Duo undergo course on inclusive learning

Education
Kiak Guande: “To see a new angle is a great way forward…We will now try to implement inclusive education in our institutions.”

A MIDWIFE and a teacher say undergoing a course in disability inclusion will help them be able to better address the needs of people with disabilities.
Kiak Guande and Moses Tekei, who are currently undergoing an Australia Awards Certificate in disability inclusion short course, said incorporating inclusiveness in their departments at their institutions was important.
Midwife Guande is a clinical supervisor with Lutheran School of Nursing in Madang.
She said the course had shown her that the medical model was inadequate to properly understand and help those with disabilities.
“The social model of disability shows that where a person lives, the environment, the attitude of people they interact with and the education curriculum and pedagogy (teaching method) used can cause hindrances and barriers,” she said.
“So, for us to see a new angle is a great way forward and we will now try to implement inclusive education in our institutions.”
Tekei, who is head of the humanities department at Gumine Secondary School in Chimbu, said in his 14 years of secondary teaching, he saw that students with impairments attending mainstream schools were not given proper support to learn.

Moses Tekei: “We’re so focused on academic results, teachers don’t have time to deal with students with disabilities.”

“Because we are focused on academic results, teachers don’t have time to deal with students with disabilities,” he said. “And without that support, they (students) are unable to complete their studies and are pushed out.”
After completing the first part of their course, delivered by the Queensland University of Technology, Guande and Tekei are already identifying gaps that need to be addressed to provide inclusive education at their institutions.
“We have seen a lot of students with disabilities in kindergarten, primary and high schools,” Tekei said.
“But there are no special education teachers to teach and interpret sign language and we do not have resource centres.”
Tekei said addressing these barriers and having better support systems in place would help students with disabilities have opportunities to continue their education past primary school, onto high school and tertiary studies.