At the 34th conference of Inclusion Researchers (IFO-Conference) with the topic “Borders.Walks.Inbetween.Worlds” in Vienna, from 25th – 28th February 2020, the project consortium organized a two-hour symposium on the question of “Internship assistance as a central place of mediation between subject and inclusion-oriented action”.
Ass.Prof.Dr. Michael Wininger (Berta von Suttner Private University St. Pölten) moderated the symposium, which focused on an aspect of inclusive education that has not been sufficiently considered so far. Professionals have to perceive and overcome inner-psychic boundaries to be able to create an inclusive community in the outward appearance of the educational situation. The core of this psychological work is the recognition of one’s own as foreign or familiar. This approach should already be initiated in the support of internships, since students are inevitably confronted with inner limitations during their internship.
The main interests of the symposium were the discussion of
– the basic assumption of the interaction of inner-psychic inclusion/exclusion tendencies and the design of inclusive interaction processes/structures.
– formats that allow to deal with this interaction in teacher education.
Against this background, results of the still ongoing project Pro-Inclusive-Reflective were discussed. Dr. Jean-Marie Weber’s talk “Inclusion as an intended work with alterity” thematised why it is important for students in internships to understand the influence of their subjective constructions of otherness and equality on their actions and how internship advisors can be prepared for the task of guiding such mentalization processes.
Prof. Dr. Margit Datler presented the support module for internships developed in the project: “Reflection on self and others in inclusive action” – The design of an inclusive-reflective seminar to support the practice. Based on their own school biographical experiences the students’ relation to experiences of difference is established. By mentalizing the experiences of difference and congruence, teacher trainees are offered an educational programme in which they conceive the emergence and meaning of their current psychological structures. These structures have a significant influence on how the students experience school internships, how they deal with heterogeneity and how they later organise inclusion/exclusion processes in the self-responsible practice.
Dr. Bernhard Rauh focused in his contribution “The performative character of professional speaking about the perception of diversity” on how speaking about interaction in the classroom constructs reality. Structurally, this is about the marked reflection and thus recognition of the inner situation by others with the help of language.