Listening to Elementary Teachers’ Voices in an Inclusive Classroom: A Retrospect of their Experiences

This study explored the lived experiences, challenges encountered, coping mechanisms and insights of public elementary teachers in implementing inclusive education in schools. The participants were coming from DepEd Region XI, Division of Davao City, specifically in the schools of Bunawan District. There were ten (10) teachers who participated in the study. This study made use of a phenomenological approach to extract the ideas from the participants. The participants were purposely selected as representatives from the group of elementary school teachers in the same district. The virtual in-depth interview was employed to gather significant information with regard to their respective lived experiences. Using the thematic analysis, the following themes emerged pertaining to their lived experiences: equity amidst inclusivity, challenged but competent teachers, considering learners’ improved social skills and hurdling mainstreaming issues. Further, there were three (3) subthemes identified on the hurdling mainstreaming issues as the challenges encountered by the participants, these are lack of formal training for teachers, lack of parental support and the lack of facilities. The coping mechanisms of teacher participants on the challenges they experienced were: teachers’ training program for mainstreaming classes, cultivating patience as teachers, and teacher-parent partnerships. The educational management insights drawn from the participants were understanding the beauty of learners’ diversity and the importance of a supportive school environment. Thus, The DepEd administrators and heads may craft teacher enhancement programs through face-to-face training or through webinars focusing on handling inclusive classes and implementing instructions in schools.