Program Overview

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Course Overview

The MEd (Special and Inclusive Education) offers teachers who have successfully completed the PDip (Special Educational Needs), and obtained a H2.1 award or higher, the opportunity to continue their study and conduct educational research that will assist them further in effectively supporting students with special educational needs in their schools.

The course includes, complements, and develops learning that has taken place during the PDSEN, with an additional core focus being on the development of participants’ research literacy and personal research skills.

On completion of this course, participants will be able to:

Adopt a critical stance in their reading of existing research.

Critically discuss ontological and epistemological concerns in educational research.

Identify and justify appropriate methods for investigating a well-refined research question(s) in the context of their minor thesis.

Demonstrate a systematic understanding of current knowledge at the forefront of learning in special and inclusive education by conducting a literature review in a chosen area.

Design and plan small-scale quantitative, qualitative, mixed-methods primary research or secondary research.

Understand, explain and demonstrate compliance with key ethical responsibilities associated with research involving human participants (especially vulnerable populations).

Gather, scrutinise and reflect upon data in the context of set research objectives.

Conduct basic descriptive and inferential analyses using IBM SPSS, and report and present findings appropriately.

Analyse qualitative data using appropriate techniques, and report and present findings in an aligned manner.

Synthesise research findings and critically evaluate them in the context of existing knowledge in the chosen area.

Reflect on the role of the researcher in the research process.

Demonstrate insight into the chosen research area by making recommendations that effectively communicate the outcomes and implications of the research.