Focus on Practice: Researching Special Needs

In the March 2002 issue of BJSE , Richard Rose argued that the agenda for research in special education should be determined by establishing ‘effective partnerships’ between teachers and researchers. He suggested that teachers are beginning to be more involved in research but that educational researchers needed to ‘take a lead in involving classroom practitioners in the development of school–based projects’. John Wilson, an author of many books on philosophy and education, and currently Senior Research Associate at the Oxford University Department of Educational Studies, agrees that, if educational research is to drive forward improvements in practice, it must engage ‘the minds and understandings of practitioners’. This article takes the debate further, however. John Wilson proposes that research into special educational needs has also to engage with an exploration of the meaning of the phrase ‘special needs’ and a review of the values that underpin the use of this phrase by practitioners, policy makers and researchers. He concludes that this process will entail the development of new forms of enquiry, new ways of working, and new ways of thinking about research and special educational needs.