Schooling of metallly disable students included into the final grades of elementary school: a study about families’ expectations

Abstract

This paper resulted from a research carried out along a Mastership Course in Education (Federal University of Santa Maria) developed in 2007. Four families in which there are mental disable students participated in this study. The students are included in the final grades of elementary school in a state school in Santa Maria. The study consists in a descriptive qualitative research. This work aimed at investigating about families’, with mental disable children, expectations relation to their children’s schooling process; understanding familiar processes of schooling mobilization by revealing routines that can be helpful to their mental disable children. A semi-structured interview, which was answered by the students’ mothers, was used as a technique to collect data. According to the families’ speeches, it is possible to affirm that they attribute an important symbolic value to the school. However, in relation to the schooling expectations, there are elements pointing to singularities considering what they expect from their children schooling process. It is also possible to perceive that this singularity in also present in the way families move on to their children schooling process and it does not occur isolated, but it is supported by the school where the students study. Besides revealing the relation between the families and their children schooling process, the research shows that the families need financial, material, emotional, symbolic and informative support so that they can contribute in a positive way to the schooling inclusion.