Analysis of Parental Engagement in Inclusive Classroom from Teachers' Lenses

Abstract

This study deals with the understanding and experience of teachers in urban primary schools in Georgia and England regarding the parental engagement in the inclusive education of students with Special Educational Needs (SEN). The research is based on semi-structured interviews with ten teachers who are in two different national contexts and uses a qualitative, cross-national case study design and reflexive thematic analysis to find the similarities, differences, and common issues of the two countries. According to the results, both teachers in Georgia and those in England find parental involvement not only important but also a necessary condition for including all students in the classroom effectively. The most prevalent challenges of the parental capacity remain the parental stigma, a lack of special educational needs awareness in Georgia, emotional burnout, and bureaucratic complexity in England. The collaborative work is also affected by system-level barriers, which are of various types, such as the lack of specialist support and unclear procedures in Georgia, long assessment waiting lists, and SENCos who are overloaded with work in England. However, despite these, both sets of environments indicate constant contradiction between what the policies say should be done and what is actually done. According to the research findings, effective participation of parents in the education of their children comes with the need for long-term commitment and systemic investment, which entails things such as more provision of specialists, targeted parent education, clearer communication structures, and reforms that would ease the burden of work on teachers. These findings stress the importance of context-tailored strategies to promote the synergy between home and school and the enrichment of learning experiences in the case of SEN students.