 Hello everyone and welcome to our webinar offered by the European School Education Platform. Today we will discuss about a very interesting topic on involving parents in inclusive education, education on special education. And we have our expert here, Ingevan Depute. Her expertise lies in supporting teachers and special needs coordinators. And her studies and her PhD, her ongoing PhD if I'm not mistaken, is also specialized on this field. So before I give the floor to her, I would like to remind you of some things. As I told you, this session is being recorded and we will have some evaluation forms, which we will share with you by the end of the course of this webinar. Furthermore, I don't know if you can see my screen. Can you see my screen? Okay, I'm in the slide with the online course. Can you see it? Yes, we see it, Marielena. Great, great, great. Thank you. Thank you very much. So I would like to remind you that there is also an online course that was launched a week ago concerning this topic and you can find it and register on the link that we have provided you. You can click on the link right now if you want and you can explore the course later. This course is relevant to educators and everyone who's interested in enhancing their understanding and skills in creating inclusive classrooms through effective parent-teacher partnerships. So I can now give the floor to Inge if my colleague doesn't have something else to add. So Inge the Florid is yours and thank you very much again for being here with us. Okay, thank you. It's nice to see how international the audience is. First of all, I'm Inge van der Putten. I work at the University of Ghent. English is not my first language, it's my third language, so it needs some warming up, yeah. So but it will be fine. I work at the University of Ghent where I teach the lessons diversity and inclusion. There I also do research about children with disabilities. So my perspective is a lot about children or parents of children with disability or with special needs. And in our disability studies group, we have a lot of attention we give to the voice of children and parents. And it's very important because a lot of the times we are experienced is that it's it are the missing voices. So it's important to be very active in how can we collaborate with parents. I also work at the parents movement and that's parents for inclusion. Movement for parents to become stronger, to know their rights about inclusive life and inclusive education. And also to have some peer support between parents to take up their role as a parent of choosing an inclusive trajectory. In Belgium, yeah, we had the ratification of the UN Convention for people with a disability. So we need to develop a more inclusive system, a more inclusive education system. But that is not a reality. In the reality we see that choosing for inclusion is not the norm. We still have around Europe, we have a high percentage of children who go to special schools. So it is something we need to do very active, we need to do it very with a lot of attention. And one of the key factors is working with parents, collaborating with parents. Because one of the things is that we can see that the expertise around inclusive education, around inclusion, a good facilitator there are parents. They show us the way how we can make an inclusive trajectory for their son or daughter. So you know a little bit more about me and the person that is presenting this. Yeah. I first want to have a reflection question. When you think of collaboration with parents, what word comes in mind? And maybe you can just reflect on it or you can use the chat. I will give one, two minutes that you can answer this question. So what word comes in mind when you think about collaboration with parents? Thank you for being very active in the chat. I can see some words that pop up collaboration. It also has to do with teamwork. Sometimes it's very difficult. It's a challenge, different opinions. How do you work with those different opinions, respect? So it says something about the collaboration that it's not that easy. And what I wanted to do in this one hour course is that I will bring in the perspective of parents. And because of we did a lot of research that parents give on some golden keys. What is very important in setting up in that collaboration. But therefore I will start with a testimony of a parent and it's Ilse, the parent of Clara. And I think last year I met her and she explained, she talked about inclusive trajectory of her daughter. And she started and she said, my daughter is like a barracuda. When she wants something, she really goes for it and doesn't let go. And she gives the example that in the period of the corona epidemic, there were a lot of rules. And for example, in Belgium in that time, in April 2020, we couldn't go out. Or if we went out, it was limited with three, four people. And Clara, it was her birthday and she became 16. Yeah, it's a very important age. And at that time she said, but I wanted to do a birthday party. And she heard on the news that in the church, you could meet with more people. So Clara said, not a problem. I will give my birthday party in the church. Then I can have more people. You can see something about how creative Clara is in her way of thinking around the world. Clara grows up in a family where they are really dressed very fine. You know, their trousers and their sweater, it's in the same color. There is a lot of attention. And Clara went to a school in the city in Antwerp with a big diversity. And of course, if you have a big diversity, you also have more dressing styles, what people wear. And on one day Clara came home and she said, I wanted to wear a leather jacket. And the mother thought, oh my God, a leather jacket. That's not what I had in mind. But as she first had a lot of resistance, but after a while she said, this is also inclusion. Inclusion is about developing your identity. It's also adapting in the environment that you live in. And I found it in that testimony. I found a lot of important things that tell us something about inclusion. But it also tells us something about the important role parents have to play there. They can teach us. Although I know that collaboration is at some moments not that easy. But I think we as professional can learn a lot of parents. And I just want to mention some points. And if we look at it, we can see that inclusion is about values. It's not about a