Sustainability-oriented teacher education for inclusive education in Southern Africa

Abstract

How do teacher educators prepare future teachers for inclusive education? The Sustainability Starts with Teachers programme involved teacher educators in 11 southern African countries on capacity building for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) in teacher education, which focused on many issues, including inclusive education. This qualitative formative intervention case study research involved teacher educators in Malawi, Tanzania and Eswatini to build their capacity for integrating inclusive education into the mainstream curricula of their respective countries. Focusing on disability education, the research generated data to answer the main research question from workshop observations, interviews with teacher educators, their reflective journals and documentation. Bronfenbrenner’s bioecological systems theory is used to underline the environmental components of teacher development. The study’s main finding is that how teachers understood the concept of inclusive education influenced how they taught student teachers about inclusivity in ESD context.