Society, culture and special education for differently abled children.

Abstract

The current research entitled “Society, culture and special education for differently abled children” undertakes the task of exploring various aspects of special education in Skardu. This research carried out three objectives. First objective of this research is to figure out the perception of people about special education. Second objective of this study deals with state of special education in Skardu, and third objective is meant to explore the hurdles and barriers faced by special education in Skardu. Anthropological tools of data collection i.e., in-depth interviews, case studies, participant observation and jotting were used data acquisition. Purposive and convenience sampling were used during this research. Sample size of this study was 34. This study was conducted between October 2020 to January 2021 and the duration of this study was four months. Several techniques and tools like in-depth interviews, focus group discussions, observations, jottings, and audio recordings were used for data acquisition. People were very diverse when it came to figure out their perception regarding education of differently abled children. Female were less favoured, and special education for female was least preferable according to them. Children with down syndrome, and mental retardation also got least attention in terms of education while children with different physical abilities, hearing impairment and visual impaired were more on the preferable side. State of special education in Skardu was less than desired. Majority of the students were out the educational spheres. Special education complex developed various programs and plans in order to accommodate differently abled children in mainstream society and the results of these programs and plans were quite prolific. Although special education complex was providing facilities to the students to improve their life standards but there were some serious problems also which need to address. Lack of hostel facilities, library and budgetary issues were among main hurdle in special education