place, but it's about values. It's about belonging. It's about how you stand in life. Clara wants a leather jacket because she wants to connect with her peers. And a lot of the times we have professionals. We think about maths and language and all those subjects. But if we talk about inclusion with parents, we can see that they bring in more the values about belonging and connection and having a place in a school. And if you are not there, you are missed. So I think we can learn a lot when we talk with parents. We can learn a lot about what inclusion is. Another thing is that inclusion is also a pedagogical choice of parents. It's a way how they look to the world. It's a way how they want to support, to educate their child. And we live in a neoliberal society. You need to be an independent person. And there we can see that parents make sometimes different choices, choices that go into that neoliberal idea. For example, Ilse, the parent of Clara, she said, I found it so important that she can ask support to her peers, that she can ask support to the teachers. So it's not about being independently, but it's about I'm living in this world and what is the support? What are the resources that are there and that I can use? Can I use my smartphone? Can I ask questions and so on? So we can learn from parents about what is inclusion about values. But we also learn from parents that inclusion is about a pedagogical choice, a way of how you want to develop your child. Another thing we learn also in the testimony, we can learn that the representation of their child, they do it in a way that it's very recognizable. For example, Ilse is not telling that Clara has autism, but she's telling my child is a barracuda. She uses a metaphor in a way that we can understand that there are some thinking ways of Clara that is very rigida, is very rigid and that it would be that she takes things very literally. For example, with the corona epidemic and the party in the church. But she brings also a view of Clara that is very recognizable. In a way we can see that it's about a girl that is becoming 16 and she wants to have a party. That's not about a child with autism, but it's about a girl from that age that wants to do the same things as her peers. So we can learn a lot about how parents represent their child. We can learn about it. How do they do that? Because we can use that in our connection with other professionals. For example, the teacher of the next year. I can give a representation that is very rich. Another thing is that it's also about working together. In the story of Ilse, she connects a lot with different people. She connects with the teacher. She connects with the peers. She connects with the supporter. What we see is that parents have a network or they can think in a network. They can think. They already experience that inclusion. You don't do it alone. You need a lot of other people to make it work and that we can also learn from parents. So I think it's important to see that in our collaboration with parents that although we are the professional that we can learn a lot of parents about how they experience inclusion and how they make inclusion work. So I just want to ask you the question again. You can reflect on it or you can put it in the chat. Do you have a representation in mind of how parents present their child in a very rich way? Why do I give this question? It has to do with if we are talking about diversity and we have a lot of categorization. We talk about children with a different background with a diverse background or who are multilingual or who have special needs and then we sum up the different labels. It's important to have a more recognizable idea view because in that recognizable representation there you already can see how you can support a person and who is that person. If you say Clara has autism I don't know what that means in that context but with the little example I just gave you know that you have to be very careful in the way you talk about things because Clara will take it very literally. So that is also one of the things we can learn from parents what inclusion is but we can learn a lot about how they take up that representation of their child. So I already took a lot of words inclusive education and it's already very clear that it's not a place it's not about children who are very diverse who go to a regular school. It's much more it has to do with values and it has to do with things I wrote down here. For example it has to do with that regular schools will adapt their infrastructure, their organization the methods they use, the teaching material all those things they adapt. For example for Clara she didn't do a classical examination but they look at the evolution of Clara throughout the year. They had very clear goals and they looked what is the evolution of Clara but she didn't do any examination because we know that it's very difficult for Clara that it would be a very high barrier for her. So that is important to see what they did because she didn't participate on the examination at the end of the examination. One of the things is that Clara made soup and together after the end of the examination they drank their bowl of soup and it was a way that there was belonging because the parents said what I experienced at home because she's not participating in the examination that she's also isolated. So again parents can give their experience but they also can think about what is needed. Thank you, Yasna, for your reply. It's on the ground floor. Another thing is inclusive education. It's not only about adapting but it's also a springboard for inclusive society. What we see is that the students who grow up with Clara they can collaborate and they know that support is something very natural. For example Clara at the beginning of the year she gave some explanation about her needs and the way she likes to have support and it was a very intensive moment because after the presentation of Clara there was a dialogue with the peers they were telling but I also need some support or I also have some difficulty with languages or with reading and you could see that there became a very positive climate because this is what inclusive education is doing that we get inclusive society. Another thing is that it's important that there is support support for teachers and for principals I think what is very important that we give teachers space to collaborate and that we give teachers space