Dis/ability and Disruption: Possibilities for a Critical Disability Studies Approach to Early Childhood Inclusion

• In Event: Reenvisioning Early Childhood Education at the Intersections of Disability

Abstract

This paper draws on data obtained during a participatory action research (PAR) study which explored what happened when one early childhood community of children, caregivers, and teachers, engaged in the project of taking a critical disability studies (CDS) approach to inclusion. Throughout the PAR project, which took place in a multi-lingual, inclusive, mixed-age (6-8) classroom in France, the disruptive potential of dis/ability emerged as a significant catalyst for taking specific actions to create a CDS informed inclusive classroom. This paper describes how dis/ability provoked the classroom community to develop new ways of being, doing, and learning.

Author

• Nicole Eilers, University of North Carolina - Chapel Hill