Schooling experiences of students with intellectual disabilities

Abstract

Despite the vast scientific production and the dissemination of inclusive education policies, less attention has been paid to the subjects’ own view of their schooling experiences. This article presents an excerpt from a research that analyzed the daily lives of 30 youths and adults with intellectual disabilities, with the focus on their school experiences. Data were produced in open interviews, without a predetermined script, based on the Life History methodology. In line with previous field studies, the accounts showed that students with intellectual disabilities, in general, are not having adequate school experiences that, in fact, guarantee their development, participation, learning and social inclusion. The analysis of their speeches, especially of those who attended common education, points out, with few exceptions, a course of difficulties and school failure, leading in some cases to the return to the specialized institution. The reality portrayed makes us question the coherence between educational policies and proposals and their materialization in the daily school space. The teaching and learning process conception, the curricular structure, and the predominant pedagogical practices, as well as the teachers’ social representations about this public, are still impregnated by the meritocratic and classificatory culture, incompatible with an education for diversity. It is emphasized that listening to the feedback from these students, targets of policies and programs, should be the starting point for the development of procedures and pedagogical strategies that are, in fact, in line with the perspective of school inclusion.