willingness to create the best opportunities for students with disabilities, but that they lacked preparation to do so. An analysis of participants' open-ended comments supported quantitative results and prior literature findings. Implications and suggestions for future research are discussed.