Give children with disabilities to daycare? Inclusion and support as part of external support

Inclusion and support as part of external support

We talked to special needs teacher Caroline Völker about today’s childcare concepts for children spoken with learning difficulties or other impairments.

Give child care or not?

Parents of special children should always consider some important factors that can influence a decision for or against the external care of their child with disabilities:

Socialization:
Each parent knows their own child best. For your decision, carefully monitor whether your child is striving for social contacts. Would these have a positive impact on your offspring?

development:
The third factor in decision making is the importance of self-actualization. Every member of the family has the right to develop their own personality. This also includes the parents.

Insulation Danger:
Devotion can also lead to isolation. Feel yourself emotionally or socially isolated and need an exchange with friends, other parents or colleagues?

Integration and inclusion in daycare

Both integration and inclusion education pursue the abolition of structured educational systems from which children with disabilities are quickly excluded.
While within the integrative concept for school and kindergarten a normality concept predominates, in which children with disabilities are “taken in”, inclusion sees itself as the next stage: “The goal is,” says special educator Caroline Völker, “that the children consider themselves to be here perceive a community that combines diverse skills and levels – according to the motto: everyone is different. ”In KiTas everyone is excited to participate actively and equally in the learning community.

For the expert, the concept of inclusion is clearly the means of choice. "The key issue of inclusive concepts is the appreciation of diversity," clarifies Ms. Völker. Including pedagogy describes the "transparency of the upbringing and educational methods as well as the open attitude of the educators towards all children."

There is a wide range of external care for children with disabilities.

Offers for children under the age of three

For under three year olds, the care offers are defined differently by federal state and by the respective one country financed. The regional ministry of culture and local youth welfare office is available in these cases with advice and lots of information. The general consensus is that every child – whether with or without a disability – needs other children for positive development.
Children with disabilities can find their way into crawling groups or play circles founded by parent initiatives or can be looked after in small groups by day carers. In the meantime, care is also taking place in mixed age in many kindergartens. So the group is already colorful from the start.

Offers for children from the age of three

If the children are over three years of age, the childcare options multiply: Basically, a distinction can be made between integrative – including day care facilities with inclusive concepts -, additive and independent facilities in the field of education.

Caroline Völker knows about the current status in the educational landscape in Germany. Among all the different concepts, the inclusion, in her opinion, is "certainly that best – and one that has been a fundamental right for people with disabilities since the signing of the Disability Rights Convention at the latest ”.

Additive kindergartens
… understand their groups as being looked after separately. Special and regular kindergartens work together institutionally and are under one roof. A similar concept is pursued by cooperative kindergartens, which promote a temporary exchange between children with and without disabilities, but still support groups separately in different institutions.

Exclusive facilities
… are special and school kindergartens. In special kindergartens, only children with impairments are looked after and explicitly encouraged. School kindergartens are used to prepare children for everyday school life who are already in school but still need some time to find their way around school. They are often in direct contact with special kindergartens.

The following checklist can be helpful in preparation for the daycare facility for your child.

About Caroline Völker

In addition to her first state examination in primary school teaching, she studied to build up a master’s degree in special and integration education. Since the beginning of her training, Ms. Völker has been working in the family relief service of Lebenshilfe. Most recently, she worked as an integration teacher in a primary school and a Swedish primary school where children with and without disabilities learn together and taught early childhood educators in the area of pedagogy at the SRH Gera University of Health.

And after the daycare the school follows! Read here how blogger Katarina Weides found the right school for her daughter with Down syndrome.