Within a South African context, facilitating the increased participation of marginalized groups within society has become a cornerstone of social policy. In institutions of higher education, this has generally involved the targeting for support of individuals representing groups traditionally excluded on the grounds of socio-economic and disability status. The focus has tended to be more on physical access issues and some technical supports. For students with disabilities, assessment practices are fraught with additional limitations. One will say that access issues within higher education have been inadequately conceptualized and as a result failed to address fundamental issues around assessment for students with disabilities. Hence, this chapter explores diverse assessment practices that are used as a tool in responsive inclusive education settings particularly in institutions of higher learning. It comprises of a literature review focusing on the analysis of inclusive education and diverse assessments practices that can be used to respond to challenges of inclusive education.
Top15.1 Introduction
Institutions around the world have made inclusive teaching and learning a priority through policy, institutional and instructional commitment (May & Bridger 2010; Wray, 2013). This is because institutions of higher learning have become increasingly diverse, educators are emphasising inclusive practices in teaching, learning and assessments practice to accommodate the needs of diverse students. The philosophy of inclusive education is grounded in upholding human rights, promoting respect and equality, by providing equal opportunities for participation to all students irrespective of their gender, race, ethnicity, language or physical ability (Banks, 1998; Kaur, Noman & Awang-Hashim, 2015). One can also connect this pedagogy of inclusive education with the philosophy of Ubuntu where the emphasis is on humanity, liberation from unjust educational oppression, socio-economic oppression, poverty, racism, political oppression and gender injustices. Roseanna Bourke & Mandia Mentis (2014) indicate that teachers committed to inclusive education have the potential to revolutionise pedagogical and assessment practices within their space of teaching. It is also important for teachers to find creative ways to ascertain what and how a student with disability learns, and how to create responsive assessment tool to determine successful learning and to enable further learning.
It is worth noting that Inclusive education was originally developed for early childhood to high school learners, prior to its application within higher education. However, as more students with disabilities successfully complete their early schooling, the need to move towards inclusive practices within higher education has increased. In the inclusive education system, the provision of education for learners with disabilities is based on the level of support that learner needs to address the specific barriers to learning that they are experiencing. Hence, National Department of Education (2001) introduced the White Paper 6 and it explains a full service school as regular school special equipped to assist students with barriers to learning within the mainstream school system. On the other hand, here is a district-based support team to introduce strategies and interventions that will assist educators in the mainstream school system to cope with a diversity of learning and teaching needs. The backdrop provided above shows that institutions of higher learning are different from basic education system where there are schools that specifically cater for learners with special needs in higher education there are no such institution, all diversified students are incorporated in one setting. The question arises: is how are these students supported in higher education particularly in ensuring responsive assessment tools that could enable the learning of student’s diversity including those with special needs and assist them to overcome their barriers to learning in order to succeed in their studies? Hence, there is a crucial need for an inclusive approach in assessment to accommodate student’s diversity, accessibility, opportunity, relevance and responsive.