Recording Support Measures in the Sequential Pedagogical Documents of Children With Special Education Needs

Abstract

This study investigates the descriptions of support measures in the sequential pedagogical documents (individual education plans or programs and others) of children with special education needs from early childhood education and care to preprimary education. According to the previous research, the role of pedagogical work is largely disregarded in these documents, which typically focus on describing children’s challenges instead of support measures. In this study, the sequential pedagogical documents (N = 257) of 64 Finnish children were studied for approximately 3 to 6 years, and the data were analyzed by investigating the textual and content-related coherence, as well as the linguistic precision, of the descriptions of support. Consequently, four chronological patterns of describing and developing the support measures—missing, repetitious, disorganized, and explicit—were introduced, and the study results emphasize the importance of the specificity and continuity of documentation.