Understanding and Responding to the Experience of Disability

Understanding and Responding to the Experience of Disability informs readers about current understandings of disability and ways of recognizing the needs that arise from the lived experience of impairment in schools. While most schools have clear procedures in place with respect to identifying children with special educational needs, the same is not true for disability. Moreover, research suggests that many schools have restricted understanding of this distinction, often equating disability to children with SEN and children with health conditions, thereby failing to recognize the pivotal role of impact.

In this insightful text, Jill Porter argues that disability needs to be understood within the setting in which it is experienced, thereby recognizing that it is not a fixed attributable label, but one that is cultural, contextual and fluid. By providing a theoretical basis for understandings of disability around notions of impairment, experience and impact, the book combines three key components:

• a conceptual understanding of disability – to provide a clear value driven framework for professional responses;
• an empirical illustration of the development of materials to support an understanding of why the process of disability data collection cannot simply be reduced to two questions on a form;
• embedded illustrative case study material to provide exemplars of how the materials can be contextualized and used to make adjustments to enhance the participation of all children.