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Home Based Education: A Key Driver of Inclusive Education

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In Madhu Gupta (Eds.), Inclusive Education: Issues & Challenges, Mastermind
Publications, Meerut (UP) 2014, pp. 277-284 (ISBN 978-93-82782-14-8).

Home Based Education: A Key Driver of Inclusive Education

Vandana Punia* & Aruna Sharma**
THE BACK-DROP
The educational scenario of global and national level is going through a sea change.
The education delivery mechanism which had been very popular but concentrated has been
emerging with new innovations for its widespread use. The move of inclusive education has
become a hallmark in the educational agenda of every country in general and for India in
particular. In fact the philosophy of ‘inclusive education’ revolves around the assumption
that almost every students should start in a general classroom in the initial stage. However
depending upon the special needs of select children they could be moved into the
environments which is comparatively restrictive and also suits to the special needs of child.
Hence the concept ‘home based education’ which was in restrictive use in earlier times has
become more popular and handy in the philosophy of ‘inclusive education’ which can be a
key driver of ‘inclusive growth’. Economic growth of any country will remain a distant
dream and far from reality of ‘inclusive growth’ if its education is not made inclusive. The
inclusive education again call for rightful education without bias of any kind could be
regional, caste, creed, gender or special physical & mental requirements of the children.
Therefore, the concept of ‘home based education’ which in the ancient times was a privilege
for children of distinct and affluent class like kings, queens etc (who normally wanted to
keep their wards away from the general public) has emerged in a new from of serving to the
differently abled children so that Children With Special Needs (CWSN) are not deprived of
their right to education. Since the Government of India adopts the socialistic pattern of
society to attain inclusive growth wherein each individual irrespective of their physical and
mental abilities has a mandate to contribute in the system. Hence keeping this in view, the
present paper has been attempted to explore the utility and mechanism of ‘home based
education’ for inclusive growth.

