Inclusão de estudantes com transtorno do espectro autista: compreensão dos docentes atuantes no atendimento educacional especializado

Abstract

Autistic Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterized by neurological development disorders that result in deficits in social, communicative and behavioral dimensions. In the Specialized Educational Service (SES), the ASD it stands out as one of the diagnosis most present in the school environment. Thus, the present research aimed to: i) investigate, in education standardizing documents, the guidelines for inclusion of students with disabilities, pervasive developmental disorders and high abilities/giftedness in Basic Education, as well as the guidelines for training inclusive educators; ii) investigate the understanding of teachers working in the SES about inclusion of students with ASD in the educational context of Elementary School. Research has a qualitative and descriptive character, being elaborated from Document Analysis and Case Study. In the first stage, an analysis was carried out on documents that guide education in Brazil and in the Rio Grande do Sul state , with the aim of identifying guidelines for teacher training and for students inclusion. In the second stage, a questionnaire containing open and closed questions was applied to teachers working in SES, in order to identify their understanding of ASD and on the school students inclusion. Data were treated using Content Analysis and categorized using word clouds. Results referring to educational documents analysis indicate limited guidelines and duplicates, praising the right of this students to remain in regular classes of regular education, with the SES support, but without guidelines on how the inclusion process should take place. This limitation affects the guidelines related to the training of teachers in regular classes, being directed to professionals in specialized classrooms, which inhibits the inclusive process in general. It was also identified that the documents do not indicate the responsibility of the Union, states and municipalities in case of non-compliance with their legal provisions. Participated in the second stage of the research, nine teachers working in the SES of public elementary schools. It was found that the understanding of teachers about the SES is close to what is stated in the legal guidelines. As for the ASD, it was found that the teachers have fragile knowledge, alluding to the most publicized characteristics about this disorder, without, however, delving into the aspects related to the social, communicative, behavioral and neurodevelopmental deficits. Among the data found, there is also evidence of the inclusion difficulty and understanding process of not recognizing that they are sufficiently capable to adequately assist students with ASD. Thus, it is concluded that, in order to remedy the gaps diagnosed here, it is urgent to review the normative aspects related to inclusive educators training for ASD and SES, in order to expand the guidelines on the inclusion of these students in all its spectrums. It is further inferred that it is necessary that these documents clearly contain the guidelines for educators training from inclusive regular classes, continuing education of SES professionals, and who aim, in addition to discussing the conceptual approach of ASD, to enable them, through strategies and methods, to meet the specific needs of students with this disorder.