to reflect on their practice. So they know what is meant with the quote that Yasna is telling that the needs are on the floor because it's a student in a wheelchair. What does it mean? What do I need to do differently in my organization to make sure that there are no obstacles anymore? So I think it's very important if we think about in terms of need support for teachers that we think in terms of time for collaboration time for reflecting on your practice and to be the architect again of your classroom and in being an architect of your classroom it's also important that you make your education very accessible, accessible for all the students who are in your classroom and we know that principle of universal design for learning and if we still have any barriers there then it's important that we have reasonable accommodations we can look at it from how can we have solutions that the barriers are going down. So inclusive education is not one definition but it's a process and in that process the collaboration with parents is very important to think about how can we adapt how can we make sure that we have a springboard for an inclusive society that we can support each other in that searching process and that we make the adaptations that are there are there for all the children. I have another quote of a parent and it's Dana it's a parent of Wacht and she said in the collaboration I experienced that in the meeting everyone is there but it's still a puzzle where everybody takes a piece of it and in my feeling they don't get the whole puzzle we miss something in that overview in that taking that shared responsibility and what we found is that parents are a very important figure there are the first and the most important figure in the lives of children and it's very important to be aware that we as professionals we are passing by we come one moment a year maybe a little bit longer but the parents are the one that have the first and the last taking up the responsibility for their child and in the collaboration it's important that we give that responsibility for parents another thing is that parents have important perspective and they have local knowledge we call it local knowledge because it's knowledge they created in working with their child we work for example I'm now working with a girl that is 12 years old I need those parents to have an idea of what do you know that works what is your experience, what is the interest and so on so that is the local knowledge the expertise I need as a professional and for example if I refer again to Clara Clara she has autism but one of the things is that she doesn't have a problem if there is change in her teacher is sick and there is another teacher that's not a problem for Clara but when it's now in Antwerp we have now around 20 degrees it's just okay to have a light you have a t-shirt then you need to make sure that Clara that she take off her sweater that's something very difficult for her when it's the moment when you take off that sweater that is the way we can see that she that she stays in that structure of a trouser a sweater and I put it on when it is 20 degrees Clara we don't do it anymore and then she's not flexible anymore so it's important that we take up that knowledge of parents they know those things when Clara is in the spring a little bit grumpy we now think oh it's too hot hot and she is still wearing her sweater it is that local knowledge that we need from parents parents are also very important in the decision making process what we see is that we inform parents but it's important to take up partnership to have teamwork and that they are part of that decision making process and one of the things that we found in our research is that it's very important that we give an idea of how the classroom is working how the classroom is organized how is their child participating actually parents don't know that and if they don't know that they cannot think with us or they give advice or ideas that are not referable to a classroom a classroom is still working with the group so what we found in our research is that we need to take into account there is a very important role for us that we give a view of what is happening in that classroom how is your child participating and not in a way of it's not working or there are a lot of obstacles but just showing how a classroom and a group is working and we can do that with pictures we can make a little video if they found that's okay with privacy rules and everything but there are a lot of ways we can show and we can make it very visible how their child is participating then they can take up a share to responsibility then they can take up thinking about the decisions they have to make and so on so another testimony of a parent or a quote of a parent is I wear all those different hats I'm a psychologist I'm an expert I'm a therapist and yes I am also a parent and what I wanted to show is a video a little fragment a little clip of the video we made it's a video inclusive it's from Ellen Vermeulen and we made it in a research project where we filmed from the perspective of children and we will see a little bit of Nathan and Nathan is a boy who is in secondary school and Nathan has his own goals he's working on his own trajectory and he is telling us some things and we will listen to it Enge, can you hear me? Excuse me? Can you hear me? Yeah, I can hear you but I don't see the video Yes, I will share my screen I will stop sharing the presentation I will share my screen and we will see the video Thank you Can you see my screen? Yes Perfect, thank you I know that my voice is very loud but far away I have to say that I am different and different and so on For me, it's a bit loud and it's a bit... Yes A fever thermometer What is a fever thermometer? A short thermometer Yes, a short thermometer Let's try I'm going to take a bikini I'm a badawan I'm a landscape I'm a photo apparatus Let's see how well... Let's hear him in the distance So what we can see is that or what we can hear is about Nathan who is telling what the role of his parent is in the beginning of the year giving some explanation about the needs of Natan That is not so easy It puts parents in a role that is very vulnerable also because they have to talk about their child How do you do that? With a classroom of pupils They are 16, 17 years old That's not that easy So that is what Mohammed is telling from all the different hats he is wearing On the other hand we could also see at the end of the video clip Nalta is telling what his dreams are Maybe he wants to go to university and I know when the teachers heard his desire there they said it's not possible It's not the right perspective It's not okay But when we talked with the parents they said there are two things One of the things is that he said I don't have any dreams First of all we think as a professional we need to work with Natan You need to have dreams and so on But the parents told us the brother of Natan when he saw the movie he said actually Natan is a very chill person He can be in this moment He's very mindfulness He's not worrying about the future So when we got that perspective of the family that how Natan looks to the world we could see that is also something we can take into account and it changes our idea of the Alarambels who went on from old Natan doesn't have a perspective and the perspective he has is not the right perspective It's not possible to go to the university So I think I also read it in the chat We see a lot that we say that parents have a wrong perspective but I think it's important that in our collaboration we go in communication very deeply to know what do they mean and what is their idea of living For example the parents had already had contact with higher education to look at what are the possibilities What we want is that Natan could learn that he has a long life to learn I think it's important to know that is the perspective and one of the things is we need to give time to parents From our perspective of a professional I'm the teacher of that grade and I need to give that advice But most of all we see that it takes time to develop a pathway that is not a standard pathway So I think in working with parents we need to give parents time Sometimes that's difficult when you have a transition to another school because there needs to be some testing I also understand that there is some tension in it But I think there is still some space that we can give parents time to develop a pathway an idea of what is possible For example I can say Natan is already he's still learning in a higher education because he has a passion for music and he's also working in a library where he knows everything from Bach to Mozart So he's a very valuable employer there So I think it's important that in our collaboration we have a tension for those different hats parents are wearing and sometimes they go in resistance or they don't collaborate because of there is some tension between those different roles or different hats they have to put on So I just want to know what is your strategy of bringing in the expertise of parents into your classroom practice so that you can better address the needs of the children You can share it again in the chat or you can think about it What are strategies that help that parents can bring in their expertise their local knowledge how can they do that invite them to school a very important one I will go to the next slide and we put together the strategies that teachers are doing and that parents says that is very helpful to get a partnership where there is awareness of the very different there is awareness of our parent role we are not the professional So it's important to invite them to school One of the things is a strategy to have involvement of parents is engaging actively in connection and I think also open days for parents are very important again giving an idea of how a classroom is organized we did some research with parents who are not familiar with the Flemish educational system and the experience of schools was that there was a lot of resistance of parents they didn't want to collaborate and so on and one of the things is that actually they didn't have a clue of how a classroom was organized how their child was participating so actively involving parents connecting with parents is very important times that parents can collaborate in a school and then they can share their experience for example another thing parents also say is providing a bridge figure they say it's a figure it's a person that can be the bridge between school and the home context but also a person that when we are working with a lot of people we can make sure that groups come together that there is an agenda when there is a meeting and so on but always somebody who checks with parents are you aware of what is happening what are your points that you want to discuss what are the points from the school we want to discuss and so on so I know it takes a lot of energy we want to have collaboration with parents it will be very important to make sure maintain an open communication we had a lot of we already did a lot of research with parents and one of the things they give us they say we notice when there are obstacles or where there are things not spoken they know it so making sure that you have an open communication and in an open communication you also say that is working well and that are the obstacles recognizing the parents expertise making sure that we know their local knowledge that we can collect that we can use that so preparing actively working on that involvement secondly they say it has to do about this child in this school it has to become very personal and therefore parents say listen to the anecdotes the little stories from the home context for example for Clara if I think about it she can go in a stress level and gets very angry but the mother is very good in using humor and just doing that it makes sure that Clara is calming down so knowing what is that mother doing can help us the little anecdotes are helpful another thing is that parents say setting up an interaction and I see that somebody is telling making lessons both with students and parents it could be that you do something together that there is an interaction if I work around for Natan for example we have to work around Mozart what are the things you already could do at home to listen to Mozart and so on what was he telling what was his idea and so on be loyal to their choice of inclusive education it's maybe a very hard one but it's important if we look at inclusive education it's a way of life it's a pedagogical choice we need to take into account and to respect that choice also the needs are central I think I already said it has to do with making sure that you have a very rich representation of who is this child listen to the parents very carefully and being open to new things sometimes we need to search