* Dr. (Mrs.) Vandana Punia, Department of Education, Chaudhary Devi Lal

University, Sirsa, Haryana -125 055 (INDIA).
** Dr. (Mrs.) Aruna Sharma, B.J.R.D. College of Education, Pali, Mohindergarh,
Haryana (INDIA).
THE ORIGIN AND MEANING OF HOME BASED EDUCATION
Inclusion, as a way of joining together children with special needs into regular school
education, gained importance in India during 1970s, with the launch of ‘Scheme of
Integrated Education of the Disabled Children-IEDC’ in 1974. The increased wakefulness
and need to educate CWSN has also been reflected in the National Policy on Education- NPE
(1986) and the succeeding Plan of Action- POA (1992), which advocated for providing
integrated special education for the mildly handicapped and severely handicapped children.
There are differing views on inclusion wherein some view it as policy driven by the
conviction that all students have a right to be in a regular school, and hence, try to bring all
children into mainstream in the inclusion mold. This philosophy can be just as coercive and
inequitable as trying to force all Children With Special Needs (CWSN) into the mold of a
special education class/special school or any other alternative placement setting. Similarly
the other segment believes that all students have the right to be in an educational setting
where their learning potential of the children is optimized to its fullest.
The role of government in a democratic system with regards to home-based education
is encouragement, information and support, not the domination as far as education of CWSN
is concerned. The Persons with Disabilities (Equal Opportunities, disabled without creating
room for dicey situation Protection of Rights and Full Participation) Act, Government of
India, 1995 (hereafter, PWD Act) also provide for the relevant provisions in this regards
though not specific to ‘home based education’. Even the RTE Act (2009) as originally passed
in 2009 and the RTE Amendment Act (2010) by the Parliament also did not have any
provision for approved by the Parliament in the year 2012, “home-based education” for
disabled children. Though the Government of India launched Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (SSA)
for Universalization of Elementary Education aiming at providing useful and relevant
elementary education in the age group of 6-14 years by 2010 yet this goal cannot be
accomplished in isolation of Children with Special Needs (CWSN). SSA has adopted a more
pragmatic approach in implementing the programme of inclusive education wherein its
framework clearly states that “SSA will ensure that every child with special needs,
irrespective of the kind, category and degree of disability, is provided education in an
appropriate environment. SSA will adopt zero rejection policy so that no child is left out of
the education system. It will also support a wide range of approaches, options and strategies
for education of children with special needs”. Inclusive education in SSA is a more
expansive concept which stresses upon providing education to CWSN in an environment
most appropriate to their learning needs may be from a regular school, bridge courses to
prepare CWSN for schools or home-based education.
Home Based Education is an important mechanism of service delivery in inclusive
education as initiated by SSA. Generally home-based education is defined as the education of
children with severe intellectual/physical disabilities, who can be educated in the
combination of home-based and alternate educational settings to enable them to achieve
independent living skills. Home based education aims at school preparedness and preparation
for life. Alternate educational settings provide opportunities for learning of social skills,
vocational skills and implementation of life skills. A severely intellectually disabled child
will be a child who would not be able to perform two or more of the Toileting, Feeding,
Communication, Motor Skills, Basic social skills, and Self grooming functions independently,
which a non-disabled child of that age group could do. Research findings reveal that
inclusion is best determined by the individual needs of the child wherein some CWSN can be
included in regular schools by giving them high level of support resources whereas the others
might have been granted pre-integration Programme in form of home based education. Still
some CWSN with severe disabilities would require an Educational Programme with
intensive specialized support which is normally beyond the preview and scope of any formal
school in current situations. Home-based education is in its growing stage in India and cannot
be even considered as an alternative to schooling. Yet it can prove to be a remedial measure
to be used in exceptional situations. Though home based education is a relatively
controversial topic for many educators and policy makers as many critiques are not in its
favour it is violating the philosophy and vision of inclusive education yet keeping in view its
significance it can bring desirable results in specific situations.
The July 2006 report called ‘Discovering New Paths to Inclusion-A Documentation
of Home-based Practices for CWSN’, states that “no child having special needs should be
deprived of the right to education and taught in an environment, which is best, suited to
her/his learning needs. These include special schools, E.G.S., A.I.E. or even home-based
education”. Universalisation of Elementary Education, being flagship Programme of Indian
Government, SSA has adopted Zero Rejection Policy in its implementation which signifies
that no child having special educational needs should be deprived of getting educational
opportunities in an environment which is best suited to his learning needs. Various steps
were initiated for the inclusion of children with special educational needs yet there is a group
of CWSN who is not eligible for inclusion due to the high degree of their disability. Because
of severe disability some children are not able to accommodate themselves in regular schools
and some disabled children need highly specialized skills taught by specially trained teacher,
and herein home based education is a legal option for inclusive education. As stated earlier
home-based education is the education of children with severe intellectual/physical
disabilities, who can be educated in the combination of home-based and alternate educational
settings to enable them to achieve independent life skills. Home-based education aims at
school preparedness and preparation for life in alternate educational settings for severely
intellectual disabled opportunities for learning of social skills, vocational skills and
implementation of life skills and thus comprises of following features:
 It is the combination of home based and alternative educational settings.
 Its main purpose is to enable CWSN with severs disabilities to achieve independent
life skills.
 It is an efficient mechanism of service delivery mode in inclusive education and aims
at school readiness and preparation of life.
 Its main objective is to provide alternative educational settings to help CWSN with
sever disabilities in learning social skills, vocational skills and above all life skills.
 It is being imparted by the teachers of model inclusive schools and family is active
participant in planning, intervention and evaluation.
 Emphasis is given to early identification and intervention of child and parents can be
well informed about their child weaknesses and strengths whose full participation is
required in providing skill based training to their child.
RATIONALE, SIGNIFICANCE & ADVANTAGES OF HOME BASE EDUCATION
Various surveys and studies have revealed that a large percentage of CWSN are
deprived of their right to education due to the severe nature of their disabilities as they might
not be accommodated in a regular classroom setting. Due to specific needs of some children
at some point in their lives, they may need a special education programme which is
completely outside the purview of the regular classroom which necessitates the provision of
home based education owing to the following reasons:
 Specialized skills requirements by specially trained teachers.
 Alternative academic curriculum due to non-response/inordinate time requirements to
the standardized curriculum.
 Need the support of peer group but away from mainstream school boundaries.
 Excessive requirement of active parental partnerships/cooperation/participation.
Although, no formal impact assessment studies could be available to assess the
usefulness of home-based education, yet the related researches and reviews highlight that
home based education can lead to various advantages like:
 The parents of CWSN become effective teachers along with the ‘expert’ tutors and
this parent-expert partnership builds mutual trust and thus sharing home-based early
intervention. Since the child and the family have access to an inclusive and well-
coordinated range of services that address the child and families’ physical, emotional,
social, and special needs which improves the quality of life not only for the CWSN
but for the whole family.
 The progress of CWSN can be assessed through a carefully designed individualized
programme with active and wholehearted participation of parents. In this
phenomenon CWSN witness progress in their overall development, together with
cognitive and language domains and once the child builds up the basic Activities of
Daily Living- ADL, the alternate services could be extended to the regular schools
 CWSN improve degree of eye-contact, expressive language and comprehension of
instructions and communication skills. The services which are provided keeping in
mind the linguistic needs, socio-cultural norms and values of each child and family
leads to a follow-up the progress on a regular basis, and consequently it helps in
reduction of disruptive behaviour of CWSN.
MYTHS AND CHALLENGES OF HOME BASE EDUCATION
There are certain about home-based education that children education under home
based education ‘miss out the socialization’, and also ‘the exposure to approved forms of
knowledge’. Though the authors are advocating here the philosophy of home based education
only to CWSN yet the evidences from other countries have gone in favour of home based
education even for normal children. In Indian context even in the historical times the wards
of kings and queens were provided home based education that used to rule later on. The
advocates who speak in favour of home based education view that these children do not
report the feelings of resentment, the boredom or the certain bad habits which can be
attributed to normal school culture. It is true that a home-based school is basically a one-class
school operating in a room in a home, small space at tutor’s place, or the shade of a tree does
the supply of learning materials as available in a normal school yet some classroom(s) could
be adorned with wall charts and visual materials as per requirements whereas others are quite
bare and children sit on mats on the floor of empty rooms even than this phenomenon help in
growth of the children and also performing a social cause.
While talking in favour of home based education the evidence in UK, USA, Canada
and elsewhere confirms that the children educated under home based education are, on
average, two years ahead of their schooled counterparts and in the case of working class
children closer to three years ahead and it is rare for home-educated young people to be
unemployed. If we take the case of USA situation where of the 42 or so past presidents, 17
were home-based education graduates and the studies trying to rank them in order of their
success, consistently put the first five as George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Franklin D.
Roosevelt, Thomas Jefferson and Theodore Roosevelt who all were home-based education
graduates. Bertrand Russell, distinguished philosopher and mathematician, was another home
based education graduate who observed about himself that “I was glad I did not go to school.
I would have had no time for original thought, which has been my chief stay and support in
troubles”. So the philosophy of home based education which has witnessed the success for
normal children can prove to be boon for CWSN while not only educating them and
attempting to bring them in mainstream but giving them a meaning of their life, yet the
system has inbuilt challenges in the form of:
 Home-based school conditions and the professional isolation;
 The tentativeness, sustaining and improving home-based schooling;
 Policy implications and recommendations of integration into the government system;
 Teacher training support and teacher accreditation.
CONCLUSION
 Inclusive growth of any country which enhances its competitive strength is an
encompassing term and very rightfully includes its economic and educational growth.
However the growth will remain a distant dream and far from reality of ‘inclusive’ if its
education is not made inclusive. The inclusive education again call for rightful education
without bias of any kind could be regional, caste, creed, gender or special physical & mental
requirements of the children. The move of inclusive education has become a hallmark in the
educational agenda of every country in general and for India in particular. In fact the
philosophy of ‘inclusive education’ revolves around the assumption that almost every student
has a right of education irrespective of their physical and mental qualification. The concept
‘home based education’ which was in restrictive use in earlier times has become more
popular and handy in the philosophy of ‘inclusive education’ which can be a key driver of
‘inclusive growth’ due to its various merits as discussed in the paper. In fact home based
education is an important mechanism of service delivery in inclusive education as initiated
by government of India.
References
Batu, Sema (2008). Caregiver-Delivered Home-Based Instruction Using Simultaneous
Prompting For Teaching Home Skills to Individuals with Developmental Disabilities,
Education and Training in Developmental Disabilities, 43(4), 541–555
Cavkaytar, A. (2007). Turkish Parents as Teachers: Teaching Parents How to Teach Self-
Care and Domestic Skills to their Children with Mental Retardation. Education and
Training in Developmental Disabilities, 42, 85–93.
Collins, B. C. (2007). Moderate and Severe Disabilities: A Foundational Approach New
Jersey: Pears
D'Haem, Jeanne (2008). Special at School but Lonely at Home: An Alternative Friendship
Group for Adolescents with Down syndrome. Down Syndrome Research and
Practice, 12(2), pp. 107-111.
Lustig (2009). Homebound Instruction: The Legal Segregation Of Students With Disabilities
Under The Individuals With Disabilities Education Act: ProQuest Dissertations and
Theses, 2009
 Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan (2006). Discovery New Paths in Inclusion: A Documentation of
Home Based Education Practices for CSWN in SSA: Elementary Education &
Literacy Bureau- MHRD (2006).

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