Examination of inclusive education and resource room service in a preschool : Examination of inclusive education and resource room service

Pre-school education which takes place in the fastest and most critical years of the development of individuals. Qualified and equal education opportunities offered to children with special needs are important in terms of their development in the pre-school education process.Based on these ideas, this study aimed to examine inclusive education and resource room services in the pre-school. For this purpose, this study adopted a phenomenological research methodology to examine the phenomenon in depth. The participants of the study were determined by the criterion sampling method, one of the purposeful sampling methods. The participants of this study are nine pre-school teachers who have students with special needs in their classrooms and a teacher who provides resource rooms education to these students. The research data were collected through semi-structured interviews and document analysis.  The analysis of the data was carried out with the inductive approach. As a result of the study, it was determined that inclusive education and resource room have many contributions to students with special needs, families, teachers, and students with normal growth and development. In addition, the basic elements of inclusive education and resource room were determined to be physical arrangements in schools, teacher training, resource room, cooperation, and inclusion activities. Also, it was determined that methods-techniques and materials suitable for the characteristics of students with special needs were not used in the planning, implementation, and evaluation processes of the inclusive education and the resource room. At the same time, it was revealed that effective cooperation and teamwork were not carried out during these processes.