In March 2023, Mrs. Evi Katsapi, an Associate Professor from University College London (UCL) with more than 20 years of experience in interventions for children with special educational needs and disabilities, gave an online guest lecture, “Special Educational Needs and Disabilities: Labelling and Inclusion” in Dr. Catalina Ng and Ms. Catherine Cheng’s Understanding and Embracing Diversity Course for Early Childhood Education BEd (Honours) students.
In her lecture, Mrs. Katsapi drew upon her deep and broad knowledge of the field to define inclusion and special educational needs and disabilities in the United Kingdom (UK). She also helped students understand the dilemmas of inclusion and shared the advantages and disadvantages of labelling. Mrs. Katsapi had previously worked with Dr. Catalina Ng on another COIL activity on interventions for case studies.
In this Semester's collaboration, they are joined by Ms. Catherine Cheng, who shared her thoughts on COIL with us: “It was a precious and fruitful experience collaborating lectures with Evi from UCL in helping our students understand the concept of inclusion for special needs education across borders. My students benefited a lot from this lecture.”
For example, a student reflected after the lecture, “Inclusive education or special education? Which is easier to implement in Hong Kong? When a teacher discovers a student with special learning needs in Hong Kong, their first reaction is to find a teacher with special education experience to help them. Perhaps, as future teachers, we need to change our minds and explore how to make our classrooms more inclusive.”
The guest lecture by Mrs Katsapi is available here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxSn0ZG8jC0
Written by Sofie Chua (schua@eduhk.hk), COIL Facilitator