Practice-Based Research – activating teacher-researchers through the INCLASS project

The NCSE initiated a new practice-based research programme in 2023 to build teacher research capacity and skills and enhance inclusive teaching and learning experiences. The programme was designed to complement the NCSE’s existing research programme that informs national policy and practice, with classroom-based research on areas of inclusive practices undertaken by teachers in their schools. The NCSE is working with 6 Higher Education Institutes, who are supporting and working with schools on practice-based research projects.
The programme enables the cycle of research to policy and policy to practice research come full circle. This paper outlines an example of this cycle. Over ten years ago, NCSE research informed policy advice to the Minister for Education on resourcing teacher supports to schools. This advice culminated in historical changes to how schools were funded with teaching supports for students with additional educational needs (AEN) in 2017. A number of Department of Education publications guided schools on the use of such resources in the following years.
This paper outlines how one of the HEIs, University College Cork, has worked with schools under the NCSE’s programme to explore how supports are being used in schools. The Inclusive Classrooms for Learning and Achievement in School Settings (INCLASS), is a project looking at accomplished inclusive learning environments for students with AEN.
The Irish education system is now committed to developing inclusive practices across the system (NCSE, 2024). Nevertheless, progress around mainstream inclusive practice is still developing. In recent years, the topic of inclusive education for children with AEN has been of central importance to national debate and experience. This project focuses upon Stage One of the Continuum of Support (NEPS, 2007) and how teachers can develop more inclusive practice in their respective settings. The aims of the project were to:
• develop better understandings of how we meet the needs of learners with AEN in classroom settings across school types.
• develop clear indicators of good practice through a close-to-practice literature review, HEI-supported CPD workshops and case study models through asking teachers to observe, reflect upon and write about examples of ‘accomplished inclusive teaching’ (Doecke 2021).
We developed specific objectives that guided the work of the project:
• To address the gap between teachers’ attitudes to inclusive teaching for students with AEN and their knowledge and skills in the same area.
• To generate narratives of successful and accomplished inclusive pedagogical practice in classrooms by teachers to exemplify ‘what good looks like’ in inclusive practice.
• To develop teachers as research partners in the INCLASS research intervention.
The project involved specific phases, beginning with research literacy development of the participating teachers (n=12) and schools (n=4). These HEI-based sessions centred on: identifying focus and questions; approaching a literature review, methodology including ethics, data analysis, and writing-up/disseminating research. Once designed, the research project received full ethical approval from the UCC Social Research Ethics Committee, as well as clearance from schools’ Boards of Management. Classroom observation was used as the primary research method (physical, human, interactional, pedagogical) as the research team endeavored to get as ‘close-to-practice’ as possible.
Findings emerged from this research relating to key thematic areas of structured and unstructured approaches to classroom support; Universal Design for Learning (UDL) as an enabling framework for inclusion; the uses of collaborative partnerships for classroom inclusion. These thematic findings emerged from close cross-case analyses in the participating schools.
The implications of this research are two-fold and relate to advice for practice to support classroom-level inclusion in schools and serve to advise us on ‘practice-based research’ as a viable practice-informed, and practice-informing, approach to education research.
References
Doecke, B. (2021). ‘The Best Way to Approach Any Text’?. Changing English, 29(1), 89-100.
National Council for Special Education. (2024). An Inclusive Education for an Inclusive Society: Policy Advice Paper on Special Schools and Classes (NCSE Policy Advice Paper No.7). Retrieved April 10, 2025, from https://ncse.ie/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/An_Inclusive_Education_for_an_Inclusive_Society_NCSE_Policy_Advice_Paper_7.pdf