Evaluation of the project "From novice teacher to teacher mentor" - teacher's work with the chronically ill pupils

Abstract

The current understanding of inclusion within the contemporary Czech education system confirms the existence of possibilities of appropriate ways of working with chronically ill pupils in class. Moreover, teachers are expected to be able to cope with such demands as it is considered to be one of their professional competences. In order to improve these competences, the Faculty of Humanities at Tomas Bata University in Zlin implemented a project titled From Novice Teacher to Teacher Mentor, a part of which was an instructional module "An analysis of teacher's work with ill children". The primary focus of this study is this very module and the basic theses are as follows: What knowledge of children's chronic illnesses do novice teachers have? What does inclusion of the chronically ill child in a school environment look like? Did teacher participation in the instructional module "Analysis of teacher's work with ill children" improve their professional competences? The aim of the study is to point out the possibilities of professional growth of pedagogical workers, especially novice teachers when it comes to working with the chronically ill child. (C) 2016 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd.