Keeping Up With the Class: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Coteacher Interactions

• In Event: Roundtable Session 3
  In Roundtable Session: Disrupting Norms of Ability and Disability

Abstract

Co-teaching is a way to meet the needs of students with disabilities in inclusive general education settings (Friend, 2007). Although co-teaching has been the focus of significant educational research, traditional deficit discourses of disability persist in educational settings and impede inclusive education efforts (Naraian, 2010). This study draws from the critical theoretical field of Disability Studies in Education (DSE) and methodological foundations of Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA) (Fairclough, 2003) to analyze the discursive interactions of two co-teachers in a nominally inclusive context. Findings suggest that co-teacher interactions and pedagogy privilege “keeping up” with the pace of standardized general education curriculum, as per NCLB and IDEA, which results in inequity and marginalization of students with disabilities in the co-taught classroom.

Author

• Jennifer Ashton, College at Brockport - SUNY