for a solution a solution is not there on one day we need to search for it so being open to new things exploring for example the teacher of Clara she said I never done it all my students did an examination so it was for her very difficult to take that step to see how can I also make sure that I can monitor the evaluation of Clara but it doesn't need to be in an examination so being open to new things taking that share to responsibility that is your responsibility as a teacher or a supporter take up that share to responsibility and last of it parents say the strategy of co-creation and in that strategy they say listen actively to each other and sometimes we need to brainstorm to make new ideas to develop new ideas another thing is what parents also say give support rather than advice a lot of the times parents also say give us time give us perspective give us maybe connection with other parents so that you can see what is needed and I just want to give an example of my own trajectory of one of my sons he has dyslexia and one of the things is I found it so important that he could read because I think it's a whole environment a whole world that is now locked up because he can't read but in interaction with other supporters and other parents I can see that there are a lot of resources that in this world maybe it's not that necessary or there are a lot of resources and it will change my idea in what is needed to develop or what is needed to support him and shares successes inclusion can also can only work if we also share successes and maybe it are very little steps but what is working can we share that can we explore that why is it working and one of the things is keep in mind that there are power relationships we want to have an equal relationship with parents but parents are in their very vulnerable role it's about their goals their child so we need to take into account that there is a difference in a power relationship and for example parents say if I come to a meeting then parents then there are a lot of professionals and the first thing they ask is can you tell how it's working at home or can you take the first worst or can you give your perspective sometimes it feel not secure for parents because that has to do with the difference in power relationship it's only it's almost an impossible task to talk a lot and to take you into strategies that can work in collaboration with parents in one hour so I hope that I inspired you and that now I will leave some time to have some time to have some questions thank you very much it was indeed a very interesting webinar so I saw a comment earlier like a few comments sorry I saw comment firstly from Natalia she said that parents are undoubtedly important in the lives of their children it's true in the decision making process however quite often their perspective is not right it is affected by their own expectations what do we do if they are not willing to modify their perspective despite the attempts of teachers to give them an idea of what is going on in the class yeah I think I want to thank you I think it was Natalia yeah to thank you that you already do a lot of yeah that you want to go to collaborate with parents what I think is important what I said is it has to do also with time because one of the things is what we say is it is influenced by their own background and their own values and their own perspective but that is normal that is with each of us that way so I think it's important that we give time to parents and that we listen very carefully in what is the value that they think is very important for example for my son I think it's very important that he still has a very good self-image it's not because of the reading is very hard that it also has to affect his self-image so sometimes with parents if you can discuss what are your what are the things you are worried about if you can explore that then sometimes you see it's not about the discussing point of his reading for example but it's about the discussing point of the warriors that parents have the things there are just the way they are very vulnerable about it so I think we need to make time we have to listen very carefully and maybe it's maybe not the right answer but not to think in terms they have a wrong perspective but they have a different perspective and maybe that also can make more connection between the the two diverse perspective thank you very much I would like also to highlight another comment I saw from that the relationship with parents is the key to success and also I see some the recommendation of some extra curricular activities in which parents and children students and teachers could maybe interact and participate all together yeah that's it was a comment it wasn't a question it was a comment but I think it's a very important comment we need to make sure that we don't divide the context of school and home that we divide it very that there is a distance but it's a challenge how do you do that when parents have to work and they cannot come to school from in Belgium it is 830 till 3 for example so I think we need to search how can we do that and for example I saw it in the chat that a person said I create lessons together with parents I think one of the things I saw what was very interesting is if you invite parents at home, at school and it can be in the hours that it's possible for them that they also can experience what is it to be a student here yeah it was a school where they worked very independently and they didn't give any scores anymore but they give stars you have one star or four stars and the parents were very worried about it what does it mean will my child get a good qualitative education so therefore in working together with the parents they notice what experience their children have and that it was very qualitative education so I think it's very important that we bridge those two worlds but that we also know that we need to adapt what is possible for parents indeed, thank you very much for all the fruitful information and all the comments and thank you everyone for participating I think we have reached the end of this webinar I have shared with you a short survey it would be really helpful for us to have your feedback you can find the link to the survey on the chat thank you again for presenting this webinar with us and everyone thank you very much have a nice evening and we hope to see you soon again in another webinar yep, thank you have a nice day