Attitudes of kindergarten teachers towards the educational inclusion of children with disabilities in the Arabian Gulf countries: A cross-cultural study

Abstract

The current study aims to identify the kindergarten teacher’s attitudes toward the educational inclusion of children with disabilities in the Arabian Gulf countries. The study has been conducted on a sample of 747 kindergarten teacher selected from four countries in the Arabian Gulf region including the Sultanate of Oman, the State of Qatar, the United Arab Emirate and the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. To achieve the aims of the study, the researchers developed a questionnaire for measuring the attitudes of kindergarten teachers towards the inclusion of children with disabilities into regular classes. The questionnaire consisted of 34 items that addressed three domains: cognitive, behavioral and emotional dimensions. Results revealed that the attitudes of the kindergarten teachers about the inclusion proved to be moderate for each of the dimensions of the questionnaire and the total dimensions, while there were statistically significant differences on the following variables: age, qualification and specialty. The results did not show any statistical differences for the teaching experience variable. In light of these results, the study suggested a set of recommendations to enrich the process of the educational inclusion of children with disabilities in the Arabian Gulf countries.