Inclusion from the pupil’s perspective: Creation and validation of a questionnaire for measuring the inclusive quality of schools
Gabriella Ferrara, Francesca Pedone
Many national and international studies have concentrated on the evaluation and promotion of the inclusive qualities of schools. It is a complex issue, which has led to wide debate and a variety of contributions, which, in turn, highlight the need for a tool capable of measuring the inclusive quality of our schools, in order to determine the empirical evidence regarding this topic.
This article presents the results of an experiment in drafting a questionnaire in order to measure the inclusive quality of the school system perceived by its pupils. The questionnaire is intended as an evaluation and selfevaluation tool that enables the inclusive quality generated by the context to be measured, as it is perceived by pupils. At the same time, the tool allows reflection processes amongst teachers to be promoted, so that they can implement educational activities which contribute to the planning and control of inclusive teaching practices.
This contribution puts forward an original tool for measuring the inclusive quality of the school system perceived by pupils attending primary school in several Sicilian towns. It was administered in its definitive version to a sample of 1652 children. The psychometric properties of the tool and the significance it can hold in the areas of planning in research and of educational design are presented in this paper.
Keywords
School inclusion; questionnaire; inclusive community; primary school
