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Dealing with diversity: The inclusion of students with disabilities in music

One of the most common complaints made by teachers of many inclusive classrooms is the wide range of abilities among their students. A significant factor leading to classroom heterogeneity is the diversity and severity of disabilities represented in the classroom. As a result of varied abilities in the classroom, teachers face two important challenges. The first challenge is providing instruction that is sufficiently broad enough to address the needs of all students. Teachers not prepared to meet this challenge, wittingly or unwittingly, often exclude some students from instruction. The excluded students are frequently those who do not learn vicariously, and consequently, are dependent upon direct instruction. The second challenge teachers face in the inclusive classroom is the task of evaluating students of varying abilities fairly. Music educators, like all educators, must be prepared to use alternate grading methods in order to evaluate students with disabilities in the most appropriate manner possible. The purpose of this paper then is to examine the literature related to curricular and evaluation accommodations for students with disabilities. There are few studies or articles in the music education literature on these two specific topics; therefore, many of the citations are from the special education literature with implications made for music education. Future and current researchers are encouraged to carry out research in this important and fertile area.